Category: Uncategorized

Categories
Uncategorized

Phone Withdrawal

Before going to bed, I informed my family and friends that I won’t be easily reachable the next day. I also took out my watch that I hadn’t been using since I received an apple watch for Christmas – figured I would need to know the time as I walk around campus. As I was falling asleep, I thought that keeping my phone charged next to my bed (because I needed an alarm) and starting my No Phone day with a phone next to my head, I was already not off to a great start. 

As I woke up, finished my morning routine, placed my phone far up on my shelf, and sat to start working, I got excited for the productive unconnected morning ahead, and succeeded in focusing for a good 3 hour of work. 

Towards the end of my session, as my attention levels were dropping, my compulsive reflexes of typing “we.” and “fa.” to access the web.whatsapp.com and facebook.com tabs on my laptop, were much more repeated. The slot machine effect was pronounced when I focused on what I was lacking – I had to fill in the gap. I then felt the urge to reach out to grab my phone from the shelf while keeping it face down and placed it right next to me as I was finishing up my last reading. I was not even questioning these FOMSI urges and still believed I needed my phone next to me, face down – for today my phone was technically just a black rectangular plate. Why did I need to keep it close, if I knew I wasn’t going to pick it up and check notifications? 

I left the house for a quick lunch with my friend in Broadsheet, just near my house. As I was waiting for him, I reflected that my most intense urge was not to check notifications, nor was it to listen to podcasts (although I was craving to listen to “Your undivided attention” that I just discovered after reading Tristan Harris’s article) – but it was much more the fact that I wanted to check in with my long-distance relationships. The time I usually spent killing, whether it is while fixing my lunch, or walking to school, I usually call someone from back home. Not having my phone highlighted this attachment addiction, that had been reinforced with the ease of connectivity. I also noticed that I couldn’t satisfy the spontaneous urges of adding a book to my goodreads list (that will most probably stay on this to-read list for a long time), or checking my Hinge likes (that I mindlessly swipe left on, with no exception – but that’s a different story), or just simply… scrolling! I couldn’t scroll, my finger missed the feeling of repeatedly jumping from  mail > insta > facebook > twitter > mail > insta > mail > insta, and this felt like a true addiction.

After a pleasant lunch, I went back home to finish a few of my readings before my yoga session at 7pm. Just as I arrived home, I had a mini subdued adrenaline rush when thinking about all the notifications that I will be checking later at night – eerily, I felt excited.

I still had 2 more hours until class, and laziness started to kick in. I was increasingly tempted to reach out to my phone to waste time. Checking whatsapp on my laptop before leaving, I get a message from Jackson on a group chat, asking to have dinner tonight at 8:30 – right after my yoga class. Pleased with the idea, I had to impose location immediately, and rapidly typed  “Let’s go to Trina’s Starlight Lounge, @jackson @nicolas @sue @isa are you in?” Forcing them all to check their phone, I waited just 7 minutes (it was already 6:52), got positive replied from Nicolas and Jackson, closed my laptop and left the house – spontaneity was not an option without a phone.

Categories
Uncategorized

It’s Easier to Imagine the End of the Internet Than the End of Capitalism

The assignment was off to a not-so-great start. I had committed to entirely cut my internet access for a duration of 24 hours, and I was already bargaining with myself to delay the experiment. There was this Really Important Phone Call I had to make, and it already felt like I had to bend the rules. For my defense, I was meant to check in with my partner, who had been navigating immigration issues from outside of the country, on the other side of the planet. Granted, I should have made that call earlier, but as anyone involved in a remote relationship knows, the complexity of romantic life scales up with the number of time zones between you and the other half. In any case, even before the experiment had started, it was already impacted by the non-negotiable nature of these interactions. I called my partner, and then proceeded to shut down all my online devices.

Later in the morning, I found myself wondering what I was even going to do while eating, as I usually would watch some professional esports games during breakfast. Slightly embarrassed, I remembered the contempt I once felt toward people who had television turned on at all-times including family meals. For once, I would be eating at the dinner table rather than my desk, without a digital presence to entertain me.

As I ate, I made a mental list of things this temporary no-phone-no-internet rule would entail. At the top, there was the inability to access most media (I did not have access to physical formats other than books), work on my research (most of my documents were hosted in the cloud), and code (you could only go so far while offline). More surprising, I could not even play music, as my MIDI keyboard required an app in order to make any sound. I had been aware of my dependence on online services, but this whole ordeal felt unnecessarily disruptive: surely, I should be able to read my own writing even without a connection? Thankfully, no phone also meant no alarm clock, and the 24 hour period would be over before I woke up the next day. For the time being, I was on my way out to see some friends in Brooklyn.

