Anita Tatlow

If it’s ok with you world, I’ll reply later…

Technology. What a wonderful thing! Without a doubt, we live in a world is a world of instant gratification.

24 hour helplines. Extended store opening hours. Next day delivery. A world of entertainment, news, opinions, education and inspiration at our fingertips… if you need or want something, there’s a high possibility that you won’t need to wait long to get it.

And this works so well for today’s consumer! So where’s the problem?

Well, as this cycle becomes part of our daily routine, we also come to expect an instant response from others too – from messages to our friends to contacting and posting on social media platforms. Are we becoming wired to expect these immediate responses?

Take a look at this screenshot I took from our Facebook Page:

See a problem? While we might be able to expect large corporations to respond in super-human time, individuals and independent start-ups aren’t quite the same. It seems, Facebook can ‘reward’ me with a badge if I respond quicker to people’s questions and comments. What a great idea…in principle.

When people communicate with you from different time zones all over the world, reality seeps in. You see, in order for us to respond instantaneously would require me to not be present in so many of life’s moments:

• I would have to stop conversations in full flow at the sound of a notification (don’t worry – these are already turned off).
• I would never be fully present in meetings, and conversations with colleagues when I am working as a worship leader.
• During time spent with friends and family, my mind would be elsewhere.
• Imagine what a songwriting or recording session would be like if I had to stop at the sound of a notification just so that I could get the ‘responds in under 5 minutes’ badge.
• And timezones… What do I do when the other side of the world is awake and active online? Interrupted sleep? Or maybe I should just forego this night time luxury…
• Precious evenings that I spend with my husband, when we don’t work, would be compromised and constantly interrupted.
• In fact, my life would be more focussed online than everything around me and that isn’t really where I want to be.

Don’t get me wrong – I love to get messages of encouragement and questions from people but Facebook, I don’t think you’ve got it right in this case. It’s not about haste. I’d rather spend time on a more personal reply when I have set aside time to be fully present.

So, if it’s ok with you, I might do things differently.

Rest assured I will look forward to reading comments and to replying but if it’s ok with you world… I might reply later.

Written by Anita on 15th March 2016 in Life, Music, Work.
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If you need me, I’ll be browsing Pinterest…

Many changes have taken place for us over the last week. Not least, we sold our apartment and bought a new one (well, contracts have been exchanged and the process is underway). We’ll still be living in Stockholm – in a different area of the city called Helenelund. As we work from home 50% of the time, we felt that we needed more space to be able to have a home-studio setup to allow us to work more efficiently and effectively.

The whole thing happened rather quickly, (and might I say in a very un-Swedish fashion). I shall elaborate: The housing market (as I have come to know it) in Sweden nearly always operates on a bidding system – apartment viewings are at very fixed times and following these open-house shopping experiences, potential buyers begin a ‘bidding war’.

With a housing shortage in Stockholm and changes coming into effect regarding mortgages in the summer, it seems that there is more competition than ever when it comes to apartment listings and we have heard so many first hand accounts of people losing out during the bidding process.

So… last Thursday I received a phone call from our estate agent with an offer from a potential buyer who wanted to bypass this whole system (she wasn’t Swedish) and just make a fair offer. After a little negotiation, it seemed that everyone was happy and we accepted her offer – bearing in mind she hadn’t even seen the apartment at this point!

Inspired by our buyer’s forward thinking, now knowing our flat-hunting budget and not wanting to miss out ourselves, we took the same daring step and reached out to the estate agent of an apartment we were keen to make an offer on and asked what price the seller would accept.

Thankfully for us, it all worked out… By Friday afternoon we had viewed the new apartment, signed the contract to sell our home and buy our new one. And by Friday evening we were ready to crash on the sofa!

But it feels good. The new flat will need a little renovation but it will be great to put our own stamp on it.

So… if you need me, you’ll find me browsing colour schemes, upcycling projects and home decor ideas on Pinterest for the next few months.

Oh and our current flat is no longer the ‘tidy show-home apartment’ that we managed to create for the one-client viewing… that only lasted for about half a day!

Written by Anita on 8th March 2016 in General.
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