24/6: The Power of Unplugging One Day a Week

[poppy music]

Good Morning, everyone.

It is my pleasure, I'm Vera Titunik,

I'm features editor for WIRED magazine,

and it is my pleasure to introduce the

Shlain Goldberg family today.

This is a family that has really some technology

credibility on this stage.

Tiffany Schlain is a digital native,

she's a filmmaker, she was a founder of the Webbie Awards.

Ken Goldberg is a roboticist at UC Berkeley,

he's a co-founder of the Berkeley AI research lab,

and he has a lot of academic distinctions

that are too numerous to name.

Odessa, their oldest daughter is 16,

and right before and I mean right before

we came on the stage, she was teaching robotics

to teenagers, and here,

we have Bluma, and she is 10.

And that means she has more tech savvy

than just about anybody in this room.

[laughing]

So, but it's not their tech credibility

that we're here to talk about today,

or at least not in the way that we might think.

Tiffany has talked a lot about technology

and also has said the power of technology

is that you can also turn it off,

and that's what we're here to talk about today,

because this family has accomplished something

that I find kind of incredible, which is that

for the past 10 years, for an entire decade,

once a week for 24 hours, they unplug.

There's no telephones, which we discovered

just a few minutes ago

when we were trying to figure out where these two were.

There's no Netflix, there's no Instagram,

there's no TikTok, and I didn't grow up with those

kinda distractions, but I find it impossible

to live without them for even a couple of hours,

and I'm sure that some of you in your audience

are feeling your phones and kind of wanting

to grab them right now, and you understand that feeling, too

but um, you managed to do it.

And that's what we're gonna talk about today.

And Tiffany has recently written a book,

called 24/6, The Power of Unplugging One Day A Week,

and this practice that you do as a family,

you call Tech Shabbat, and we're gonna talk about that

and about how you came to this practice,

and the particulars of that, and there will be

time for audience questions.

We're gonna have about 10 minutes at the end of this

so you can ask questions, and look,

before we get into the specifics and how you actually

make this happen, I wanted to ask you, Tiffany,

just to explain a little bit about,

first of all, why you'd call it Tech Shabbat

and how you came to decide to do this practice

and do it in your family.

Yeah, we are Jewish, and

but we're not religious, and actually,

the only people that I really knew that did a full day

of rest, which is really what Shabbat is about,

were really Orthodox Jews,

but about ten years ago, in a period of days,

my father died and Bluma was born,

and Ken and I really wanted to change

the way that we were living, 'cause you never know, right?

Life's short and everyone's staring at their phones

all the time, and when I first met Ken,

he did graduate school in Israel, which he can talk about

where the whole country shuts down for Shabbat,

and it made a real impression on him,

so he did do that when we first met,

but then the smartphone kind of blurred that line

for everyone, so when my dad died and Bluma was born,

we started, we're part of this organization called

Reboot that did a national day of unplugging,

and we did it, and we were like, we need to do this

every week, it felt so good.

So it's been, the best thing I think we've ever done,

that's what I would say, on how much it's brought back

into our lives, and we love technology, clearly.

We're not anti-tech, but it's just been

a great practice, weekly practice I'd say.

So Ken, when this came up, you didn't object,

you didn't have trouble turning off your phone,

turning off your robots?

It's still a little tricky, I have to say.

The idea is, we're not orthodox in the sense of

turning off all, like we don't touch technology.

We drive, we use a landline, turn the lights on and off,

but we don't, we just try and stay away from work,

and to my mind, that was the biggest thing was

just that I got a day without feeling guilty,

that I had work to do, which was really,

in grad school was constantly pressure.

So, and then, interestingly, we've found that

we're much more productive on Sunday

as a result of having a day off.

So, Tiffany's idea was to say, okay,

let's tie it around technology and screens,

which is really interesting because that's,

that is actually today, so much of work is connected

to that and also all this other, these obligations around

social media and other things that constantly pull

our attention, but if you let go of that

for a day, it's just very refreshing, ultimately.

And even, leisure starts to feel like work.

I think, what you mentioned, Instagram,

like posting and filters and copy,

everything feels tied to stress in some way.

So to bring it back to what does a day of rest

mean in the 21st century, and for us,

it means the screens, which are such a mixture of everything

coming at you news, and FOMO, and work,

and some good stuff, too, from friends,

but you could easily just talk to them

on the phone if you needed to,

but really just take a day of off.

But you talk about screens, why,

I mean, I can imagine you can read a book on a screen,

you can read a book as a book,

you can do a crossword on paper.

We allow, their Kindle.

