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10/5/25:


As we’re hitting the fall, I’ve always personally considered this to be my new year moment. The weather mellows out, kids and adults are going back to school and classes are starting back up for a lot of people. Everyone is back from vacation and working on earning their holiday money, and it just feels like the right time to give a life change a “test run” so to speak, in the last few months of the year with the holidays serving as great breaks to pace myself. And once I’m in the groove of whatever I’m doing, I have gained enough momentum to much more easily keep myself going for the new year, or I have time to rework what I’m doing to something more manageable. Of course, I don’t have the strict “start date” that January 1st does which is very good for me! I’m sure other people would feel different on that, but I like the buffer of time to just muse and workshop my ideas of change and rebirth before I get in there and start.

Recently, I’m giving more serious thoughts to what it means to be “anti-social media”, “anti-current web”, and a digital minimalist. Years ago when I first joined Neocities, I thought I was solid in what those things were, and my focus was pretty zeroed into criticizing large social media companies and the role they’ve taken in shaping….almost everything, in some way. I was frustrated with it and I needed a place not just as an alternative, but to vent my frustrations and find others who feel the same. I don’t think I feel differently, but I do have different priorities and I’d like to think I’m getting a bit more nuanced in how I see this stuff. I can’t bring myself to hate modern technology, because it does so many great things, but I’m certainly making advancements in my journey to figure out my own way of using it. I think I can be very sensitive to a lot of things social media and technology brings, and I have been trying for a long time to sort of have my cake and eat it too about it, because I honestly think that is a possible thing.

Of course, much of what I’m going to do and already do is being shaped by the ADHD thing. It always is. But there’s a certain clarity I get around this time of year that I don’t want to waste out of being cautious to my learning disability. I get a bit more reclusive around this time, too, which is crazy since I’m already pretty closed off to people mostly by choice, but this season and following winter has so many social events and gatherings it’s hard for me not to save my minuscule social energy for these times. This is strangely the months where I am oddly reminded that I do indeed have a social life irl! You’d think summer would have more of this, but I suppose the free-form nature of planning social meetings during it are just not suited for the people I know. To be fair, I haven’t reached out myself, the times I was outside at protest events or even just for a walk have me sort of regretting it because of how gross and sweaty I feel. I don’t mind being like that alone, but with other people around I just get insecure.

One of the things I’ve been looking around for is adequate replacements for the social media I used to really love. And current, if you count tumblr. Can tumblr and pinterest really be replaced by something more mentally healthy and productive? Can I honestly recreate the feeling of enjoying pretty pictures, planning out personal projects and simply soaking in and enjoying my interests in a way that is actually good for me and actually scratches that itch? I think so, but it has been a subject of my thoughts for a long time now. I know I don’t really use either very socially, I think I’ve always been a bit awkward about these things from day one, which for both was about 15 years ago now, tumblr for sure being the oldest social media besides gaia that I still use. Honestly, that is crazy. I think if someone told me I would still be using those things over 10 years after the fact, I would have tried to cut them off. Something about the idea of being such an old head on those things doesn’t feel right to me. I don’t think I would feel the same about a forum or blog, things I would spend time talking to other people or just writing and coding myself. Those things make sense, as being proud of their age, there’s even a stronger sense of ownership with those. This is why I don’t really mind the still being on gaia thing even though I’ve been there longer. To me, that feels more like a social experience and I have a lot of options and stuff to do. Older websites kinda had that, where you could engage in multiple things instead of being zeroed into a single feed. But these single-feed spaces feel more like a drug to me than a fun online facet of my social life. In fact, I think that’s sort of the plan in these places. Tumblr is less bad about this for sure, but all pinterest really does socially is perhaps the messsaging system and comment system on pins, which are still limited in how long the comment is. Instead, it feels like it’s just letting you look at what people like just enough to have that sting of peer pressure and subconscious understanding of “this is what people are liking now, and this is what’s normal now” to make you shape how you approach your own interests and how you measure yourself. Of course, as of late pinterest is just ai and ads, so I haven’t used it in a long time and I can’t help but miss it during it’s glory days. Tumblr has only just begun to feel like more of an echo chamber that thinks it’s not an echo chamber, still with great art and quotes and funny text posts to look at, but I’m really wondering if seeing a long feed of images I haven’t seen before is really all that great, or needed, or good for me. I used to look through so many books and magazines and get inspired to make my own things, but after finding the beautiful reblog button I did that less and less. It’s like the repin and reblog buttons sort of hijacked that amazing feeling of trying something cool yourself. I was safe from all boredom, wrapped in inspiration, with no other action taken besides a series of clicks. At first, it felt the same as making the recipe or painting the picture myself. “I’ll do this later when I have time!” I said while wasting said time on my feed. Until eventually my blog and everyone elses became more of a symbol of who we are, and more importantly a symbol of the people we would be if we weren’t wasting it reblogging. Now it feels like each of my blogs and pinboards are just scrapbooks of pretty pictures and nice ideas, all telling a slightly different but ultimately fictional story. At best I’m taking the values from every quote and infographic but in the end my boards are no longer a guide but a type of daydream I’m experiencing on a digital plane. I don’t think this is going to lead to many good things in my life, because doing it for years hasn’t done nearly as much as well, doing something else, probably would have.

