How to Use Your Smartphone Without Losing Your Sanity

The Mindful Use of Digital Technology

The people will not revolt. They will not look up from their screens long enough to notice what’s happening. - Robert Icke and Duncan Macmillan, stage adaptation of George Orwell’s 1984

Whether you are in a line at a supermarket checkout counter, waiting to board a flight, or on a quick work break, you are constantly looking at your smartphone’s screen. Even when you are out, having a nice dinner with your spouse, family, or friends, your ability to enjoy the current moment is diminished by your urge to document it for your social media audiences. A simple glance at your phone is enough to make you go down the digital rabbit hole with a slew of updates, messages, posts, tweets, links, and whatnot. The next thing you know, you have lost the track of time and wasted valuable minutes, if not hours.

However, if you are anything like those people who use their phones and other digital technologies mindfully, you know how to hold long conversations without feeling the urge to look at your smartphone’s screen. You find it easy to get lost in your day-to-day activities like preparing food, reading a good book, gardening, or taking a walk. You have the ability to have fun without the urge to excessively document it for your social media audiences. You are even okay with sitting quietly for some time, alone with your thoughts rather than filling your in-between time with social media updates. You know your priorities and that is why the tech giants and FAANG companies don’t have a hold on your time and valuable attention.

Digital Technology is Addictive by its Very Design

When digital technologies started taking over our lives, little did we know that there was a steep price to be paid for all the benefits we were receiving from them. A mounting body of evidence suggests that various tools of the digital age, especially smartphones and social media dictate how we spend our time and how we feel. These technologies are designed for addiction. Facebook’s former director of monetization once admitted that Facebook intentionally made its product as addictive as cigarettes. Billions of dollars are spent to do so, without any regard for the well-being of the users.

Sean Parker, the founding president of Facebook, admitted to the same at an event.

The thought process that went into building these applications, Facebook being the first of them, . . . was all about: “How do we consume as much of your time and conscious attention as possible?” And that means that we need to sort of give you a little dopamine hit every once in a while, because someone liked or commented on a photo or a post or whatever. — Sean Parker

Our Attention is Diverted to Information that is Utter Rubbish to Increase “User Engagement”

The endless bombardment of polarised news, useless gossip, desperate ads, and updates from our “online friends” has turned us into information addicts. We are stuffing our minds with information that is absolute garbage. We find ourselves jumping from one social media site to another and then to messaging apps, and the tracking apps (even the ones that track your periods, exercise routine, and finances to pass on that information to Facebook and others).

In the past decade, people have consumed so much useless information that a part of their brain must have become a garbage dumping ground or turned into a landfill for redundant information.

Every single minute, there are billions of “likes” and “hearts” on Facebook and Instagram and, millions of swipes across Tinder. It is done to increase “user engagement” and the “average session length” so that social media companies can make more money.

If you think you have control over what information you choose to give your attention to, on social media or apps, you are sadly mistaken. Social media companies hire the best talent all across the globe to tend to their ever-perfecting algorithms that are constantly consuming data about our likes, dislikes, what we do, when we sleep, etc. They leave no stone unturned to bait our attention towards information and ads that they want us to see! In a way, they are trying to reprogram our minds to maximize their own profits. It won’t be an understatement to say that social media companies know more about you than your best friend and spouse!

If you think social media is entertaining you with this “harmless information”, don’t be mistaken. Your attention span is decreasing. I would rather watch a sitcom, movie or documentary over scrolling social media.

Your Smartphone is Using You

Most of what the tech companies are doing is enabled by the small, seemingly harmless devices in our pockets that we don’t part with, even while using the restrooms- Smartphones!

Could you recall the sense of panic that pervades your mind when you have to surrender your smartphone before a meditation class? Not carrying a smartphone for a while should not be the cause of panic though. The point here is that we are addicted to carrying our smartphones everywhere. Each minute of the day, our smartphones are not only collecting information about us but also bombarding us with ads through app notifications, calls from tele-callers, and Whatsapp “notifications” reminding us of the “deals of the lifetime” that we don’t give a shit about. Speaking of shit-

The arrival of the smartphone has made it possible for companies to target you whenever and wherever they want. They have access to you even when you are shitting!

A recent study has found that using smartphones while pooping is common.

Smartphones have become the technology to enable other technologies to pervade our lives. Smartphones give apps and social media access to you all day long, even when you are pooping or sleeping.

