Power your phone off and don't install any garbage apps. Don't do social media on your mobile phone either. This is really just about will power.
My awakening moment about how smartphones fragment our attention span
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Re: My awakening moment about how smartphones fragment our attention span
#22I had a similar awakening moment about 5 years ago. Felt like I wasted my 20s on consuming content and only playing video games outside of work. I had a similar journey. I’m even writing a book on it. I have found that the one thing that has helped bring enlightenment to this problem is reading books and thinking each day on how to apply them or just simply observing those around me instead of being glued on a device…
> observing those around me
Most days within the last few weeks I've been leaving my phone at home. Not having one on me makes me actually look around at my surroundings more. It takes a bit of getting used to but after a while it no longer feels bad during downtime, just normal.
Re: My awakening moment about how smartphones fragment our attention span
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have a landline in my home, it's great. Can't get texts so people have to call, they can leave a message if it's urgent. I can leave my phone off as long as I want and still be contacted when I'm at home.
Yeah, and if you want to go the "hacker route" you can terminate the landline in a cobbled-together Asterix PBX for even more fun. You could use a VOIP number but then it would go down when the Internet goes down.
Increasingly, “landlines” are VOIP with legacy connections.
Re: My awakening moment about how smartphones fragment our attention span
#24Related: Anyone using Blinkist? How is it?
The summaries are mediocre at best. If you are willing to have someone you don’t know summarize a book for you, then it’s good. There’s plenty of people posting book summaries online that are a bit more reputable. I personally think it’s filling the exact niche of people not spending more time being analog to find out for themselves by reading and redeveloping their attention.
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Re: My awakening moment about how smartphones fragment our attention span
#25So glad to see I'm not the only one taking drastic action after falling into the phone/attention trap. This won't work for everyone, but maybe 6 months ago I got a phone safe (this kind of thing: https://shorturl.at/drzMT >, I refer to it as the "phone jail"), which I leave my phone in from bedtime every night to ~4pm the next day. And I leave the whole rig on my bedroom shelf while I go to work at the library/cafe/k…
I did something similar for a while, but I still found myself distracted when the phone was out of the case. I ultimately opt to simply make the phone less addictive.
On Android, I used Digital Wellness to monitor how I was spending time. Then I uninstalled all the timewasting dopamine-trap apps, set limits on Firefox (10min day), disabled vibration/sound notifications except for phone calls, removed all app icons from the home screen, and set a complex unlock passcode (disabled face unlock). I also started using the phone for "harder" things, like writing long emails.
At this point, my ADHD brain just sees the phone as a tool... because that's all it is.
Next step is figuring out how to apply the same lessons to my laptop.
Re: My awakening moment about how smartphones fragment our attention span
#26I think that smartphones merely illuminate a pre-existing problem.
That problem is that people, as a rule, live in a dream-world. The smartphone just provides the most convenient exterior manifester of dreams that we've invented so far.
The cellphone is a dream-amplifier. The natural evolution from books, radio and tv.
But the central problem isn't the phone. It's our habitual-dwelling-in and preference-for the dreamworld. The phone is just the enabler.
Re: My awakening moment about how smartphones fragment our attention span
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, and if you want to go the "hacker route" you can terminate the landline in a cobbled-together Asterix PBX for even more fun. You could use a VOIP number but then it would go down when the Internet goes down.
Increasingly, “landlines” are VOIP with legacy connections.
Yeah, the trick sometimes is ask for "burglar alarm" or "actual two-wire" or similar so they give you a real pair to the CO.
Re: My awakening moment about how smartphones fragment our attention span
#28Since I haven't been commuting or going many places, my phone mostly sits idle for days, unused. I watch my wife and daughter constantly in front of theirs and I don't understand. I hate using those little screens with terrible input and fundamentally boring distracting apps. The problem is though, I'm addicted to my computer. I'm not actually sure it's that much better.
It's much better just because your desktop it's yours. Even if it run Windows or OSX it's still give you less strict cage, surveil you less and give you more options.
Unfortunately even if you run a FLOSS OS you run on crapload of proprietary fw down to the CPU but again, you have some ability to move and act, on a mobile you are just free to do what the OEM decide you are allowed to, with it's right to change policy as it wish.
Re: My awakening moment about how smartphones fragment our attention span
#29I agree with most of the points in this article and try to practice them, but I wish the author would have waited before offering his take. There are too many bloggers who read a self-help book or two, get really energized, and then, before testing the long-term results, suggest their readers to follow suit. Often, a few entries later, the blogger will then modify their take, which gives them more content for the blog, but seems like a waste of the reader’s time.
Re: My awakening moment about how smartphones fragment our attention span
#30So glad to see I'm not the only one taking drastic action after falling into the phone/attention trap. This won't work for everyone, but maybe 6 months ago I got a phone safe (this kind of thing: https://shorturl.at/drzMT >, I refer to it as the "phone jail"), which I leave my phone in from bedtime every night to ~4pm the next day. And I leave the whole rig on my bedroom shelf while I go to work at the library/cafe/k…
Getting an actual honest-to-goodness landline isn't terribly expensive, and works as a phone for emergencies. Most people wasting time on smartphones would put it down almost immediately if it had no internet access.
You don't a landline. As you mention yourself it's very hard to waste much time on a mobile phone with no internet access. OTOH, a laptop with internet can be as just much of a timesink as a smartphone.
The internet, it's a hell of a drug. Can't live with it, can't live without it.