On your marks, get set, get ready to get your life back!
If you’re ready, take a few minutes to read this and THEN, while you’re out driving or exercising or just lying around, LISTEN to this podcast. It’s literally changing my life. This information is helping me revisit the compulsive relationship I’ve had with my phone.
I feel that this message is very very important and this is THE BEST delivery I’ve heard so far about how and why I feel so awful when I realize I’ve spent an hour or more of my day wasted on my phone.
I know many of you have heard a lot of the statistics on scrolling, phone use, etc. I have too. I’ve been working really hard to delete apps, move the ones that are known to be addictive to the last screen, and to have my phone shut down everyday from 7 in the evening to 8 in the morning. And while this has been a game changer and really has been giving me more time to invest into other, more important activities, it’s still so tough.
The research says that the average person will spend the equivalent of 20 years on their smartphones. Twenty years!!! That number is astonishing to me. When I heard that, I was like ‘H. E. double hockey sticks, that’s not going to be me’!
I think I was one of the last people, at least in my circle, to give up my black berry. I held onto that thing because I just knew, without really knowing, that my life was going to change, and not for the better. My husband, the tech lover in our family, really wanted me to join the land of the….I don’t know what, but something. Something that I knew I didn’t want.
And then it happened, and I slowly got sucked into texting. Facebook came next. Then I could check my email. And then I could check my work schedule. Music came and Spotify and then podcasting……And then, and then and then. Come 2024 and I’m in a weird love triangle with my phone….it’s like a bad relationship. I’m addicted and I hate it and I love it and it makes me angry, but I NEED IT and I can’t live without it.
Sound familiar?
If this is you or someone you love, I highly recommend taking time to listen to one of my favorite podcasters (the great Mel Robbins) discuss this with a Harvard researcher and Psychiatrist. I think he knows what he’s talking about.
If nothing else, just know that cell phone usage is contributing to:
- Decreased available dopamine throughout your day if it’s used up first thing in the morning through messaging and social media use. This means it’s harder to feel a sense of satisfaction and enjoyment for the rest of the day and harder to get things done. Dr. K says that we have a limited and finite amount of dopamine everyday. The dopamine hits we get from using social media and the like, potentially uses up the little bit that we have, which can lead to feelings of depression, anxiety and hopelessness!
- Neck, upper back and lower back pain and tightness
- Becoming less YOU and more what THEY want you to think, feel and do aka: becoming someone you haven’t really given permission to be because your thoughts and feelings have been hijacked
- Difficulty concentrating and carrying through on tasks and thoughts
Be you! That’s what I project for you when I see you, talk with you and pass along this information. Take back your thoughts, time and energy. It’s seriously so liberating!
I have more time to read books, clean up my house, spend time in the garden, swimming, walking, doing art projects, staring at the sky…..all things I loved to do and have forgotten about since I was compulsively checking my phone for years.
Let me know what fun you’re able to add back into your life, once you start disconnecting. AND I’d love to hear your biggest take-home from the podcast!
Always in healing,
Dr. Arjan