But what is the better way to do all this? Does that even exist? I’m trying to see if it does. I’ve spent years getting here so I think it’s fair that it may take years to polish things out. I don’t mind, it’s becoming a huge focus of mine and I think the effort is worth doing. It’s going to be a re-haul of my entire lifestyle, which is tricky, but can be done at my own pace. Personally, as a bit of an addict to such changes, I’m a little excited. I know I am ready and have wanted this for a while. I’m also aware that this is much more becoming more like myself then it is becoming another person.

This is a bit of a long-ass introduction like usual, but I was hoping I could list a few things I’m putting into the strategy:

Notion: I’m shocked at how much I like this right now because I’ve tried this app before and didn’t really mesh with it. I barely remember why, but it was probably due to lack of understanding and to be honest lack of just plain using it for anything. I probably thought this app was something different than it is. The only downside is the looming fear I will run out of space on my free account. I really hope I can avoid paying, because paying for things like this on a MONTHLY basis just makes me nervous, I don’t really buy digital things unless a totally must, and I really do not have the money for it anyways. I would hate to hit my limit before I figured out if this is actually going to be worth the purchase. But past this issue I really do like the ease of use and versatility of it. I probably said before, but despite the excess of good reviews about Obsidian I just can’t seem to really enjoy using it and I think the learning curve just isn’t worth the time and energy for what I can see it do. I may just need to come back to it one day, but no one is using obsidian the way I would be. Notion is great about letting you make what resembles a webpage or homepage where you can insert a lot of different things with many layout possibilities. I love this, because I can not only make something useful but visually pleasing. I can interact if I need to, to journal or change information or whatever, and I love that you can insert things like RSS feeds and music playlists, and overall if someone was trying to make a page that was a vision board, or a place to check on their favorite websites, or all the information needed to start a new hobby or project, that could be done here. I am a bit bummed I can’t just throw and drag around images on the pages like Milanote, but I can make it through lol. I like being able to create lists with all the bells and whistles. I can tell this is more for those in school or doing work collabs, but I think I can still work with this nicely. I love the idea of making a “landing page” for myself that I go to before anywhere else and perhaps even exclusively. I want to be able to put a select few feeds from blogs I enjoy on a single page, so I can check it and be done with, no getting lost from distractions. I like having a page where I can sort of grab what centers me back to my personal goals in case I struggle to feel motivated. I also like the idea of the more practical elements of my life on a single spot I can check off, and generally keep track of while also making pages that help me keep my hobbies and interests a priority. Often I can get distracted when I look for something in relation to say, making a website layout, or just some sort of practical thing I’m looking for and I would hope this sort of helps me reduce that. I also just love the idea of a personal digital notebook where I can collect my thoughts and reviews on stuff, my lists of things I plan to consume like movies and books, and if I choose to, I can publish those things publicly later on this website. It’s like a private homepage and I do genuinely yearn to organize things like this. I want to look at all the lists of stuff to watch, to read, and games to play, and feel excited to check off that box and make my own little review, or just look at how much I’ve enjoyed in my checked off lists and how great it is to be able to enjoy these things. I want that part of my brain to be more put together for the sake of being more productive at enjoying myself. Somehow when I organize things like this instead of going by the seat of my pants it’s like I can process what’s happening to me better, and it feels more real and less forgettable. I don’t want my life to be so forgettable anymore, because it’s so much better than it used to be, and because I really like having a clearer mind. Notion is at the core of what I plan to do to make this all happen. It might seem insane to some people that I’m putting so much thought into all of this, but this is years of growing I’m catching up with. It has to be this intense and meticulous.

