Isolating oneself from outside distractions to help concentration is nothing new - libraries have provided quiet places for studying for aeons.
How is typewriter any different than fullscreen text editor? You can have a quiet room with a computer no?
What I'm saying is, if they don't work on themselves, a physical device won't help long term imo. Eventually they will land back on distractions.
By way of analogy, learning to swim in calm waters helps you learn to swim in rough waters by giving you the experience of what swimming is even like.
Should you not rather train yourself not to be distracted by the noise like you train yourself not to be distracted by notifications?
Edit: but one thing that is incredibly important is partitioning your workspace. Perform work where work should be performed and keep that separate from where you automatically do leisure activities or seek out pleasurable distractions.
Make it easy to be good isn't just a parenting precept, it works to manage yourself as a mature adult as well.
There's no need to throw the baby out with the bathwater. I'm empathetic to the people that feel like they can't focus in commercial operating systems, but their only option is to adapt or fall off. Making MacOS or Windows into a usable and non-distracting environment is basically the only way I have been able to make money in the tech industry. If I told my boss I was switching to a typewriter for efficiency purposes, I'd be gone before the end of the day.
Again - for personal use, go crazy. Nostalgic stuff is fun! This is not a solution for 90% of the workforce though and I would argue that relying on a typewriter for isolation is harming your professional prospects. Apply to any job and compare the reactions you get bringing your typewriter to the first interview with the reactions you get from bringing your laptop.
If you don't care about the way people perceive you, how productive you are, how accessible your work is or how error-proof your product is, maybe a typewriter is for you. I cannot imagine a practical application (even casually) where you would benefit from a typewriter over a word processor and inkjet printer. I say this as someone with a typewriter not 20 feet away from where I'm standing now; they suck.
Is that a personal problem, or a computer one though? Many people (myself included) have zero issue ignoring Twitter and Instagram while we work. In fact, typing on a computer is much easier than using a typewriter for a number of reasons:
- Don't need to buy ink ribbons or paper to continue typing
- Don't need to stop and switch out stamps to change your typeset
- Can infinitely reproduce a single document as many times as you want
- No white-out or paper strips required when you make a mistake
I don't know if you've ever used a typewriter before, but it should simply be common knowledge that it's the slower and more distracting way to type. Every second you spend using a typewriter instead of getting comfortable with a computer is wasted effort. Every time you take your typewriter apart to make a simple change, that's time you could be spending writing uninterrupted on a digital medium.
Then it's not for you, continue using a computer. It's a personal problem solved by the use of a single purpose technology rather than a multipurpose one, as I've initially stated.
I have used a typewriter and while it can be slower than a computer, some wasted time is better than wasting all one's time because one can't focus and distracts themselves instead. Sounds like you still simply don't get it, and I'm not sure how I can explain it further as I've restated my points several times now that those who use it can't focus when writing on computers.
Also, having a physical copy of your work >feels< safer.
Also found this in a quick search, basically an ereader + keyboard: https://getfreewrite.com/products/freewrite-traveler
People need all sorts of excuses to just calm their mind and say it’s some disorder.
But I’ve literally never met someone who genuinely tried meditation and it didn’t help them.
I used to run a meditation group at work and the dozen or so people who consistently showed up reported that it changed their life. And I’m no expert I just do breathwork and concentration on a single object like a red dot sticker.
They rather use medication or spend money buying gadgets and toys.
Oh well. Not my problem when the solution is literally built in.
Get off your high horse. My brain is literally, physically, developed wrong. It's broken. I need treatment, medication, therapy, not a fucking meditation tape. Not that meditation is bad or wrong or worthless, because I used to like it, but it's not medicine.
Do you also insist people with bad vision just try looking harder? Maybe squint a little bit more? Who needs glasses, the fix is built right in!