2012 (Rosy Retrospection)
I roll over in bed as I hear the alarm clock on my iPhone ringing. It's 7:30 AM on December 11th, 2012. Supposedly, the world will end tomorrow.
I unlock my phone to see notifications from a few things I missed overnight. Not much seemed to happen while I was asleep. I briefly check instagram and see a few new posts. Then twitter. Not much has been happening in my circles since I went to bed.
The smell of freshly brewed coffee starts to make its way into my room as I set my phone aside. "Modern life is so convenient!" I think think to myself while patting myself on the back for remembering to set the coffee maker to automatically brew this morning.
After a quick breakfast, I get in the car and start my commute to work. I bought the new Rush album Clockwork Angles on the iTunes store this weekend, so I plug my phone in to the Aux port and rock out on my way to work.
The office is lively today, just as it is every day, so this detail doesn't really stick out to me, but it was a little difficult finding a parking spot!
On my walk in, I swing by my colleague's office to chat about the weekend's Barclays Premier League results, as both of us love playing soccer. I gloated about the opportunity to watch Arsenal beat Spurs live this weekend, while my colleague's club Chelsea wasn't shown on TV. In lieu of televised soccer, he proceeded to tell me about his exploits in his weekend pickup game.
After work, I need to decompress, so I turn on pandora radio and plug in my earbuds. I love to spend this time of the day reading a post from my favorite blog or catching up on e-mail conversations with friends from a far. But I begin to grow frustrated by pandora's recommended songsāmostly radio hitsānot the deep tracks I've found listening to my favorite albums cover-to-cover, so I switch back to my iTunes library.
Next, I log on to YouTube and search for the Chelsea highlights my colleague was telling me about. After the video ends, I look over to my clock and see it's only 6 PM! I don't yet realize it, but I'm really enjoying being in control of my evening.
Now it's time to call some friends and see if anyone has plans after dinner. The finale of the second season of Game of Thrones is tonight and I'm interested in watching.
They come over, we watch the episode, and the chat for a few hours before calling it a night.
Before bed, I crack open the book I just got from Barnes and Noble and read.
As I peacefully fall asleep, I completely forget that the world is supposed to end tomorrow, for I am too in-touch with my physical world to worry about things like that which are outside of my control.
A Note from the Author
Was 2012 actually this good, or are we just remembering the past through rose-tinted glasses?
When I look back, I remember 2012 as a special year. Not because we actually owned our own music, but because we owned our attention.
Do you remember a time when it wasn't possible to binge watching a show? In 2012, you probably would have needed to go to the store, purchase a box set of the show you want to binge, and play DVD after DVD after DVD until finishing the show.
In 2012, there was much more friction to do nearly everything. We had to drive to the store to buy something, we had to purchase a song to listen to it, we had to search for a video to play it, and to leave work we had to get into the car and drive home. Information and novelty was plentiful, but required some effort to get itājust enough effort to force us to spend our time intentionally.
Chris Williamson has a theory that around 2012, there was a perfect balance of informationāenough to stay informed without being overwhelming.
Compare this to 2025āa frictionless world of abundance.
Our brain has not yet evolved to cope with this wealth of information. Biologically, we assume that information is scarce and are rewarded for novelty.
In the modern world, so much willpower and intentional life design is required to truly be in control of our attentionāthe one resource we have that everyone else in the world is vying for.
Awareness that we aren't in control is an essential step in taking back ownership of our attention.