What happened when I turned my TV and video time into 'time for myself'.
I finished dinner.
"I worked hard today."
I mutter that to no one in particular.
I feel a little peckish.
Since I'm on a diet, I nibble on just one end of a dried sweet potato instead of a snack.
……Since it's just the end, I feel like it has fewer calories.
Of course, there's no such convenient truth.
I turn on the TV.
On a travel show, a dinner at a hot spring inn is being laid out.
I watch it while nibbling on my dried sweet potato.
It's quite a monk-like experience.
A commercial comes on.
This time, I open my smartphone.
Recommended videos stream one after another.
Cats.
Jazz.
History.
Ramen.
Cats.
Before I know it, I'm watching both the TV and the videos.
...What on earth am I watching?
No, even before that,
I'm not really watching either of them.
At that moment, it suddenly occurred to me.
'Will these two hours leave anything for the me of tomorrow?'
Of course, I like television.
I also like YouTube.
So I don't intend to make them the bad guys.
When I watch a travel show, I want to go on a trip.
When I watch a cooking show, I feel like a chef.
When I watch a professional baseball broadcast, for some reason, I feel like the manager.
Human beings are truly busy creatures.
However, when the next morning comes,
I can't remember what I watched yesterday.
I only remember the inn.
I also remember that the dinner was luxurious.
And yet, the name of the show itself doesn't come to mind.
It seems my memory is dominated by my appetite.
One day, I thought,
'Is this just me?'
So I decided to look into it.
Then, I came across an interesting theory.
It is a theory called
'Desirable Difficulties'
by Professor Robert A. Bjork,
a cognitive psychologist at UCLA.
It has a difficult name,
but what it says is surprisingly relatable.
People tend to remember things longer if they
struggle a little to understand them,
think about them for themselves,
or try to recall them,
rather than information that enters the brain easily.
I found this strangely convincing.
Watching videos is not bad in itself.
However,
if you are just watching them mindlessly,
your brain thinks,
'Well, this is information I can forget eventually.'
And it just lets it slip away.
It seems they think of it as just about that.
On the other hand,
reading books,
thinking,
writing notes,
writing novels,
and composing music.
This is a bit troublesome.
Because it is troublesome,
the brain also,
'This seems worth remembering.'
gets serious.
The human brain,
might be unexpectedly lazy.
Since then, I,
have changed how I spend my evenings just a little.
It's not that I don't watch TV at all.
I watch videos too.
However,
'time spent watching aimlessly'
I reduced it a little.
Instead,
I open a book.
I write a note.
I write a novel.
I create music with AI.
Then, strangely enough,
the nights became shorter.
No,
the time is the same,
but the content has become richer.
Come to think of it,
the things I have created this past year,
were almost all born at night.
Note articles.
Full-length novels.
Songs published on YouTube.
That time,
was not because I had any special talent.
The two hours I spent watching TV,
I only borrowed thirty minutes.
As we get older,
'It's too late'
is a phrase I hear often.
But lately,
I've been thinking something a little different.
It's not that it's too late.
The night,
is still there.
If you have two hours,
you can read thirty pages of a book.
You can write, too.
You can play the piano, too.
You can learn English, too.
Of course,
you can also eat the ends of dried sweet potatoes.
Life,
unexpectedly,
might just be made up of the accumulation of such small moments.
So tonight, too,
Before I pick up the TV remote,
I think I'll open a book instead.
While nibbling on the end of a dried sweet potato.
#note #LifeReignition #Senior #60s #SelfActualization #Reading #CognitivePsychology #HabitFormation #Learning #AI
【Another challenge started in my 60s】
As part of reigniting my life, I am also working on writing novels.
I am currently publishing a legendary mystery novel on TALES.
It is a slightly different world from note, but this is also an important creative activity for me.
If you are interested, please take a look.
▼ TALES work page
(Link)