ABSTRACT
We need only consider the dramatic changes in new technology to appreciate the new and relentless pressures of the digital age on museum work. There are computers at home and work, fax machines, cell phones, pagers, laptops, BlackBerries, high speed connectivity, email and the internet, all of which are convenient, efficient, and useful, but at a cost to mindfulness. Jon Kabat-Zinn, a professor of medicine and meditation teacher, describes the consequences as follows:
This new way of working and living has inundated us all of a sudden with endless options, endless opportunities for interruption, distraction, highly enabled ‘response ability’ … and a kind of free-floating urgency attached to even the most trivial of events. The to-do list grows ever longer, and we are always rushing through this moment to get to the next.4
