2 min read

📱Your smart phone is subtly destroying your soul and you know it - Part 3

📱Your smart phone is subtly destroying your soul and you know it - Part 3
Photo by Gaelle Marcel / Unsplash

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is -- his good, pleasing and perfect will.

Romans 12:2

Beautiful, isn't it? 🙏

This is written by Paul. He's basically a serial entrepreneur and started lots of churches back in the 1st century. This verse is in a letter to the Romans and one my most favorite bible verses. I digress..

In Part II, I spoke about how subtly of smart phone addiction and the greatest quality of life change I've experienced.

The greatest quality of life change since ditching my smart phone is the freedom I've gained from not feeling like I need to be in the presence of my phone.

It's easy to allow the patterns of this world dictate what is good.

When I gave myself the space to really reflect on this I had two realizations that started the process to transform and renew my mind:

⏰ We give 25% of our waking day to our smart phones

  • Most of us are awake for only 16 hours a day.
  • My average smart phone use, 4 hours a day. That's 25% of my waking hours.

The impact of this can be hard to feel. Our smart phone use is usually sprinkled throughout the day.

In addition to that, we usually do "other things" while using our smart phone -- so we enter a challenging space where we won't acknowledge our smart phone use to be much of a hindrance but in actuality it's completely divided our attention.

🧠 Our phones eat up psychological bandwidth and makes me lethargic

I would think about my phone hundreds of times a day. Not long. Probably just a second.

1 second might not feel like a whole lot, but the devil is in the details.

Anytime you are doing on thing and end up thinking of your phone when you don't need to you, your brain undergoes a context switch.

Context switching is basically the equivalent of dividing your attention. The reason why you see a loading bar or pinwheel when using software is because your CPU is being stretched to "context switch" into the new application.

What seemed like a 1 second thought actually turns into several seconds with an impact to productivity.

Please try doing this

The next time you go out to eat someone try this: You, be fully present with them. Don't touch your phone, ever. If you're paying, get cash or your cards ready -- no mobile pay. Observe whether or not they give you the same attention. Chances are it'll be a few minutes before they interact with it.

Take inventory with how you feel. Please come back and share! Maybe even do your own #ship30for30 atomic essay.

Part I and II can be found at allarde.com or my Twitters.