A journal is respectable. A spreadsheet is creepy.
I think this summarizes the whole point of Gray Wolf’s piece in the New York Times. The original quote was in past tense but I have paraphrased in the present tense, because the sentiment is still valid in the present tense.
It is one thing to keep informal record of one’s actions and activities; but it is another matter to allow minutiae data-keeping to infiltrate every crevice of our personal. It borders on the creepy. There is a reason why we are humans and not machines.
This is not to say that tracking does not have its benefits. Perhaps a more problem-focused, goal-oriented approach to tracking does a better service than the everyday slog where some individuals can decide to track the entire gamut of their daily activities, picking apart their lives in ways that are not beneficial to them. Everything a person tracks requires time and energy and some things are probably not worth the effort. If people want to change specific aspects of their behaviour or habits and need to explore the pattern, that seems reasonable, but to track every aspect of one’s daily life, where is the enjoyment in that?
As Gary Wolf rightly mentioned in his article, the data-collectors claim that their ultimate goal is to increase efficiency – to improve their productivities – and to eliminate shortcomings. Perhaps this point of view is rather narrow, ambiguous and, perhaps, unfathomable. Efficiency should imply rapid progress toward a known and targeted goal. For many self-trackers, the goal is unknown. Although they may take up tracking with a specific question in mind, they continue because they believe their numbers hold secrets that they think they cannot afford to ignore, including answers to questions they have not yet thought to ask.
When it comes to data analysis, I am of the opinion that less is more. Before I embark on a data collection activity, I’ll have to ask myself the most important question: What is it for?
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