When I lived overseas, I didn’t have a smart phone or internet at home. Heck, I didn’t even have water or power most of the time. The exception was when I lived in Zamboa, where my home on the farm was also my workplace. My mobile phone could only get signal in one specific place on the kitchen windowsill, which was at the other end of a long corridor to the office. Our satellite internet was sporadic and could barely cope with Skype connection. The antithesis of modern connectivity in the UK.
And here I am today, connected, wired on the move and 24/7. I have just been setting up an IFTT to turn my internet connected lights on when my geo locator on my phone recognises that I am a certain distance away from home. Whaaaaaat. I have had a smart phone since 2010 when I returned to the UK and I love that I can reach people so quickly and so easily.
I don’t love that it’s always with me, those little notifications silenced but visible…..let me just check this DM, doom scrolling, audio booking, music listening, emailing, tweeting, checking sleep data……
I watched (ironically) a great doc on Netflix called the Social Dilemma. If you haven’t seen it I HIGHLY recommend you take a look – industry insiders tell how they have engineered all our social media options to be as addictive as possible and designed to keep you there. How many times have you been just about to exit messenger when you see the little … telling you the other person is typing. That’a no accident. I am not anti-tech but it was an eyeopener to be reminded that tech is part of a capitalist machine, it is not a benign thing that just wants you to be able to connect. As they point out, Facebook hasn’t been selling your data – they’ve been selling you.
We tell ourselves that it is an advantage to be connected, it’s efficient, helpful, fast, productive. And this is true. But it can also start to take over – take over our attention, our focus, our conversations. Some people really feel fear and anxiety not being able to access their phone. Our brains have been trained to feel the reward of digital addiction. So how can we mitigate this ?
- What the rules are this holiday – ie no phones at the table, certain limits for gaming time, no pics shared without permission, a certain number of hours per day off your phone, commitment to manageable and positive social media time only, phone only to be used for certain things (like access to audiobook or meditation app).
- Like any addiction, managing it will become easier if you can accept that you are using your phone/tablet/computer too much and to the detriment of other things in your life. If you cannot go 24 hours without using your phone, it is time to set some boundaries.
- There are plenty of time measuring apps – including how many times you pick up the phone (I was horrified when I checked mine!). There are ones where you can grow a little virtual forest when you don’t use your phone. Anything to help make visible the time you spend on the phone. My iPhone can give me a breakdown of total time spent in a day (how is it even possible that I am doing anything else) and which apps get most of my time. Set a challenge to reduce it each day so that by the end of the month you are using your phone at least 50% less.
- You can also use your phone to limit your access to certain apps during certain time periods. If you try and use an app that you have listed, you will be reminded of the limit – that pause can be enough to just rethink your need. If you use an iPhone you can set these limits across family devices.
- Turn off pings, notifications, sounds etc. There is a reason gambling machines use flashing lights and sounds. You can very quickly and easily reduce your screen time by making access a more deliberate action.
- Use the lazy persons trick – I have found this to be extremely successful. I have a tendency to mindlessly scroll or fall down a You Tube hole. One easy way to break this habit is to make it easier not to do this. If I leave my phone upstairs, I am likely to be lazy enough not to go upstairs and find it. Then the craving passes and I can direct my attention to something more joyous. Work smart not hard.
