Insightful—and imagine the difficulties intertwining that with monitoring illness or treatment efficacy. Sometimes I’ll have patients who report back to me their Oura ring or Apple Watch stats when I ask how they’re doing. Now, we know certain measurements like heart rate variability, REM sleep changes etc are associated with numerous illnesses but I just want to say “no, no, how do you feel?”
The desire to be able to know what’s going on in your body and optimize it can get so intense that it defeats the purpose of actually knowing your body and mind. But we aren’t cyborgs (yet) :)
as a yogini i have a built-in longing to listen to myself and understand my own body unmediated by another (much less tech). i don't even count steps or anything like that. i know it's very motivating for others, but not for me.
my tiny acts of resistance - buying birdfeed at my local hardware store instead of amazon, meditating outside with no phone in sight, communicating with friends via text not social.
My partner and I talk about this same topic, specifically sleep scores with the Apple watch. Yeah, these things should be force multipliers, not second-guessers. I do sometimes go on "technology free" excursions where I wear and old Swatch and leave my phone at home.
I love this: "The danger isn’t that AI replaces us. It’s that we stop believing ourselves."
My girlfriend and I have Oura rings as well, and here is part of our practice of using them to help us feel good...
If we wake up and already feel good, like we got good sleep and are ready and excited to start the day, we ideally won't look at the sleep score right away. I already have my own information, so if the ring said "you slept great!" okay, I already knew that from my internal experience. But if I think I slept well and the ring said "no you didn't!" then that can cause some cognitive dissonance and questioning in the vein of what you're discussing in your piece.
On the other hand, if I wake up NOT feeling great, I'll look at the sleep score and if it's like "yeah dude, you didn't sleep well!" I'll be like THANK YOU RING FOR AFFIRMING MY EXPERIENCE. Of course I don't feel great, look at these numbers! But, weirdly, if I think I didn't sleep well but my ring is like "yes you did!" then I might be like, oh cool, I actually COULD be feeling better, and some kind of placebo effect sometimes kicks into gear.
So, if that makes sense to you, I recommend it! Look within yourself first! If you like what you see, run with it! If you don't, look to the ring for support, either confirmation or inspiration.
Prescient- Baratunde- Oura and DoD partnership escalates and Oura also partners with Maven Clinic (where the former GC of Life360 just joined) 🤔 Surveillance\performance tradeoffs.
Until we have a federal privacy law or I take a year sabbatical and visit my family in the Netherlands and have EU resident protection, I would not seriously consider it. I have thought about working with their legal to button up their digital trust posture to a point where I would be comfortable as I think much good can come from taking the mystery out of health and habits.
Insightful—and imagine the difficulties intertwining that with monitoring illness or treatment efficacy. Sometimes I’ll have patients who report back to me their Oura ring or Apple Watch stats when I ask how they’re doing. Now, we know certain measurements like heart rate variability, REM sleep changes etc are associated with numerous illnesses but I just want to say “no, no, how do you feel?”
The desire to be able to know what’s going on in your body and optimize it can get so intense that it defeats the purpose of actually knowing your body and mind. But we aren’t cyborgs (yet) :)
thank you. haven't tried the ring.
as a yogini i have a built-in longing to listen to myself and understand my own body unmediated by another (much less tech). i don't even count steps or anything like that. i know it's very motivating for others, but not for me.
my tiny acts of resistance - buying birdfeed at my local hardware store instead of amazon, meditating outside with no phone in sight, communicating with friends via text not social.
My partner and I talk about this same topic, specifically sleep scores with the Apple watch. Yeah, these things should be force multipliers, not second-guessers. I do sometimes go on "technology free" excursions where I wear and old Swatch and leave my phone at home.
Dear Baratunde,
Great piece! Very relatable!
I love this: "The danger isn’t that AI replaces us. It’s that we stop believing ourselves."
My girlfriend and I have Oura rings as well, and here is part of our practice of using them to help us feel good...
If we wake up and already feel good, like we got good sleep and are ready and excited to start the day, we ideally won't look at the sleep score right away. I already have my own information, so if the ring said "you slept great!" okay, I already knew that from my internal experience. But if I think I slept well and the ring said "no you didn't!" then that can cause some cognitive dissonance and questioning in the vein of what you're discussing in your piece.
On the other hand, if I wake up NOT feeling great, I'll look at the sleep score and if it's like "yeah dude, you didn't sleep well!" I'll be like THANK YOU RING FOR AFFIRMING MY EXPERIENCE. Of course I don't feel great, look at these numbers! But, weirdly, if I think I didn't sleep well but my ring is like "yes you did!" then I might be like, oh cool, I actually COULD be feeling better, and some kind of placebo effect sometimes kicks into gear.
So, if that makes sense to you, I recommend it! Look within yourself first! If you like what you see, run with it! If you don't, look to the ring for support, either confirmation or inspiration.
Thanks for sharing as always!
Love
Myq
Love this Myq!
Prescient- Baratunde- Oura and DoD partnership escalates and Oura also partners with Maven Clinic (where the former GC of Life360 just joined) 🤔 Surveillance\performance tradeoffs.
http://www.mobihealthnews.com/news/oura-opens-manufacturing-facility-support-us-department-defense
Literal identity crisis…
Until we have a federal privacy law or I take a year sabbatical and visit my family in the Netherlands and have EU resident protection, I would not seriously consider it. I have thought about working with their legal to button up their digital trust posture to a point where I would be comfortable as I think much good can come from taking the mystery out of health and habits.