What's your question? You know the first question that you ask someone when you meet/greet them. In Australia, it's "how you going?" In the US, it's usually "how are you?" Though in San Francisco these days, it is more likely: "how's your start up?" I like to ask "what surprised you today?" People have to stop and think and it starts a different conversation- try it!
In the middle of last year, I noticed something new. When I spoke to colleagues and friends by phone, skype or email, their first question was "Where are you now?" This question shift was unexpected, because I have been on the move for the last couple of years as an ecosystem diplomat and for OpenQRS. Yet something about that movement shifted last year.
So, I took time to reflect on where I had been in 2014. I had the great fortune to work with and visit colleagues, family, friends and friends who are like family in 21 cities across 7 countries. I clocked in with 88 days in San Francisco, sometimes referred to as home; 50 of those were before March 1 and 5 of the remainder were spent on jury duty.
In the middle of last year, I noticed something new. When I spoke to colleagues and friends by phone, skype or email, their first question was "Where are you now?" This question shift was unexpected, because I have been on the move for the last couple of years as an ecosystem diplomat and for OpenQRS. Yet something about that movement shifted last year.
So, I took time to reflect on where I had been in 2014. I had the great fortune to work with and visit colleagues, family, friends and friends who are like family in 21 cities across 7 countries. I clocked in with 88 days in San Francisco, sometimes referred to as home; 50 of those were before March 1 and 5 of the remainder were spent on jury duty.
It seems in hindsight that 'no rest for the weary' was the theme of 2014, I averaged 1 week in a place and spent almost 1/7 of the year going to/from somewhere. I was in transit for > 280 hours! That is 7 weeks of 40 hour work weeks in transit by plane, train or car. And that doesn't include walking and commutes with Metro, Tube, Subway, UBahn, BART!
This exercise prompted me to reflect on the cost of transit time. Transit is not all a loss of work time. Long flights remain one of my favorite places to get work done-- though airplane mode laser focus is increasingly threatened by wifi accessible flights.
The question is prompted was: If I spend time this much time in transit, what do I not have time for as a result? There are lots of ways that we lose time: facebook, abyss of discovering cool things we didn't know about before on internet, driving, TV, commutes, games, etc. We can bring attention to these pockets of lost/hidden time. My friend Jan Stewart tweets #deepdive then meditates on her tram ride to/from work- an awesome practice.
I love life on the move; though in 2015, I anticipate longer stays. Most of all, I am excited to experiment with creative ways to spend transit time. Like this travel meditation video that I made for Adobe's #givethanks campaign, A Bird's Eye View & Accidental Intimacies.
So my questions to you:
1) What question do you ask others?
... Change it up in 2015 and let me know how it goes.
2) What would your infographic of time spent in 2014 look?
... Do you want that to be different in 2015? If so, what will you do differently?
P.S. This post was written in San Francisco where I have been since the 1st of January. And I don't have plans to go anywhere....yet.
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The tools that I used for this post: infographic adapted from a Piktochart; stats/map from Travellerspoint; Bird's Eye made with Voice ipad app.
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