A 10-Step Guide To Defeating Your Technology Addiction
And the 7 signs that you might want to pick up the pace
We have a problem.
A big problem.
It’s easy to not realize it. After all, who is really counting how much time they spend on their phone or laptop?
I guess my Apple products are…anyways…
It’s easy to lie to ourselves and justify what we’re doing. “I’m just staying connected”, or “I’m just taking a break from life for a minute.” But is that really all that we’re doing?
addiction — the state or condition of being dedicated or devoted to something
Our so called “technology addiction” has gotten so ridiculous as a culture that what’s referred to as “internet addiction” is now included in the DSM-V with three different subcategories with some common features.
At the very least, technology will ruin your eyes and take away time from the things that you actually wish you could be doing with your life.
At the very worst, you’ll develop a clinical level addiction to screens, online presence, and avoiding real life at all costs.
No one plans to become addicted to technology…we just don’t have good barriers, boundaries, or plans to dealing with the excessive lure of the online world.
Here are seven signs that you might be addicted to technology, maybe more than you realize:
1 — You can’t take a walk without your phone in your hand or feel like something’s wrong if your phone is ever out of your sight
2 — You have “the twitch” (what Anthony Ongaro calls the feeling we need to compulsively use technology/social media — or “an impulsive, unproductive, repeated response to a feeling of discomfort”)
3 — You never have true peace and quiet, and are constantly craving the noise of soundbites and the mental noise that an online presence provides to your always ringing “ears”
4 — Your phone is the last thing you see/interact with before bed every night
5 — You go online/on your phone/on social media to numb out the stress of your life
6 — You, oddly enough, don’t have time to work on the projects that you most want to be working on
7 — You have a lot of anxiety about being reachable, being able to reach others, and staying “connected” in some vague sense with other people
While this is in no way a comprehensive list, I think it’s a good place to start understanding ourselves and how irresponsibly tied we are to the devices we carry around with us at all times.
Without further ado, here are ten steps you can take to start breaking up with tech:
#1: Delete social media
I know, I know — it seems extreme. But what in the world are you doing?
I’m a girl in college. I get that we need social media to stay connected.
But we have a problem.
Even people who claim to be fairly disconnected still get all of their information from a media app and crave scrolling for distraction anytime they get a spare minute.
Anthony Ongaro, the man behind the idea of “the twitch”, writes the following about his own realization of his addiction:
“Mid-keystroke, I heard a knock at my office door so I lifted my hands from the keyboard and looked over. After a short conversation with my coworker, I looked back at my computer screen and couldn’t believe what I saw. At the end of a half-written sentence, I had typed the word, “facebook.”
What. The. Heck.
During that interruption and mid-keystroke, my brain seemed to have short-circuited. It was in that oddly shame-inducing moment when I learned I did not in fact own my attention. So if I didn’t own it, who did?”
— Anthony Ongaro, BreakTheTwitch.com
Don’t tell anyone. Don’t make a big deal out of it. Don’t make your new years resolution to not be on Instagram for a month. Just stop using it all of the time.
Delete it off your phone, create some distance, and see what kind of life is in store for you when you don’t have to share every last second of it.
We’ll get into more of the specifics of how to do this in later points.
#2: Make your phone a “dumb phone”
There’s no need to pay hundreds of dollars for a phone that purposefully does nothing. Just make your smart phone a regulated machine that only does what you need it to do.
Or, you can go on Walmart’s website and actually find what’s called a “dumb phone” now. I’ve decided that I’ll use a “dumb phone” with only phone calling purposes for the next time I trek into the woods for a couple of days.
In the mean time, I think it can be beneficial and sufficient to make your smart phone into a “dumb phone”, by narrowing down what you actually need it to do.
At the end of the day, I really need my phone for four different things — the internet (sometimes), GPS, phone calls and texts. I also would say that I need it as a camera or recording device at times. These are all purposes that I need it to perform quickly and portably, which it does well.
Everything else is just a plus. With a lot of these things, I opt for consuming them on a device that isn’t my phone, in my home when I’m not around other people and have set aside specific time for enjoying them.
(P.S. Don’t ask about my addiction to the online card game Nertz…that has truly reached DSM-V criterion level at times…)
#3: Quit watching high-stress television
I eventually became so addicted to Grey’s Anatomy this semester (which I vowed would never happen again…) that I had to delete Netflix off of my phone.
I was exhibiting true addict-like behavior — trying to hide the fact that I was watching it from my roommate, lying to myself about how much I was watching, and simply not being able to exist without it running in the background.
“It turns out sometimes you have to do the wrong thing. Sometimes you have to make a big mistake to figure out how to make things right. Mistakes are painful, but they’re the only way to find out who we really are.” — Denny Duquette, Season 3 Episode 4, Grey’s Anatomy
It got the point where I’d be excited to leave a social gathering so that I could go home and watch more episodes. It was a sad few weeks of my life that ultimately had me grossly disliking the show again at the end of my month long binge.
Now, I spend my time watching Friends, Seinfeld, and the old classic Designing Women. These television shows, in contrast to intense procedural dramas produced today, are calm and a peaceful thing to end the day with. Who said entertainment had to stress us out?
#4: Give your phone time outs
Get rid of your phone for as long as you can. To start beating the addiction, you have to get some space. Today, for the first time in a while, I left my phone downstairs after I got breakfast. I checked a couple messages, sent a couple, and then I left it. I didn’t need it anymore.
“It just became a house rule, when you’re at home, that all the phones go in one spot, so if you want to check a text, if you want to check an email, you go to that spot, but it’s not on your (body).” — Joanna Gaines
After that, I was much more productive than usual. While it was a bit more inconvenient to operate Spotify from my laptop and some people had to wait for some texts back, the freedom I had to pay attention to what I wanted to get done was revolutionary and essential to doing well today.
