De-Atomization Is the Secret to Happiness (2022)

This is why I never focus on just one thing at a time. When I'm doing a standup with my team, they also see me make a sandwich on Zoom. I never just "meet up" with people. If we're meeting up, it'll be at the gym or at least on a city walk, so I can repark my car. Dinner dates are dull. I take my dates to Macy's to help me pick out shirts. Never miss an opportunity to integrate!

The way many approach vacation and travel seems to exhibit this "atomization."

There is a lot of list-making, going to very specific coordinates, taking pictures, and attempts to live out the experiences that others have documented. I'm not fully innocent of this.

I've learned that knowing someone local and having them show you what they like about their location, or paying someone (although it's hard to get guides to go off script), is usually much more rewarding for me.

I think it's a valid viewpoint (I'm not sure I'd go as far as claiming it is the secret to happiness), but have other interpretations.

I think the examples can be cases of "checkbox-ticking", and not considering enough the whole experience of your life. Like, being fit for being fit seems quite pointless. Being healthy is a nice goal. But the point of being fit or healthy should be so you can explore the world and do and see all the things that are worth doing and seeing and feeling enabled by your fitness. It's not just to be fit or get a girl/boyfriend.

I think the, almost tautological, assertion should be: Meaning is the secret to Meaning. If you spend your life checking boxes, you will miss on experiences and associated meaning. Having a meal just to satiate your hunger is probably the worse reason to have a meal. Better to have a meal so you can do things and stay healthy (and satiate your hunger). Better yet, if you so enjoy, to have a meal to enjoy the amazing world of tastes and textures of good food (and satiate your hunger and stay healthy to do stuff in the process). It's not just about glueing stuff together ("de-atomization"), but about actually valuing meaning and experiences, and not just checkboxes. I think better said: you should treat your life (and really the whole cosmos that includes the lives of others and assisting others) as a canvas to be filled with fulfilling, rich, deep, etc. experiences -- curate your inner world.

Who cares if you did check off that box, be fit, have X amount of money in the bank, etc..

Now, de-atomization seems like a decent heuristic simply because "box-ticking" and doing things for reasons other than them contributing to make your life meaningful is likely to make them atomized (like, box-ticking weakly implies atomization). But just because a task is single-purpose does not mean it does not contribute to meaning in your life: maybe you really need to focus on your job, go to the gym to stay healthy, etc. (atomization doesn't imply meaninglessness). And I applaud making things that are otherwise dull enjoyable, by say listening to music while you do it, or other imaginative ways.

Sometimes you just have to chop wood and carry water though, and that's fine.

"Life and fitness used to be deeply intertwined. You could not live without fitness. Now they are separate"

Say that to a Vizier in 700 AD. He was very flabby, no doubt.

This applies to learning as well. I find when I learn with an actual context for learning and its not just 'learning time' I usually have a much better time.

“De-atomization” calls to mind ikigai, where you find an avocation that fulfills multiple purposes of what’s good for you, your family, the world while making use of your talents.

It’s different, though. Because I imagine someone who does a hard job they hate, getting fit in the process and leaving work at work when they come home to the family they’re supporting, is more characteristic of the de-atomized person OP has in mind.

Another concept that comes to mind is the idea of “balancing” personal needs of work, friends, family, mind, body, social, spiritual, etc. A lot of literature will suggest that you “set aside time a d attention for each of these in your week” and might point out that you can fulfill multiple at once, but seldom talks about the VIRTUE of activities that specifically fulfill multiple at once.

(2022)