Not being at the hospital 24/7 was a radical change to my life pace. This also changed the relationship to my phone - not for the better. I suddenly found myself spending an excruciating number of hours in the bedroom in the dark next to or trapped under a sleeping baby/toddler, and somehow it seemed more "relaxing" to scroll on Instagram or telling myself I was doing "research", than to read books. The habit of checking my phone spilled into the day.
I noticed that I would sometimes even get irritated with my child, when I was on my phone – as if they were distracting me from my phone, and not the other way around. I saw that I was missing my phone and needed (needed!) to know where it was.
We all know the calculations that tell us, how many years we would have spent on our phone by the time we turn 80. It´s scary. It also didn't help me change. I have always loved reading and writing, I love being outside, there are a million things, if asked I would rather do, than scrolling. And yet – here we were.
I have since changed my habits around this, but not in a day, and it´s an ongoing process. As with anything worth it, there is no quick fix. I began by doing 48 hours without a phone, and I bought a so called dumbphone (and kept my smartphone).
Things that are supposed to help, like greyscale, deleting apps, deleting email, putting a hairband around the phone etc, didn't work for me. I set up time limits, which basically just extended my screen time by how long it took to put in the passcode to access my phone in 15 minute increments.
Spending 48 hours without a phone was much simpler, and at the same time much less blissful or exciting than I had anticipated. I found the effects of reduced phone and internet usage, such as better concentration, less anxiety, etc. came with a bit of latency.
The most interesting thing happened just before I went to turn my phone back on on Sunday morning. I actually did not want to. More precisely, I noticed that I was clenching my jaw and muscles in my torso, shoulders and neck were tensing up. It was a small shift, barely noticeable, but it was there – and reliably so, it is detectable in some variation every time just before or after picking up my phone (if I pay enough attention to notice). The less time I spend on my smartphone, the easier I find it to spot this tensing reaction.
So whenever I want to use it, I remember this. Using my phone makes me (my body) feel bad, - even if it (and all the apps on it) are designed to make me want to use it and think that it will make me feel better.
But, even actively noticing that picking up my phone already makes me feel tense, was not enough for a profound change in habits. I knew this beforehand, now I just had felt proof. And this is why I bought myself a simple phone: to make my smartphone redundant enough to be able to keep it out of sight for most of the day while not getting rid of it entirely.
The dumbphone ( I have a lightphone III) can take notes, photos, find directions, send text messages, and make phone calls. Directions are a little less reliable and text messages only work for contacts in the EU (and most of my friends use signal or whatsapp) - but this is a compromise I am willing to make. I love some functions of my smartphone which it does not replace, such as voice notes, and use it for banking, which is why I am keeping it for now.
My smartphone sits in the drawer, turned off - because if it is constantly available, I will reach for it, and once distracted, it is very hard to pull myself back into focus. The combination of making my smartphone less accessible while having a replacement for the most important functions is what tipped the scale for me.
Being less connected to my smartphone is as nice as I thought it would be. I model behaviour I would like to see in my child, as it will be even harder for the next generation to be disconnected from technology. My brain feels less foggy, I am more present and less snappy with my child - and more poignantly, more so on days when I do fall back into the social media/pinterest/whatsapp (yes, even whatsapp) trap.
If I could, I would turn off the Wifi in the house, just to put another barrier in, but my partner uses it for work. I have toyed with the idea of having him set a password, but feel that this might just be annoying. We will see.
There is a big trend around analogue living, trying to get offline, and I think for all the right reasons. As always though, there is no black and white - going back to historic times, or even the 90´s, would not suddenly make everything better. I believe that simply turning off all our phones would not either - and if it was so easy as simply setting the intention to use our phone less, none of us would have a problem with it.
I think that using our phones too much is both chicken and egg. It makes being present, which I think of as being "in our bodies" harder, but not being present in our bodies is also what makes us use our phones more. If we start to notice what is going on in our body (such as, tensing) as a reaction to a thing (such as a phone), it becomes a little easier to make choices that benefit us in the short and long term.