If it helps, turn it into a competition with yourself. See how long you can go with your phone in the car or on the charger in your kitchen.
It’ll be incredibly uncomfortable at first, but soon you’ll start to see how much more life has to offer and how addicted you’ve really become.
#5: Ditch the smart watch
I’m a more present person when my Apple Watch is dead.
While smart watches can be incredibly helpful for tracking activity, fitness levels, and getting away from your phone at times if you have cellular installed on your watch and leave your phone behind, they’re also often enablers.
“The iWatch may be more fashion than function.” — Rebecca Ziegler
So often, I find myself distracted by my watch in a way that simply doesn’t aid my life. What looks to be a helpful tool, is actually just pulling my focus more without providing much meaningful assistance unless I want to know how far I’m running or biking or Zumba-ing on a day-to-day basis.
(Frankly, I don’t often care that much.)
Bonus content that I had to include: Be wary of any product that makes you feel like you have to have it. I lived a perfectly happy life for 19 years without a watch. Never did I ever want one, or wish that I could have a watch that’s connected to my phone.
Now, due to advertising and careful design by a company hoping to take my money, I’ve been brainwashed into thinking I have to have it.
#6: Fill your needs in other ways
What Anthony Ongaro refers to as “the twitch” is a nod to something deeper behind technology addiction. We’re looking for something. We desire satisfaction, a dopamine hit, connection, or an ease to our boredom.
In order to address our technology addiction, we have to address the deeper needs at play. If you feel starved for connection, maybe you need to ask a friend to dinner or gather your family for a game night.
If you’re bored, maybe you need a hobby, a project, or something creative to engage with.
“Control of consciousness determines the quality of life.”
― Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience
I promise you — people were doing really interesting things before cell phones came along. And not to sound like your grandma, but I’m sure you could hunt some of them down and make them apart of your life instead of staring at a screen all day.
Stop fixing symptoms and figure out what you really need. Let “the twitch” tell you something. Sit with the boredom. Learn how to really connect with people. Do better than looking at a screen to fulfill your needs.
#7: Replace technology in your evening routine
Like I mentioned before, if your phone is the last thing you see before bed, then you might have a problem. A Saudi Arabian study conducted in 2016 reported that more than 90% of adults were using their phones right before bed, and that social media was what they were accessing for the most part.
Social media has been heavily reported to be the cause of a lot of negative effects in both the lives of teenagers and adults.
It’s so radically unfortunate that we’ve let this dangerous tool sneak right into our beds with us — allowing it to invade our heads, our sleep, and our actual dreams for life.
“The news never sleeps, but that doesn’t mean you should, either.” — Deseret News
If you are battling a tech addiction, kick your phone out of the bed. Find a better way to spend your time in the evenings. Connect with your family face to face, read a book, spend quality time with a partner. Do anything but look at a screen.
What feels like decompression is actually just increasing your stress, plaguing your sleep, and pulling you from the life that you want.
#8: Reframe your thoughts about your phone
According to a Gallup poll, around fifty percent of people agree with the statement “I can’t imagine my life without my smart phone.”
We’ve been conditioned to believe through advertisements and lifestyle design pushes in the last sixteen years that we have to have a phone to survive.
What’s so interesting is how quickly that myth can be dispelled by the simple fact that these “life-altering” and “necessary” devices didn’t exist prior to 2007. I was five years old before the world changed forever — and I would probably be just fine if my smart phone privileges were taken away from me.
“Digital minimalism definitively does not reject the innovations of the internet age, but instead rejects the way so many people currently engage with these tools.”
― Cal Newport, Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World
Sure, life would be inconvenient, but that probably wouldn’t be the end of the world. In order to be less addicted, we have to challenge our beliefs.
There is no code of conduct for the world that says that you have to have social media, or know about so and so on YouTube, or have a LinkedIn, or anything.
Some of it is helpful, of course, but you have to really weight out for yourself what you need and what you can easily leave behind with the right intentions and decision-making system.
#9: Employ apps to limit screen time
Thankfully, there’s a lot of technology that’s designed to help you stop using it. I won’t provide a comprehensive list of apps here, but I think the key is to identify what you need and then specifically find an app that fulfills that need.
“Simply put, humans are not wired to be constantly wired.”
― Cal Newport, Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World
For me, right now I just need an app that tells me how much I’ve spent on my phone. For that, I use a widget that I add to my home screen that tells me. Maybe you need an app to block certain apps, or to enable a passcode for certain apps that only your partner or best friend knows.
Whatever you need, hunt it down and implement it in your life. Let technology be your friend and establish some boundaries for you so that you don’t have to worry about keeping them later.
#10: Find better content
Read some physical books. Find good documentaries, well-made films, or in-depth YouTube videos that will scratch your brain in a far deeper way than made-for-TikTok content that’s made to be consumed in 10 seconds.
“When grappling with the promises and pitfalls of our digital devices, it helps to understand the similarities between our technological diets and our literal ones.” — Robbie Gonzalez, “It’s Time For a Serious Talk About the Science of Tech “Addiction”
Ditch the fast food and find yourself a steak dinner online. Use it as a tool to grow yourself, rather than a numbing tool. Be discerning about what you consume, and watch yourself grow into a better and deeper person as a result.
Technology is a tool that I think we should use. But we have to learn how to use it responsibility and for our betterment, rather than our detriment.
I refuse to live my life tied to a 6x3 inch box of technology that I somehow accidentally let guide my every action. I don’t want to become that person.
You are not your phone, or your laptop, or your Instagram profile, or your number of Twitter profiles. Your interests extend past an algorithm.
Kindly,
Katie
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