#addictedtomyphone

4. ‘I’m addicted to my phone’

Aren’t we all? Probably not. I am. It’s the first thing I do in the morning and generally the last thing I do at night. This impacts the quality of my sleep and the level of energy I start the day with (tying in with part 2).

Steps I’ve already taken to address this issue are:

·         Turning off most of my notifications.

·         Putting large chat groups on permanent mute so that I can look at them at my own leisure, rather than look at it with every new message.

·         I limit what social media platforms I talk to people on. This keeps notifications somewhat organised when they do come through.

·         I block personalised ads whenever I can.

My phone is incredible. It’s what I was hoping for in future phones when I first got one somewhere in the early 2000s. It’s not a top of the range phone, but it is perfectly adequate for my senseless scrolling, video watching and interesting things finding. Without my phone, I’ve lost contact with my friends, family, business acquaintances, local businesses, and new people I have yet to meet. I also lose my language learning app, my photos and videos, and my schedule for work. I might gain a bit of peace from the addicted buzz going through my brain, but I will also gain a powerful wave of anxiety over what I’m no longer paying attention to.

My solution to this isn’t to just bin off my phone or to block everyone and everything, but to limit my exposure time, rest my eyes and to pay more attention to the things around me. I often comfort myself with a little white lie saying something like: “Well, I don’t follow celebrities and I never look at my phone when someone’s talking to me and I’m not on my phone all the time, so I’m not really addicted to my phone, am I?”