RSS feeds: The humble RSS feed has been around for a while and has been wrongfully ignored by too many people! To be fair, there is no money in caring about RSS feeds if you’re a company, which is why it’s so important to remember today. Cutting out the design of the websites it’s taking from is a must when trying to minimize distraction. I don’t want to lose the joy of getting to read what a person is up to at the moment, and I love to read blogs, I don’t want to give that up! But the way I do it needs to change. With all due respect to the amazing layouts people are making these days, I need to just see the text for now. I also love that this can stop me from ever logging into a place like tumblr. It’s a win-win for me, and with embedding feeds into pages on notion, I can have different feeds for different types of content, while keeping things minimal enough. I love too that unless I’m just going crazy with a bunch of feeds, I should be done checking the feed quickly enough to get back to what I was doing for the day. I have so much respect for this web classic!

Internet Archive: I’ve been spending a lot of time reading books and magazines on the internet archive, and as someone who likes a lot of older things, such as books from the 70’s and the 90’s, I’m finding something interesting to read here all the time. I’ve really been into interior design books from around the late 80’s and early 90’s recently, and any old craft magazine is usually interesting to me. I think going through the old records of the stuff that’s made our current cultures is a really great way to embrace nostalgia. Also, the format of searching for and through collections is kinda how I allow myself to jump from thing to thing in a controlled setting, I might have multiple craft magazines from the 70’s that I’m in the middle of but for me that’s better than seeing a totally new thing in less than a second over and over again in a feed. It’s hard to describe, but I hope that sort of makes sense. I also just think anywhere with a bunch of free reading material (that isn’t just like...ai or clickbait garbage I suppose) is usually a good thing.

Free Books! As in, anywhere I can get a free book from. Of course the first place is checking the library, which is extra goated because there’s more than just books for free there! But I especially love that I can read magazines for free and get those huge hardback expensive art books that cost way too damn much for me to ever afford otherwise. And obviously that’s why Libby is equally great. However, places like zlib are wonderful too, for what I can’t otherwise find or simply want to keep. I always consider my time spent reading a book as time that is rarely wasted. What I really want to make sure to do in the near future is have a specific time set aside every day to read, even if it’s just like 20 minutes. Something about the very act of reading a book benefits my mental health a surprising degree.

Wikipedia: Weirdly enough, I like just dicking around in my Wikipedia app. I guess it makes sense knowing when I was a kid I was always on my encyclopedia CD software when I wasn’t typing motherlode in Sims 2. When I need an app to fidget with and pivot my brain into thinking about something else, this is here for that. I love the new quiz game it has now too, even if I suck at it lol. It’s fun to jump around articles, but I honestly just like being able to look up info about everything that comes my way. I like knowing stuff!

Wikihow honorable mention: I want to like wikihow more and use it more often but sometimes it has this half-baked feel that usally just looking things up on reddit will do much better. I still can’t cut it off, because sometimes I really do need a guide to do something everyone else on earth knows how to do.

Streamio and Steam Am I even allowed to mention streamio? Lol oh well. I use both (along with realdebrid, might as well mention that too...and soulseek) to enjoy games, movies, shows, music, and all that stuff. I don’t really have a problem with me watching stuff or video games really getting out of hand these days, and actually I prefer I do stuff with these instead of the endless scroll. I would love to spend more of my free time getting through my ever growing “to watch” list more, honestly, because there’s a lot of stuff there I know I would love if I actually got to watching it. I definitely struggle with that type of executive dysfunction that stops someone from doing things they love and enjoy. It’s frustrating that I have to actually push myself to do these.