Kindles are allowed, the old kind of kindle,

I mean, just like all you can do is read.

Yeah, because I spend most of my day

[Tiffany] on Saturdays usually reading. Same with Bluma.

So it doesn't, let me ask you, you're 16.

Are you unusual among your friends

to take this?

Most definitely, not spending, yeah Saturday I spend

relaxing and recharging for the entire week.

Especially my junior year of high school,

it's really important to not do any homework

or anything that involves thinking really hard

during Saturday, and I don't feel any guilt

for not doing an ounce of homework,

all of Friday night to Saturday night.

And you catch up on Sunday?

Yes, I do homework Saturday night and Sunday, too.

So you start doing it on Saturday night.

Yeah, once the sun goes down.

So, is what's good for you the not doing the homework,

or miss being on, what do you do on social media, or?

What do you enjoy about the digital world?

I think it's a mix of, I enjoy being able to

connect with people that I have met at various places,

I have a lot of friends who live far away from me,

and so connecting with them through social media

is really powerful.

I also enjoy all the news I can consume,

and information, things to learn about,

but also the pressure of being available to everyone

on Saturday is a lot.

I'm involved in a lot of

clubs this year, and so not being able,

not having to respond on Saturday is a really nice relief.

Well it's interesting that, and this is a question

for both you guys, you say not having to respond,

but do you ever feel like you're missing things,

or do your friends get mad, what's your?

I mean, since we've been doing it for 10 years,

it's kind of like a given that I will not

be responding on Saturday, yeah.

Is that for you too, Bluma?

How do you feel about Tech Shabbat?

Wait, well yeah. [laughter]

Oh, sorry, that wasn't a very clear question.

Do you not communicate with your friends on Saturday?

Or do you see them in person?

What is Tech Shabbat like for you and your friends.

Well, I usually hang out with you guys

on Tech Shabbat, and then on Sunday,

you can hang out with them.

Well Friday is very social for us,

we always have Shabbat.

So we have people over every Friday night.

It's not a Shabbat if you don't have people over.

Yeah, so we always have a really fun dinner,

we make the same thing every week, so it's very simple,

but Friday's very social, so Friday night,

people come over, we have a big discussion around the table,

and that's the social part, but Saturday is really

it's family day.

We're hanging out, and you know I tell people

in the book if you don't have kids, just like,

just a day to be by yourself.

We're so not used to anymore just having some time

to just be by ourselves and reflect, process,

not be on and available to everyone is a really healthy

practice, I mean every wisdom practice talks about

space for silence, and I think with these devices,

it's just put us in a state of being on all the time.

Yeah, and we're able to do the things

that you'd otherwise feel guilty about,

'cause they take too much time and you could be doing

other things, like we cook really elaborate meals

on Saturdays, and spend just laying down on the couch,

haphazardly, you know?

We space out a lot on Saturdays, and people ask,

I mean sometimes I'll say to people,

think of all the things you wish you had more time to do,

and fill your Tech Shabbat with that,

so already by like Wednesday and Thursday,

I'm putting the articles I don't have time to really read

during the week, cookbooks, art supplies,

the ukelele, whatever it is that I wish I had more time,

a book that I really wanted to read deeply,

'cause we're reading more than ever,

but we're skimreading during the week,

and I always put out the article that I wanna read more

deeply on Saturday.

How do you deal with

do you ever notice that people feel resentful

that you can't be, you can't be reached?

My sister sometimes, is like, I need to,

and I'm like well we have a land line,

I think the people that are always wanting,

you know, we're reachable so many ways,

but I think, I think everyone right now

is ready for some change

around the technology all the time so.

Yeah, like, well yesterday, well me and my friend

wanted to hang out on Sunday but we didn't know,

so then I was like, and then I will,

now well like we hang out a lot on the weekends,

now she just knows to call on the landline,

and I'm like I probably won't be up until 11

'cause I'll be sleeping, 'cause you can sleep.

We sleep so well on tech shabbat,

that's another thing we really do,

all of us sleep, and I have problems sleeping

so this is probably one of the biggest benefits is

we have the deepest nights sleep without the phone near us.

I mean, they don't have the phones near them

the other days, but just knowing that there's no demands

on you, we sleep really deeply.

I have no alarm on.

No alarm on, yeah.

Has this, it seems like this practice

brings you together as a family, is that?

[Together] Yeah.

We spend the most time together, I think,

on Saturdays out of any other day.

Yeah, naps, we just lay back, we go on a bike ride

or a walk or something.

