Finding Balance - The (ongoing) battle to conquer my Smartphone Addiction

Acknowledging and accepting an addiction is the first key step to overcoming it. For me, it's a common 21st-century issue: smartphone addiction. These oh so convenient little rectangles can be hazardous to our health, and I've realised I have a problem with mine. Excessive checking, poor prioritisation and a sense of distancing from those around me are all unhealthy behaviours.

As a self-employed person, I've justified my smartphone use over the last few years as essential for my job and providing for my family — a morally sound argument. However, I've come to see that I've been deceived by myself and the companies who love us to spend hours on our phones daily. There must be a better way - and a better example to set for my kids.

During November, my average daily phone time was 5-6 hours. Although that's concerning, anecdotally friends have reported even higher usage. My aim therefore is to drastically reduce this to something that feels more in balance with the rest of my life, and just healthier all round. Primarily I want to make these changes for me and my family, but I’m sharing my observations on this blog to help others, as I normally do with walking routes or places to visit. If my insights help you, please let me know.

PS. And for those who do decide to limit smartphone use, remember you can always visit my website on your PC or Mac!!

A depressing set of stats

How does yours compare??

I haven’t put much structure to this blog - it will be a mixture of techniques I used to limit screen time, as well as thoughts and observations I’ve made during this first couple of weeks of change. I really do hope it might be of some use to you.

Don’t check your phone first thing

Setting a tone for the day, I decided not to look at my phone until after the kids were dropped off at school, or whatever other morning routine needed to be addressed. The pros to this were being more active among the chaos, and easing into the day rather than bombarding myself with overnight news and messages, most of which would be my Uncle Dave’s holiday snaps (love ya, Dave ;). The cons, with my business head on, would be what if a client from the US or Canada had sent an urgent overnight message - I need to get back to them ASAP. Well, as it happens I did have one overnight email from a client that week - but was their experience any the worse for getting a response at 09:30 instead of 07:00? Absolutely not. So far, I have stuck to this routine of starting the day with no Smartphone use, and it’s worked pretty well - I think this is here to stay.

Get the Apps on your desktop

In 2024 my social media apps are primarily for my business. 20 years into the Social Media revolution its clear to me that they aren’t something I need to be spending hours and hours on - and yet I was still doing it!! So, to help me conquer the smartphone addiction, I deleted them from the phone and only started using the desktop version. The worry again as a business owner with a digital presence is that you aren’t seen to be present, but if I spend a couple of hours on my laptop doing work when needed then there will be plenty opportunity to respond to comments etc without feeling like you are a 24/7 chatbot, ready to engage. This isn’t perfect - Instagram for example is not as good on the laptop, its been designed for phones, so work to be done there for sure.

The ‘Threads’ App has no discernible point

That’s all I have to say.

I started to use my notebook differently

I have always loved a notebook, but not carrying my phone about left a rectangular shaped gap in my daily life. A bit like how people giving up cigarettes can often be found twiddling a biro about and even giving it the odd sly puff, I decided that I would use a notebook to fill that craving for something in my hand. This has been great fun, random thoughts tumbling out of my head - some creative, some useful and some utterly pish but all now captured on the pages of this notebook. In the spirit of sharing and vulnerability offered by this blog I will let you know that some of the topics I have written down in the short period since conducting this experiment include ‘The wisdom of the Rev. Richard Coles’, ‘dictionary of my favourite swear words’, 'places I want to travel’, ‘what Christmas means to me’ and more. It’s brilliant fun, freed from the shackles of doom scrolling my brain has reminded me of what else it can do, even if some of it is utterly, wonderfully daft. Notebooks are life and, for the small business owner, jotting down a blue sky idea in a notebook could prove more valuable than 30 minutes of scrolling through competitors social media accounts. This one isn’t a new revelation, I have always loved and used notebooks, but with limiting screen time, its gone to another level.

Notebooks are life!

Match of The Day

I left my phone at home when visiting family for dinner. A lovely evening was had, then just before bed Match of the Day came on - Liverpool v Man City. A blockbuster match, and because I didn’t know the score I could watch the highlights in full enjoyment. A small win this, but the dopamine hit you search (often in vain) for on the phone was replaced by the joy of watching Liverpool wallop Man City without knowing the result. Had I had the phone with me, I would have been keeping tabs, refreshing and needing to know right now what the score was. How much better to not know, it gave me a wee shot of Sunday night happiness.

Analog skills in a digital world

Map Reading - core skill of anyone who, like me, loves trudging around hills. I have become so used to using the GPS on my OS Maps phone App that I almost certainly was well out of practice of this potentially life saving skill. So, armed with a paper OS Map and an extract from a guidebook I undertook a short hike on the Border hills last week, without using the phone. It wasn’t the Cullin Ridge, but another example of something I have relied on as convenient but can be lived without. I guess the cynic reading this would say, well what’s the harm in using the phone app - but to the smartphone addict there is no way I would just check position and put phone away again, there would have to be a quick check into Insta, a look at what buzzwords were trending on LinkedIn and a depressing jolt of news. How much more freeing to be present on the walk, listening to the geese, watching out for roe deer and appreciating the stillness of The Borders - while occasionally checking the map and really working on navigation. This ones a winner, safe in the knowledge that the GPS is there, if you really need it…

Communication Breakdown

Most WhatsApp groups can definitely wait for you to read the messages and come back to them. Even just 10 days of limiting time on the phone has taught me that. Occasionally you will however get a message that’s more pressing - such as a family member texting me to see if I was in that afternoon for a visit. I hadn’t checked my phone for a few hours so missed that as my notifications were off. As it happens, despite it being urgent it didn’t really matter as we met elsewhere anyway. My takeway from that is that if it was truly, life threateningly urgent they could have (gulp) used the phone to call me. Actually speaking on the phone is becoming as lost an art as letter writing, most folk my age and younger actively seem to avoid it, but it’s still the most effective way of quick comms - maybe it’ll make a comeback?!??

Bumping into someone on the street

Last week I posted a humorous attempt at poetic satire on my personal Facebook page. It related to the towns Christmas Tree which sits at a rakish angle. In the spirit of not using my phone much I wasn’t sure whether to post it or not but I thought it was quite well done, (I had written it as a way of turning my anger at a squint tree into something fun!), and would give people a laugh. The best thing that happened on the back of it however was that someone actually stopped me on the street, an older member of the community who doesn’t have the internet, let alone Facebook. She had heard I had written something about the tree, would I let her see it. So I printed it off and popped it round to her house, she enjoyed reading it and we had a brief chat - forget digital social media, a printed bit of paper, handed to someone and then laughed about together in person, there’s real social for you, and a reminder of the gentle power of stopping to speak to people in the street, not being plugged in to the phone.

This is a work in progress, and not a straight line

After the first week I had managed to hit an average of 21 minutes screen time - a staggering reduction from what had come before. It was tricky at times, wonderful at others and always surprising both in terms of how often I wanted to reach for the phone, and actually how little I really needed it. I don’t expect that 21 minutes to remain a workable average - when I have long tours in the summer for example I will spend a lot of time plotting routes, checking itineraries etc but it is a start. In no way have a I cracked this addiction, but even the process of putting this post out there, and being honest about the way the smartphone has become a huge part of my life has been useful - I hope it helps you if you need it, and I would love to hear from you about how you manage your phone time. Keep in touch - emails, letters or whatsapp - just maybe expect to wait a wee while longer for a response… ;)

A start!