How to Talk to People - Introducing How To Touch Grass

Episode Date: July 6, 2026

A common piece of advice for those who are chronically online is to “go touch grass.” This upcoming season of How To, co-hosts Natalie Brennan and Julie Beck will look more closely at the often-fraught, always-changing relationship people have with technology. They’ll explore how people can be more intentional with their devices, rebuild their attention span, and find a way to thrive in this fast-paced, image-driven culture. Episodes will feature personal experimentation and conversations with experts in anxiety, education, and new technology. The first episode of How to Touch Grass publishes Monday, July 27, and new episodes are released every Monday for five weeks. Subscribe now. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you have one word, it could be any part of speech that you want, to describe your overall relationship to technology at this moment in time, what would that word be? Antagonistic. Complicated. Frought. I was going to say reluctant, but maybe that's not right. I'm Julie Beck, a staff writer at the Atlantic. And I'm Natalie Brennan, a producer at the Atlantic.

In this upcoming season of How To, we'll be exploring the often fraught, that's always changing relationship people have with technology. And the ways that in this moment, the terms of the relationship are being renegotiated. Around two-thirds of Gen Z adults, say they're nostalgic for a time before they're alive. They love technology, but they want to be in control of it, not feel controlled by it.

We've been thinking a lot about how our relationship with our devices is all tangled up in our relationship to one another. We don't realize how much. much of our habits kind of live in other people around us. Think about it. Like, when do you pick up your phone? It's when the person you're talking to picks up their phone. And how tech helps us solve some problems while also creating new ones. I don't think anyone is supposed to see their own face as much as we do now. We're just like front face and camera, front face and camera, front face in camera. And it's, it's weird. It's warping our brains. We're searching for ways to unwarp

our brains. A common piece of advice for those who have been brain-rotted by the internet is to go touch grass. So are you also telling us to touch grass? Yeah, pretty much. Coming this summer is how to touch grass. The first episode arrives Monday, July 27th. Subscribe now.