Of course, I had told them in advance I would not be reachable, in the event they changed their plans. They did anyway, and I arrived an hour early, although I had spent 20 minutes lost in Clinton Hill, asking directions from people on the street, freezing in a cold weather I had not anticipated. Things started going a lot smoother as the other guests began to arrive, and the rest of my day was spent socially, in a way that did not require a screen. Admittedly, there were a couple of instances where I found myself standing in a room full of people staring at their devices, but I did not miss mine too much otherwise.

Before it started, I had decided to make the assignment extra hard, by opting to not just shut down my phone but also give up on all internet access. That’s because I anticipated a mere no-phone policy would be just too easy to live with: as I was in-between jobs, with a partner stranded abroad, there was not a lot going on in my inboxes. If I had been a productive agent of society under capitalism’s rule, this whole experiment would have been a lot more disruptive. I imagined missing on important communications from coworkers, professional opportunities in the making, and content of the kind that enables us to remain relevant. In retrospect, that made me wonder: how much longer could I make this last?

Categories
Uncategorized

Assignment 1: No Phone

I think it’s worth noting that I tried doing this assignment 4 times before I finally succeeded. I finally succeeded on Feb 17 to Feb 18 (Tuesday before this was due…I cut it close). I kept feeling the need to text or message or call about a thing, order a Lyft or look up directions, etc — all things that broke the cycle in previous attempts.

I wanted to do a full 24 hours, so I gave up my phone at 1pm on Monday and was going to turn it back on again Tuesday night at 7pm (just over 24 hours since there was a sleeping aspect here).

By 2:45 I had already missed a message and felt bad about it. Because I didn’t get a push notification on my watch that is linked to my phone. With my phone off my Apple Watch is just a watch and pedometer. So I was definitely not going to be getting messages as fast as I would not always be on my laptop.

I left lab and went grocery shopping. I struggled at the grocery store, unable to remember everything on my list or look at ingredients for the recipe I had wanted to make. I forgot two ingredients. I got home and found myself very rapidly checking everything on my laptop as soon as I did.

The evening was difficult for me as I use my phone to help unwind and fall asleep. I usually watch videos and then when I’m sleepy and unwound I put on a sleeping mix on Spotify and go to bed. I also use it as an alarm clock in the morning and a chance to prolong my sleep in the morning and getting out of bed by answering emails and notifications.

So instead I used an old alarm clock from my roommate, which was unfortunate as I not only didn’t sleep as well but also couldn’t find a snooze feature on his clock. So I woke up still sleepy and groggy and cold and got stressed and checked my email, the weather, and my commute on my laptop before I left the house.

Not having music or my social media on my commute was not fun. I usually spend my walk/train ride on my phone on social media, the news, and communication. Getting into work I found myself again check emails as soon as I got my computer up and running.

I will say the thing that made it easier was that I had a lot of meetings and class on Tuesday. I had class from 9:30 to 12:30 and and a meeting at 3 and another meeting at 4 and a social engagement at 5. After that I went home and was very very happy to turn my phone on at 10pm.

Overall, going without my phone was inconvenient but not horrible. Having packed days definitely makes them go faster. And in meetings and class I am less drawn to my phone than when I am just at home or in my office working or relaxing (for example, I even use my phone while watching TV).

I felt slower and the accommodations I had to make were mostly due to communication and directions and scheduling. But I found myself able to do it all on my laptop, just not as fast and also not on the move as I can on my phone. In our digital world losing one device can just make you rely more on others.

I wouldn’t see my phone as addiction to its content but rather a tether to the speed and efficiency that I have grown accustomed to living. I pride myself on always being available and in communication with others. I also do some organizing around my department in terms of events and ordering. Messaging and email make up more of my phone usage than social media and even on Instagram I am constantly chatting with friends. The anxiety and need to have my device is tied to this — its ability to be an extension of me in the digital space to leverage all the things I can do on it. 

Categories
Uncategorized

Assignment 1. No Phone Day

Like a gas, noxious or otherwise, lack of phone expands to fit the space available. My partner and I both chose the lazy holiday Monday to complete this assignment, and although I probably needed my phone less than if we’d picked a busy day, I missed it more. There were more nooks of time for my awareness of phonelessness to slip into. 

That awareness, in fact, was pretty much unyielding. We talked so much about and around our phones! For 24 hours, Phone was the unseen character: Phone was Godot, Dulcinea, Maris Crane. We examined and appraised the phoneless experience at least as much as we lived it.

