I'm fighting my addiction again.

I feel like I've completely slipped, that I'm on my phone all the time. It feels like I check it constantly, engrossed with it any moment I'm not working. It's hard to avoid the negative self-talk. Do I really need to listen to multiple news shows every day? Is that 30 episode backlog of podcasts really that important? In my post about football earlier this week, I mentioned listening to multiple 49ers podcasts each week. Watching the game itself isn't enough? How much is too much?

Well, I just checked my metrics:

Daily average screen time: 4 hours 21 minutes
Daily average pickups: 72

More than 4 hours a day! And this is with most notifications off. I'm basically on par with everyone else: Americans spend 4 hours and 25 minutes on their phone every day, checking it 144 times—that's roughly once every 6 minutes.

It's easy to ask "so what." Are there even any repercussions of using your phone this much?

The scariest part—I think we don't really know. The somewhat less scary part? I think it literally makes us dumber. It drastically reduces our capacity to maintain focus. It's as if we're all living our lives through a fog. Do we want to live this way?

I think it's important we don't blame ourselves. These devices and their software are explicitly engineered to maintain our attention as much and as long as possible. And they do a good job.

So what's the solution? David Goggins said it's easier than ever before to be great: just get off your phone. Everyone is so distracted by screens that just eliminating them from your life automatically gives you a performance/productivity boost. I think he's right.

I think the easiest way to make progress is to prevent phone use for a chunk of the day and see how that goes. So, moving forward, I aim to live phone-free until 12pm each day.

There are exceptions:

I still use my phone as an alarm clock
I'll use my phone for meditation as part of my morning routine
I can use Duolingo in the morning if I have downtime before I start working
If I'm running or lifting, I get to use my phone to listen to podcasts—this is my 'reward' for exercising
I can use my phone to listen to music at any time

The point of all this is to foster a quieter headspace, to protect my consciousness from constant information bombardment. To give myself time to think. To live more intentionally, and to be more in control of what I experience.

Thus far the results have been great. I feel calmer. I feel less rushed; the passage of time feels pleasant. I feel more present. I focus less on the problems of the world (which are still important) and more on my life and my tribe, the people who matter the most to me. I haven't experienced it yet, but I believe my ability to focus will increase. And I'm just straight up happier. These effects are worth it to me.

Just consider our lives before smartphones. How did we spend our time in 2002? We had more personal interactions, we talked with strangers more readily, we were more present and fulfilled throughout the day. We weren't distracted all the time.

When you're not habitually plugged in to the worldwide digital world, you have time for you and your family. That means when you do listen to the news, you can be more present. You can empathize better with problems and are more likely to contribute your time or money towards solutions because you've already handled your personal business.

Unplugging enables us to raise our global consciousness. I'll check back in and let you know how it goes.