Unplug for a “Secular Sabbath”

Self-described “techno-addict” Mark Bittman (who sleeps with his laptop on his night table to check email first and last thing) decided to unplug every weekend for 24 hours, a day he calls “secular Sunday.” At first the experiment made him twitchy and nervous, but over time, he came to enjoy his unplugged day. He writes:

I would no more make a new-agey call to find inner peace than I would encourage a return to the mimeograph. But I do believe that there has to be a way to regularly impose some thoughtfulness, or at least calm, into modern life—or at least my version. Once I moved beyond the fear of being unavailable and what it might cost me, I experienced what, if I wasn’t such a skeptic, I would call a lightness of being. I felt connected to myself rather than my computer. I had time to think, and distance from normal demands. I got to stop.

Like other geeks, on my recent vacation I also found that unplugging does bring about a calm you can’t find in your RSS reader. Good night, secular Sunday. See you next week.