Reduce Cell Phone Usage!
Happy Friday friends! I’m here to talk to you about everyone’s favorite subject, your cell phone! It’s so crazy how as a society we are more connected than ever and often cannot leave our homes without our cell phone. Today I want to talk a bit about how to reduce cell phone usage.
I’ve had a cellphone since middle school but I honestly didn’t have a smart phone until college and I’m grateful for that. Social media and phone usage has skyrocketed in the past few years and as a society, we are starting to feel the effects. People lose sleep because they’ve allowed phones in the bedroom. Most people walk around the street with their heads down looking at their phone. When there is a lull in a conversation, we instinctively reach for our phones. And that’s not even taking into account the problems we are facing because of social media.
Basically, we need to find times to unplug and reduce cell phone usage. Cell phones are so ingrained into our society that we have to make a CONSCIOUS effort to remove ourselves from it. Here are a few things I do to reduce cell phone usage.
#1: Use an alarm clock
Bringing your cell phone into the bedroom is not a good idea. My husband and I don’t even have a TV in the bedroom because it gets in the way of the main reason for the bedroom: TO SLEEP. We have a traditional clock and I’ll even have our Google Mini set alarms. If we absolutely fear that the power will go out overnight and both of those alarms will fail, we set out phones in the guest bathroom with the ringer high enough to hear it. By removing the phone from the room completely, it reduces the temptation to scroll for hours instead of sleeping.
#2: Set a “Do Not Disturb” schedule
I started doing this because work started getting ridiculous. Texts were coming in for non-urgent matters later and later into the evening. Now I have a daily schedule set where all notifications are muted from evening until morning. This keeps me from picking up my phone when the notification rings and then getting sucked into other apps. Obviously, I set my exceptions but it has been great so far.
#3: Do a virtual detox
Taking a day or a weekend to remove yourself from your phone as much as possible is absolutely amazing. I attend a church conference where we are out in the country and we aren’t allowed to have our phones. Usually, I’m the first one handing my phone over because I am glad for a break! Sure it may seem weird at first but it will reduce your stress level and you’ll feel tons better for it!
Those are just a few of my tips to reduce cell phone usage. Hopefully you’re able to implement one or a couple of these. Please let me know if you do and how they work for you!
Do you take phone breaks every so often?
