For the month of February, the Karst Team is working on Strengthening Habits. We often think about a Rob Gilbert quote we heard a while back: "First we form habits, then they form us. Conquer your bad habits or they will conquer you." In many ways, we are the accumulation of our habits, good or bad.
More and more, our social and work lives are carried out online. Therefore we often have to reassess the way we interact with technology in order to minimise our interactions. We are simultaneously addicted and at times repelled by the amount of time we spend and content we view on our devices.
As our lives require us to be on our devices more, it makes the time we spend offline all the more precious, That's why we've also been thinking a lot about reducing screen time. Since the release of iOS 12, it's become even more obvious how much time we spend on our phones, often doing things that don't benefit us in any way. Turning on Screen Time or downloading a similar app on Android will alert you to your usage, and can even set limits on your usage by app.
Another way you can save time is by turning your phone to airplane mode when you go to bed, and not enabling your data or wifi connection until after you've finished getting ready for the day in the morning. Not only will this help you stop mindlessly scrolling before bed on Instagram or Reddit, you'll be able to peacefully enjoy your morning without being distracted by work emails or news alerts.
The last phone tip is deceptively obvious--turn off notifications to things you don't need notifications about, and clear or delete a notification after you've viewed it if you don't need to action anything. We can't count the number of times we have looked at a notification and not swiped it away, only to think we've received a new message or email. The newest version of android by Google learns from your past behavior and limits notifications from things you repeatedly ignore. You may find your usage decrease significantly simply by limiting the types of push notifications you receive!
These are just three small things that once they become habits, can decrease the time you spend on your phone, but make it more productive.
Leave a comment