A Day in the Digital: An Analog Rediscovery

Humans tend not to realise the importance of their possessions until they’re gone; leaving us in states of regret and resentment with ourselves and our actions. Through the rapid rise of technology and its strategic capability of luring us into temptation, I’ve found that I tend to regret my life decisions more often than I did before. As a consequence, one does not realise how much of our day to day is dependent on the digital, until you recognise how much it has taken from your routine. A day in the digital can be recognised through the small changes caused in our analog lifestyle.

The realisation of this digital world started becoming more evident once I found myself dedicating more time towards social media than to my hobbies; I stopped reading, painting, doing sports, and began to let myself get taken away by the narratives and visual stimulation. All of these experiences used to help me connect to that and those around me, and in some ways my body felt its absence as well. However, as the hours and days passed, disconnecting from the digital seemed harder than expected. The days began to feel trapped in the screens, with no way of getting them back. An ongoing battle between what was real and what was not.

Breaking out from a day in the digital is almost as challenging as dealing with addictions, but once you recognise that problem, that battle starts becoming more manageable. Paper calendars helped me start my exodus from the digital, then it was buying a record player. I started buying vinyls from my favourite artists and choosing to listen music at home from my player rather than from my phone. Once I began the academic year, I replaced my phone’s alarm to a vintage alarm clock; quite frankly, a game changer. My phone started to go back into being an accessory rather than a necessity; I began to delete social media apps for longer periods, and choosing to do things outside from the digital. I found myself being present in time and space, and even enjoying the deafening silence that often accompanies those non-stimulating moments. Almost like a kid, I felt the need to make and create things with the things surrounding me at those moments, such as reading, painting, and cooking. One could even argue that the feeling was nostalgic: living genuine experiences that did not require the digital world, like one did when young.

However, how far does the rediscovery of an analog lifestyle work in a digital world? Disconnecting from the current most important tool for communication also distances you from certain aspects of our society. I found myself being present within me, but felt as if I was not in participation in other people’s lives; talking to friends and family with a certain frequency started to become a difficulty. Similarly to my academic work, the only way to be able to keep these relationships and responsibilities going was to bring myself back into the digital, whether I wanted it or not. One falls back into the digital loop, making these rediscoveries and changes seem useless. On the other hand, I realised how much self control I had gained from the analog lifestyle; every time I entered a social media platform, I only felt the need to talk to friends and family rather than spend hours watching meaningless content. This stimulation had almost lost its interest in my mind, helping me leave the apps right after I had done what I needed to do. The longer I went without using social media, the less interest I had for using it once I was back into the digital. Was my body unconsciously regulating the overconsumption of the digital world for me?

A day in the digital begins through the recognition of society’s lack of analog practices in their daily routines. Rediscovering the analog in our digital lives might help us reconnect with the world we get to physically experience, however, the dependence of the digital leaves us wondering further. Considering that small objects of our quotidian have turned digital through time, such as calendars, alarm clocks, music, and many others, how are humans meant to maintain an analog reality? Consequently, how far will society let a day in the digital become a lifetime or even the death of what exists and is tangible?