Experiment for reducing my screentime

[Malice]

Hello! I have no idea if this topic should be in here or in Life on Earth as it deals with both tech and irl stuff! If this happens to not be the right place, whoops! Sorry in advance.


Yesterday, I found myself up all night on my laptop looking at pixel gifs... I had 2 classes that morning and I needed to work on my thesis project on top of that, and I ended up so exhausted that I just went to my first class and took a 7 hour nap after. I'm really mad at myself about this! I hate that I've become so attached to my screens that I'm constantly losing sleep and not getting work done or doing things I enjoy because of it! So, I decided that enough is enough, I need to figure out how to balance my screen time with the rest of my life.

I've tried reducing my screen time many, many times before with varying degrees of temporary relief. Sadly, I've always ended up back to where I've started. I've tried apps and extensions and settings and greyscale mode and basically everything under the sun (except for getting a dumbphone, I've tried but despite being an adult I am not immune to my mom telling me "nooo you need apps for certain things what if you need an Uber or blah blah blah blah" and my rebuttals fall on deaf ears) and nothing stuck. The thing is, I am also quite stubborn, and I will find a way out and I will use the same methods every time (mostly because there's not many options for getting out of this digital hell unless I cough up $50 for some app to tell me to "just breathe" or "choose wellness" while locking me out of Discord) and I will hopefully get better results this time. Why? Because I'm bringing all of YOU into it. Sort of.

Basically, I'm making my experiment public. I have a blog post on my website detailing what I'm doing, how long I am doing it, and eventually there will be weekly updates on my progress. You actually don't really have to do anything! I'm making my experiment known solely because the knowledge that other people may see me fail or succeed is a weirdly good motivator!

My goal is to reduce my phone screen time to 1 hour a day and my (recreational) computer time to 3 hours. Currently, I am approaching my last hour on the computer and it's about 7pm where I'm at, so day one has been pretty good.

I'm keeping my devices away from my bed and I won't be on anything between 8pm and 8am. This makes it easier for me to fall asleep and easier for me to get out of bed and get ready for the day.

I have no strict schedule outside of these parameters; I'm just going to live my life and see what I do when I'm not scrolling.

Today I have:
- Watched the sun rise
- Listened to three new albums
- Did my laundry
- Worked on my thesis project for an hour
- Made corrections on a paper
- Took a walk
- Sketched a bit
- Cleaned my makeup brushes
- Organized my makeup/jewelry area
- Remembered that the English department has free books (I ended up with 8)
- Read three chapters of one of the books I got

And the sun is only just now setting. My first full day and I feel fantastic. I'll do a full update on my blog tomorrow evening of my first "week" (which is just the later half of yesterday, today, and tomorrow), complete with screen time logs. Weekly updates will happen until December 13th, the day after my graduation.

Wish me luck :)

[nvalk1]

Best of luck with reducing your screen time! I had a dumb-phone for over a year, but then decided to go back to a smartphone so that I could have a more reliable device for listening to music, sending texts, and auditing deployments for my website (gotta make sure the mobile view is good). Nowadays I barely use my smartphone at all (less than 30m per day) and feel much better about it.

The main thing I noticed was just how addicting they make basically all phone software. It's a tough thing to quit.

But I think you have a good rule set forth. Make sure it's turned OFF and LOCKED AWAY !!!

You got this 

[internetant]

good luck !!

i could advice being very reflective about your time on the phone. when you have an urge to have some screen time, take a second to think why exactly you need your phone right now. is it that you need something urgent (call someone, look on the map, etc etc), you want some way to escape reality (for example, scroll through your phone, because situation feels awkward), do you want some quick rest and so on. then think of alternatives for that objective, if its not something urgent ofc.

im sure you can handle it and feel better about how you spend your day   

[grubbyfox]

If you want to try it out, you can try the free version of Focus Friend on a smart phone, lol. It's a little bean who likes knitting, but if you interrupt the bean, they lose a stitch and get sad that their knitting is interrupted. If you let it knit, it can sell the socks it knits to decorate their home.

You can set the app so you cannot use any apps on top of it (but you need to go into settings to do that), if not, it will just run in suspended and you can go on your phone anyway.

I'm trying the app and altho it's not curing me of my screentime, it does help! I will put the app on like 1 hour of knitting, then I will leave my phone aaaalll the way over where I cant access it within arm's reach anyway, and then start going about my day.

For screen time on PC, it's a bit different for me. I am usually "actively watching" something or doing a hobby or like now, browsing and chilling on a forum. I dont consider that wasteful screentime. I would feel like I was wasting time if I was reading a book I wasn't into. If that makes sense. So I dont read just to read books.

I do try to have a goal with my PC tho. I rarely just sit and dont know what to do. I will hop online to check news/weather, catch up with some friends, browse some forums, read emails, or play a game or something, or work on a website, - or watch something I want to watch because it interests me, lol.

Here's hoping you can manage it! Sometimes all you need is a detox or a push into a healthy habit and then your brain gets weened off and it regulates itself.

[foxmosis]

I can also vouch for Focus Friend!  I use it when I feel like it's time to actually get work on something that matters to me like writing or drawing, kinda makes me feel I'm taking care of a virtual pet or something.

I also don't consider computer time to be bad screen time though, really what I'm trying to avoid is my cell phone which doesn't offer any benefits.  Watching YouTube I think I'm also gonna put into the bad screen time category, like it's ultimately in the good category for me as I feel I watch videos with substance.  But it's easy for me to get sucked in and avoid what I'm supposed to be doing.

Anyways, good luck with reducing your screen time!

[Malice]

Thank you for the luck and suggestions! My first few days have been pretty good so far, I've been finding ways to keep myself busy (I got back into reading ) and I've been trying to get comfortable with just being bored. Today I was starting to get a bit more attached to being online, so I decided to clean my dorm to keep myself away from the computer. Now I have a clean space and I spent a couple of hours offline Once my laundry is done, I'll head to the art studio and work on my thesis project. I think once I get through these first few days this will be easier :)

[alexela64]

I think once I get through these first few days this will be easier

it absolutely does. I will paste here what I said in my previous thread, but thinking through a little flowchart everytime I feel the urge to do something online.
 

That way, my brain often goes "i want to watch a video" --> "Why do I want to watch a video?" --> "I want to watch a video because I am too tired to do something mentally engaging but I still want to be entertained." --> "What else could fulfill this criteria?" --> Cross stitch and listening to music or catching up on the single podcast i listen to

it's a lot about monitoring your energy levels and needs in a way that we are societally taught to ignore