Smartphones reduce our capability to have conversations face to face. Even the mere presence of smartphones interfere with human relationship. Our short-term memory and problem-solving skills take a serious hit with our use of smartphones as per a study. I am sure you are well aware of how badly smartphones are affecting our sleep patterns. Are you able to sleep timely? Studies have even found a positive correlation between smartphone addiction and depression.

Disarm Your Smartphone

I am in my late 20s. I always tend to avoid using my smartphone. My family and friends blame me for not responding to messages “instantly”. I don’t even like taking a lot of pictures either. I am one of those people who don’t like screens much. I, however, do carry my cellphone when I venture out of the house or if I am traveling. It is solely for safety purposes and to stay in touch with my family so that they know that I am safe. I have successfully disarmed my smartphone and now it can’t get on my nerves. Here are the steps I took to have a healthy relationship with my phone, where it doesn’t demand my attention and time excessively.

Disable Push Notifications

If you receive a message/email from someone, you don’t need to know right away. You can see and revert to the message when you want. Period.

If you haven’t used an app for a while, you don’t need to be coaxed into using it with a notification. You didn’t use it because you didn’t need it. Period.

If you haven’t booked a flight in a while, you don’t need to be lured to do so with a discount. You are probably not going to plan your journey based on a discount offer. Period.

Most of the push notifications (Well, pretty much all of them) are not just annoying, they are plain stupid. The marketing teams have an obsession with being on the top of the mind of the consumer which converts into constant digital nagging.

All you need to do is- disable all these push notifications that disturb you day in and day out. I am not going to go into the technicalities of the same. I am sure you will find that out on your own.

Uninstall Any App That You Haven’t Used in a While

If I have to bet, I would say you have more than 150 apps on your phone. Do let me know in the comments if I am right or wrong. We all have such apps on our phones that we don’t use, or we use once a year. Delete such apps. It will declutter your digital life. You don’t need to even burden your phone with so many apps, many of them are running in the background, doing god knows what!

Uninstall Any App That is A Threat to Your Privacy

I want to take your attention to tracking apps that sell your data to social media giants. A lot of tracking apps are meant to sell your personal information to the likes of Facebook, for them to serve you “personalized ads”. I feel that apps are time-consuming and ineffective. They increase our screen time. You can track your finances, your periods, and daily expenditure on an excel sheet instead of apps. I use a notepad to track a lot of things. It is old school but it reduces my screen time.

Limit Your Social Media Time to 10 Minutes a Day

Social media is not a substitute for actually connecting with people. When you are busy looking at updates from thousands of people you barely know, you lose out on making and sustaining a few real connections. Visit your friends or at the very least give them a phone call every once in a while, instead of “following” them on social media. At the end of the day, it is the real connections that count.

Switch to a Basic Utility Phone When You Have to do Deep Work

If you are working on something that requires hours of unwavering attention and focus, switch to a basic phone. Check out mine. It is a very old phone that I never got rid of. I used it for a year or so when I felt I didn’t need a smartphone.

Practice Mindfulness

While the above tips and tricks are sufficient to disarm your phone and digital technology, they don’t work in isolation. To maintain a balanced relationship with something that is equal parts productive and destructive for you, you need mindfulness. It helps you engage in a productive relationship with technology while safely step-siding the destructive nuances of it. The tips and tricks mentioned in this article are useful only to the point you are mindful of your digital activities.

Mindfulness is being in the present. It is about being “intentional” about your activities rather than working on an autopilot mode.

In meditation and mindfulness, I learnt how to bring my attention back to the present when I get sucked down the rabbit hole of compulsive thoughts that demand my attention. It helped me develop a lifestyle where I am no more controlled by either thoughts or compulsive habits.

As a result, I don’t easily get distracted by social media, apps either to fill the in-between time of me not having anything to do. Since I don’t even get bored easily when I have to wait, it is hard for devices to steal my time and attention. Even when I am surfing social media, I can take back my attention whenever I want to. Through experience, I have realised that mindfulness is an antidote to all kinds of addictions including the digital ones. As long as you are mindful, you won’t be sucked down the digital rabbit hole.

Mindful use of technology will leave you more time for activities that can enrich your personal and professional life. It will help you to use the digital technologies without being used by them.

Of course, it takes practice to benefit from mindfulness. But you can start right away by focusing on your breath for a few minutes. Next time you find yourself scrolling social media unnecessarily, practice mindfulness by bringing attention back to your breath. When you have to wait in the supermarket queue, ditch your phone and focus on your breath instead. When you have some free time, do a walking meditation. I am leaving you with the following article that pretty well articulates mindful living and meditation. It is a summary of one of the best books on the subject-