I think that's the thing is

there's a lot of negotiating during the rest of the week,

between all of us, can you get off the screen,

or put down the screen, get off,

I mean I just feel like this one day a week

we're all very with each other

because we're all so distracted.

I'm saying we as in the collective we,

but I think everyone, you just feel like you're being

binged and dinged and

on this day, we're just together and I think we,

it feels so nice to not have something distracting us.

It's really our favorite day of the week.

I mean, I would say, when I have,

you know, there's a handful of times a year where

Ken and I travel for work, or we have something,

or Odessa's got Model UN or something,

if you don't do it, you just feel off the rest of the week.

Yeah, and I now, it's so integral

to how I deal with stress, like next weekend

I know I'm gonna be at Junior State of America,

so I won't have my full Tech Shabbat,

and so I have to prepare for not having that day

to recharge 'cause it's become so

yeah.

Odessa, I assume you're gonna be

going off to college in a couple of years.

Do you think you'll continue this practice on your own?

Yes.

When we were talking with my college counselor

of one of the factors, and I said that one of them

is definitely being able to spend a whole day off of screens

and not having that be an impediment to

my getting around.

Are you gonna cook Friday nights?

[laughing]

Yeah, just a big meal, I don't know.

That might be a little much.

With a little, like a hot plate in your dorm room.

[laughing]

Tiffany, I wanted to ask you,

I saw a TEDTalk that you did back in 2011,

and at that time you were also talking about

Tech Shabbat.

I think we had just started it for a few years.

You were talking then about the internet and how

it was a place where, that could bring people together.

That it was a place where you could make connections

and have that sense, in a way, a sense of community

and togetherness, and I'm wondering how

your view on that has changed, or not changed,

over the past.

It might be a little less optimistic now.

I mean, I still love technology,

but I think in the early days of the Webbie Awards

and probably when I did that TEDTalk it was,

the potential of the internet to connect

people and ideas that couldn't have previously

been connected, but what I never imagined

is walking down the street today, or around tables

and people are so disconnected from

the people right in front of them.

And the ideas that could happen in a conversation

right in front of them but everyone's

staring down at their screens, so I think

one of the reasons, I didn't, I never knew

we were gonna do it this long,

but once we were getting towards the decade,

and people were getting more and more crazy and obsessive

with their screens I was like wow,

we've been doing this thing that

is thousands of years old,

we're just kind of updating it for the 21st century.

It's made things so much better that we have

to share this, and people can't believe

how much our kids love it, and it's like we all need it.

I mean, in the book, there's so much research

coming out now it is not healthy to be on 24/7,

and I feel like we're living as if it's inevitable,

that this is just the way it is,

and I don't think it needs to be that way,

and I think the pendulum has swung so far,

that to just take a moment and go,

when is technology making things better?

When is having my phone not make it better,

and when does it make it worse?

And when should I put that phone away

and when should I turn it off?

'cause there's too many instances where

it diminishes the experience of just being with someone.

In my film studio now we have screens

not on the desk, not off, not in your pocket,

but in the bag and you check it when you go

to the bathroom or take a break.

'cause it was so distracting.

And realizing how unessential it is,

like there's so many things that I know now

that I don't need to bring my phone to.

It's easier 'cause you can just carry it

and then if something happens, you have it,

but there's a lot of things where I don't,

I just don't bring it 'cause I don't need it.

And I think that's the difference between

seeing Bluma and Odessa and other,

they are very comfortable to walk out of the house

without, well she doesn't have one, but without anything.

And I think, it's not oxygen and we should all remember,

I mean we had the big power outages here,

and it was really one of those reminders,

most people said to me, it was like a Tech Shabbat.

They were like it was really fun for the first day,

and I'm like, well that's a Tech Shabbat,

and then it wasn't so much fun

when you didn't know how long it was gonna last,

but I think we've forgotten how to live without it.

And I don't think that's good.

I think the power outage was kinda different,

it was really fun the first day.

What did we do on the first day?

We played card games. By candlelight.

And then we tried to cook all of our food.

Yeah, it was super fun, but I think it's good to kind of.

I don't think it's just like a Tech Shabbat

because it's not like you turn off all your things

and you can't see anything.

Right, 'cause we have electricity on our.

[laughing]

I think now we could have some

questions from the audience if anybody

has a question, you wanna come to one of these mics

at the front of the room, we can take some questions here.

While we're waiting for that, one thing I also wanna

mention is that there's some room,

some margin for experimentation.

We've talked about this as a sort of,

it's not orthodoxy in the sense of rigidity,

so you don't have to be afraid of it like it's,

that there's no exception, or that it's extremely

an orthodox religion.