Pomodoro study with me videos: Make no mistake, I am downloading these videos to make a very long playlist I can play anywhere and reuse. Since my tv in my room is not really good at connecting to youtube or streaming services without taking forever and messing up because it’s getting in on it’s years pretty badly, I only use it for my switch and I have a flash drive I put downloaded videos on. I currently run those videos in the background in some way, either on my tv, my tablet, or laptop, depending on what I’m doing. It’s nice! I need it to keep track of time better but I also use it to remember to take small breaks or to fit in a short amount of time doing something like cleaning, meditating, or stretching. I don’t always have it going since sometimes I’m watching stuff or just not in my room lol, but it’s been a great asset for most of my down time at home being spent wisely. Sometimes I have the music ones, and sometimes I just like rain sounds.

Google Calendar and Keep Notes: Nothing new, I just wanted to say how much I love these things and can’t seem to find anything free that comes close! I use these daily for everything I need to schedule. I most love the ability to schedule tasks to do at a certain time vs a scheduled appointment. I actually have a few types of task lists that I use; bills, social, and everything else. It’s perfect because I will actually have the task remain undone until I check it off instead of if I had it like an appointment which will disappear. It’s a simple but effective idea, I may not get to my task at once, but I still have it set in a spot I can remember to get to it once I have time. Sometimes I have to reschedule, too. I love that I can put a time to do things like answer texts and emails or make calls in the future where I am able to stop worrying about having to do it, but also won’t worry about forgetting to do it. If I get the idea that I want to say, call my parents about something I wanted to ask them but it’s too late at night to do it right then, I can schedule doing that and probably get over a lot of the nervousness I get before I talk to people. Everything can be scheduled at my own very precise pace without much trouble, and that’s really wonderful in taking a lot of my stress away and letting me live a normal life despite my very abnormal self. Keep notes is also just a great way for my husband and I to keep up with our grocery list together and know when the other just got something or to see what we both need in case we want to grab something while either of us are out, since he works nights and I work days, it gives us a way to keep up with all of this without having to call and wake up the other lol. Getting our shopping done on our short weekend together takes up too much time! I honestly feel like anyone who doesn’t have like school or kids or something probably doesn’t really need more than these two things to keep up with their life. I’m just kinda being extra in the grand scheme of things lol.

So far, that’s really it. Already this seems like a lot because it’s supposed to be more about letting myself be a bit bored enough to either do the fun things of quality that I like to do, or the things I’ve just been needing to do such as organizing and decluttering. Sometimes, I’m going to hit that point where the only things that sound interesting to me are the things I’m trying to stop doing, and I’ll just have to sit, maybe even lie down and let myself be bored and unmotivated to do anything other than what I can’t. This is okay. It’s probably going to be a sign of a bigger need such as sleep or I just need to be active to get out the extra energy. I’ve always responded well to walking and I plan to do it more, and a short nap here and there might be what I need to better process my emotions and help when I’m overstimulated. Of course I want to spend time with this website, but I think I’m going to cut back on generally websurfing for what could be an asset to the site and just focus on making stuff from scratch until I hit an honest roadblock. I have a lot of fun working on here, but I know it can quickly become a source of disdain if I let comparison steal my joy from it or hold myself to a high standard. I hold no illusions, what I have here isn’t a web design marvel or a lit student’s musings, it’s just a blog that I like to write very long blogs in. But for me, it’s great to see just how extensive my mind is...or something like that. It’s quantity surprises me because I didn’t think there was that much to...me, just me. I like seeing it grow, and change, and refine. It’s my web room that reflects a lot of who I am. But I think my goal for this, especially with my Notion pages, is to have an offline version of that and to grow that part of me that fills up the pages. I’m just trying to actually do stuff and be a person actively experiencing the things they love. Maybe you are too. Maybe if I live more like this I’ll be compelled to make wonderful things. Maybe I’ll grow. Let’s see what happens together. If you’re trying your best, consider yourself alongside me in this walk we’re taking.