Every day I wake up and every day, without a doubt I first reach for my phone. Barely opened my eyes and I am already scrolling Instagram, checking my messages and seeing what I missed. Did i really miss something or is it my addiction speaking?
It all begins when my alarm starts screaming at me to wake up. I am forced to touch my phone as it functions as my alarm clock. This gives me immediate access to social media. It is only a click away. Later, before I even leave for school, I check my phone to see the time multiple times. Again, this makes it so easy to give into the temptation to scroll. Your phone functions as many things at once. Do you need to check how your makeup looks? Open your camera. Do you need to split the bill with your friends? Pull up the calculator on your phone. Do you need to write a quick reminder to send the money to your friend? No need to worry about it, your phone has got your back. These instances keep happening everyday on repeat and these are just a few examples of how our phones infiltrate our lives even when we do not want it to happen.
Taking how our phones force their way into our lives, it is no wonder people end up scrolling social media even when they don’t want to. The smart phone has become an extension of ourselves. It has formed into a tool I can not imagine living without. But, how do we escape this?
First: try to not be on your phone for the first 30 minutes of the day
This has proven to be more difficult than I thought. It is so easy to scroll Instagram when I turn off my alarm. But I power through. I go to the kitchen, I make myself breakfast, chitchat with my boyfriend, go around my skincare and suddenly I don’t even know it has been more than 30 minutes.
Second: put your phone away during conversations
The phone stays in my pocket or my bag. Talking to someone is already entertaining enough. You don’t need your phone present in these human interactions. I never keep my phone on the table in a restaurant. Putting your phone away also shows the other people you are chatting with that you value their time and you want to be there with them. I am sure you would feel very disrespected if your friend would pull out their phone while you are retelling a super hilarious story and start scrolling.
Third: watching movies
I know you might say: “but watching movies is still looking at a screen.” And to that I say: “yeah, but you should try it anyway.” Movies are a different form of content. They usually last hour and a half to two hours. This way you are entertained longer. You aren’t watching a different Tiktok every second. You are following a story. Movies put my short attention spam to the test. Every once in a while I catch myself reaching for that phone even when I am being entertained. In those moments, I know it is time to throw that phone away. I do not need more than a movie to feel fulfilled.
To not reach for my phone during movie time, I go to the cinema. In Leiden, we have 3 cinemas to which you get access to with a Cineville subscription which is only 19 euros a month and you can go see UNLIMITED amount of movies. It is so worth it. I have seen 22 movies in 5 months. In the cinema, i do not have the urge to pull my phone out. I am in a space where rules apply. I do not want to disturb other people watching a movie with me. It is a win win.
To conclude, these are only some of the things I do to not be on my phone so often. I remember when I first got my phone back in 2016 and my parents caught me staying up past my bedtime to be on Musical.ly and they enforced a screen time limit of 3 hours a day on social media, I was furious. Looking back at it, I might go back to my roots and set a limit for social media myself. No matter what you do to prevent the doom scroll, keep doing it. Doom scrolling does no good and I swear to you, you won’t miss anything.
Sources:
https://youtu.be/rooEBjZWpDc?si=9fkTjGndMNishmTK
Phone addiction so bad, watching a movie now is productive : r/nosurf
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