It's just a guilt free day, so there's no guilt

to be doing any work, that is the key.

That's the goal.

Yes.

[Female Audience Member] Hi, thank you for your work,

I've followed you for a long time,

Character Day and the Webbies are

wonderful additions to our lives, so.

Thank you.

[Female Audience Member] I had a couple questions,

and I'll let you pick which one you choose to answer.

Because what you're constructing is wonderful,

and also complex and complicated.

So I heard work free, guilt free, and then I also heard

days of preparation of things that you hadn't gotten to

that you really wanted to read.

That feels a lot like work to me,

so that's one possible question,

and the other is, it's Shabbat, and yet,

you've constructed something that is areligious,

and I'm wondering what conversations you have

in your home around

higher purpose, higher being, purpose, meaning,

in conjunction with the way that you're

sort of mindfully choosing to lead your family life.

Thank you.

That's great questions.

I think I'll take the,

I think one of the things that's most exciting to me

is bringing Shabbat out further, 'cause I think it's just

an incredible practice, and it was revolutionary

at the time 'cause it created a space in time.

Before, at work, you just went on and on,

and the concept of Shabbat was time is gonna have a break,

and there's a Jewish philosopher that calls it

a palace in time, and I feel an incredible

sense of meaning and purpose doing something

the same day that people all over the world

are doing something, so we're doing our own,

you know Jews around the world do versions of Shabbat,

and different religions they call it the Sabbath,

but a day of rest as sacrosanct is very powerful,

and it does make me feel connected to something

larger than myself, and our Shabbat table conversations

are big conversations, everyone goes around the table,

I talk about this in the book, it's one conversation,

it's not side conversation, and we have conversation cards.

We have challa.

And we have challa.

But we talk about what's happening in the world,

and what's happening with ourselves,

so it has a lot of meaning in that.

That dinner, I feel, like we don't eat dinner

every night of the week like you're supposed to,

because we both tag team a lot, but that night,

every week, we have a meaningful conversation

around the table with family and friends.

And then the other question, to the other question

you asked, the idea is putting aside something

that you wanna sit down with a little bit more

and not feel that pressure, so it's oftentimes

an article or something that you,

you actually wanna savor and kinda think about,

but you don't wanna, it's not related to work per se.

You're not obligated to read it.

Yeah, it's more for the treats.

I don't view Saturday reading.

Like if you were saying, if you have this

long list of books that you wanna read,

it's not like this is the day that you have to read

all those books.

Right, it's more like the things

that I wish I had more time to do.

Like a cookbook, I'll like oh, lemme go through that,

we'll cook or, we have a lot of books that

are just kind of fun, inspiring little bits,

it's much more like delightful reading and

pleasure, it's all the things that I feel like

during the week, I'm like oh, I don't have time for that.

Or if I read, I'm distracted or I'm not focused,

so it's like this luxurious way to experience something.

I guess I would describe it.

And actually another version of that,

this sounds like work also, but cleaning out a closet

or a drawer or something, which I don't do that much.

[laughing]

Something you never have time for.

But on that day, because you have nothing else,

you kinda say oh, well maybe I'll take that on.

I like doing it.

She loves it.

Well I think it's the things that give you pleasure,

it's the things that give you joy.

But if you don't like doing that.

Then don't do that. [laughing]

The guilt free is an interesting idea

that keeps coming up.

Yeah, maybe we need to add a guilt free tech shabbat.

Because if you're really Orthodox.

It's a lot of guilt. Well a lot of guilt.

Well we're Jewish. We're Jewish, we have guilt.

But it's no work, it's no driving, no money, no electricity

but if you think about what the rabbis talked about,

again, from a non-, just an ethics point of view,

it's like a day of rest, and in the 10 commandments,

it's commandment number four, above do not commit

murder is take a full day of rest.

So in the ethics of living a good, meaningful life,

having a complete day of rest, a full day,

is almost more important than anything.

So I think that's pretty interesting.

Sorry, we have another question over here.

You have an Orthodox, you come from a ..

[Male Audience Member] Oh yeah, my father's a rabbi,

Safardic Orthodox Kabbalist rabbi.

What would he say to what we're saying?

[Male Audience Member] You should've seen our Shabbats.

[laughing]

I actually, I have a question for Odessa and Bluma.

So I feel like my understanding of young folks

these days are that they're hyper-plugged in,

you know, they're like TikToking with each other.

She's a TikTokker.

[Male Audience Member] Like all the time.

