Yes, that title is click bait. Gotcha. But keep reading, it actually could save you four hours tomorrow and make you happier.
Question: When is the last time you looked at your phone?
For me, it was 4 minutes ago.
And I’ve already picked my phone up 41 times today (Saturday, May 5, 2018). It’s only 10:34am. Over the course of the day, I’ll clock in over 100 pickups, and over 4 hours of screen time. For me, this is is a problem. A problem I’m solving with a $50 device: the Nokia 3310.
Yes, I’m ditching my iPhone X for a Nokia 3310. Goodbye Whatscrapp and Instaself, hello four hours of leisure time.
First, some background:
August 2015, Sri Lanka. For 10 days I lived in a hut on the beach with no electricity, no hot water and … no internet. I was doing my favorite thing (surfing) with my favorite people, so felt I only needed to be reachable by phone, in case of emergencies. I notified my family and turned data roaming off. Calls and SMS only. Ten days of surfing and lying around in hammocks reading paper books later, I felt like a new man. For the past 3 years, these 10 days have stood out in my mind like a Golden Age for many reasons, and a key ingredient was NO INTERNET.
July 2017, London. I read an interesting article about Tristan Harris, and his Ted talk on how technology is hijacking people (https://www.wired.com/story/our-minds-have-been-hijacked-by-our-phones-tristan-harris-wants-to-rescue-them/). Interesting enough to share on Twitter, not interesting enough to adopt…
September 2017, London. I tried a “Device Down” challenge where I turned my phone off at 7pm every night for a week. The first few nights my brain went NUTS, interrupting my dreams with people saying “Jason! Your phone is OFF!!”. WHAT?? If that’s not a key sign of addiction, then I don’t know what is… (and I don’t sleep with my phone in the bedroom – already a “best practice” approach). My concern grew.
March 2017, London. I finally download Moment and see in glorious detail how much of my life is spent on my phone: on average 4 hr 42 min per day, or 29% of my waking life.
29% of my daily life??? Houston, we have a problem.
Enter my new Nokia 3310:
I’m starting with weekends (work week is hard given how much I hop around, and I’m on the phone constantly for work). It will be with me at all times – so I’m still 100% contactable. Call me or text me. I may not text back thanks to the wonderfully limited non-qwerty keyboard, so I may call instead.
The objective is to focus on what I’m doing while I’m doing it. Not having an iPhone in my pocket means I CAN’T check it 100 times a day. I can check it on Sunday night and see what all I’ve “missed”.
I love my iPhone (and my Apple Watch, going back to my wind up watch). But I love them a little too much… and I don’t have the willpower to simply not pick it up.
So I’m to leaving it on the shelf for now. One day soon hopefully forever.
Jason Ball 