Yeah, you may be TikToking right now for all I know,

but I guess my question is how do you talk about

tech Shabbat with your friends, and how do they

receive that and how do they respond to you

about it?

Well, my friend. They started doing it now.

Yeah, 'cause she,

well rarely, sometimes when I hang out

she's like I'm doing a Tech Shabbat, too,

with my family, it's just so funny to think.

They're doing it now.

Well the book just came out, so a lot of people

are trying it now, and a lot of people are loving it.

I mean I think we just forgot what it's like

to not be plugged in.

I think for my friends it's not so much,

I frame it as not about the screens, it's about the work

and not having to do homework, 'cause I'm very clear

that I'm not gonna be doing any homework on Saturdays

and a lot of them would love that opportunity

to have their family be like,

my parents will not let me do homework on Saturdays.

Framing it that way I think is a lot more

relevant especially this year, than just the screens.

'cause you're so tied up, 'cause I get notifications

on Google Classroom for my teachers 24/7,

that this has been graded, I check my grades online,

so it's all tied up in my schoolwork.

[Male Audience Member] Cool.

Do you have to let your teachers know?

Usually at the beginning of the year

when you're filling out facts about me, I write it down.

Usually it doesn't impede, I remember I had a teacher

when I was in like 6th grade who said

you're gonna have to stop doing this

when you get to high school,

because you're not gonna be able to handle the work.

I found that has not held true, because it has been

the only way I've been able to manage stress, I think.

Right, yeah.

[Male Audience Member] Thank you.

Let me ask you, we have a few minutes left,

but one thing that I was wondering about

was for people, in some ways,

it's a privilege to take a day off, right?

If you have a job, or two jobs

or you're a Lyft driver, you need your phone

for whatever work, how do you address that?

I'll tell you, I've thought a lot about that,

because obviously at the beginning of the Webbie Awards

the big question around the digital divide

was who wasn't gonna be on technology and who was?

But now the digital divide has flipped,

because actually, you read about tech titans

in Silicon Valley who pay people so their kids

are never on their screens, or they send them to

Waldorf Schools and what does that say?

But, I had a great conversation with a film crew,

and they were freelancers and they were listening

to me talk about it and they were like I don't know

if I can do that, I'm a freelancer,

and I remember being a freelancer, and I said,

you know, but don't you feel burnt out?

And they're totally burnt out,

and there's so many articles written about how

burnt out everyone's feeling,

and I said is there someone you could be on call to?

Like one day a week, if you each,

you're both cinematographers and you both said,

we're gonna always be on call for the other person

that one day a week and they're like, yes,

we could try that, because we all need one day.

This is going back to you need time off.

And when you're a freelancer you never feel

like you have time off, because you always

have to be available and I'm gonna check back in with

them on how it worked but if you,

you know, my father was a doctor and he used to be

on call to another doctor so that they could

have a day off, even though he was a surgeon

for trauma centers, so I think you just have to be,

it takes a little bit more work.

And then people that have two jobs, and they don't

have weekends at all, I think that,

and I write about this in the book,

for whatever time you do get off,

try to make some of it unplugged,

because you will feel relaxed in a way

that we've forgotten how to be.

And it certainly doesn't have to be on a Saturday, right?

Yeah, it could be any day.

Right, so sometimes there will be,

I'll have a conference, that I'll have to be at

on a Saturday, so what you can do is shift it

just to find another day, 'cause it doesn't,

it's not about rigidity and that's the key.

And I'm glad you brought that up 'cause I think it

is a luxury and we have to be conscious

that some people, for a variety of reasons,

for example, you have kids somewhere,

somebody's counting on you

and you have to keep your phone on

so you can get, you can be alerted for that,

that's totally understandable.

So there's all kinds of little exceptions that can happen.

It's not about something scary and you go in,

you come out Mormon, I mean Amish.

When I was, like today, I need to keep my,

I was volunteering in Robotics,

I need to have my phone on me when I'm away

from my parents, so I'm not checking it,

it's just like, yeah.

I've often thought about the flip phone,

just a version, like a bat phone for that day.

'cause the phone is such a channel to everything.

Like a portable land line.

Yeah, well we have a land line.

That's not a cell phone.

We should invent that, hey Bluma, we should invent that.

That is brilliant.

The portable land line, thank you Bluma.

We will all go out and get one now.

[laughing]

Well I wanna thank you all for coming.

What a great idea.

And I wanna thank you all for being here

and for sharing this with us, our time is up.

Oh and I'm gonna be doing a book signing.

Oh book signing

Later, right after this I think.

Thank you, Vera.

Thank you.

[applause]