It was hard to separate out the mental and physical effects of being phoneless from the effects of knowing it was new; having anticipated ahead of time how it might feel; and actively wanting to be very attuned to what felt different. Weirdly, I felt I recognized this from other times a new sensory experience had involved a deliberate choice: “Am I laughing because I’m drunk, or am I laughing because I think drunk people laugh?”

To prepare for the assignment, I gave my family and a few friends — those most likely to be concerned if they got in touch and didn’t hear back — a heads-up that I’d be off the grid. Although I didn’t communicate with any of them during the phoneless day, I did end up feeling a little closer to them, because the feeling that I ought to send them this alert was itself a nice reminder that there are people in my life who care about my safety. But I think this was a one-time, temporary-only benefit; all those same people would be very annoyed if I chose to make phonelessness a permanent state. (I have enough friends who have dated stubborn Luddites to know this is true.)

Although there’s obviously and indisputably an element of compulsion that underlies how we interact with our phones, I think we need to be very careful about our willingness to draw a parallel with addiction. For one thing, it minimizes the very real, or at least metaphorizes the very literal, danger of physical addictions — no matter how much time you spend scrolling Facebook, that action is never going to kill you. And for another, I think the pervasiveness of phone compulsion as it’s often commonly understood begs an explanation at the population level, not the individual one. Maybe epidemiology has more answers to offer.

That said, I also didn’t feel that my impulses to check my phone felt like an addict’s cravings on any more than a fleeting, surface level. I hope I’m not kidding myself about this, but the discomfort truly didn’t feel like it came from being denied tiny dopamine hits. Rather, a better comparison might be that it felt like I was walking around all day with the fingers of one hand Superglued together. Throughout the day, confronted with all sorts of minor inconveniences, I was painfully aware that there existed a tool that could erase them — and I couldn’t use it. 

In the end, I think what surprised me most was how wrong I was about some of the assumptions I’ve always made about how my phone both smoothes and disrupts my life. My estimation of my phone’s effect on my attention span has been more dire than perhaps it needed to be. When I was a child and teenager, before smartphones, I could easily pass three or four hours reading without thinking anything of it. These days, I find it almost impossible to spend even a half-hour concentrating on text without reflexively checking my phone, and I’ve made an additional habit of bemoaning this state of affairs whenever the topic of The Phonedom Menace comes up at a party or whatever. But on Monday, I settled into some reading — and not even fun reading, economics reading — and had no problem at all focusing for several hours. Somehow knowing that looking at my phone wasn’t a possibility also eliminated the impulse, which was an extremely pleasant surprise.

Reading wasn’t the only thing that turned out better than I’d imagined it would. At one point, my partner couldn’t remember a fleeting bit of trivia — “Who sings that song,” he asked, “that goes, like, ‘Ooohhhh, yeah’?”* I couldn’t answer the question but could contribute a little additional information: “It’s about how the moon is beautiful but the sun is even more beautiful,” I offered. 

As a committed pedant, I’d always imagined that a moment like this, without a phone, would feel infuriating. But instead, we just smiled, shrugged and moved on.

* The song, a masterpiece, is by Yello.

Categories
Uncategorized

Assignment 1: No Phone Day

The effect of massive cellphone use is more severe than we think. Researchers have made connections between over usage on smartphones and reduced memory, shortened attention span and reduce cognitive abilities. This 24-hour challenge has been surprisingly difficult and enlightening as a young student. I found that the time spent away from a smartphone put me in a new perspective not only regarding phone use but also plans of the semester. Constant connectivity has taken away the time we spend with ourselves.

I started my challenge before I went to bed on a Friday night, which is usually the night that I stay up the latest and the first thing that I notice is my ability to fall asleep. Phone use before bed has been a part of my routine for a long time now, especially because of my long-distance relationship with my partner. As I reflected upon the exercise, I concluded that my plans for turning off my phone have given me peace of mind; that I don’t have to check my phone for the next 24 hours which made me sleep better. But on the other hand, I was extremely bored starting the next morning.

Waking up to a full night of sleep without any alarms was invigorating, but the habitual checking of the phone was met with the disappointment of a black screen. And that was when my mindset had to change. I had to plan my day around not having a smartphone, which was honestly made easier with a laptop. But still, we often underappreciate the convenience of having these incredible technologies at the tips of our fingers. Things like ordering food, gGPS, and online shopping aside, our ability to connect with friends and family have been deeply intertwined with our phones. Even though I’ve suffered the fidgeting effects of a cellphone cleanse, I felt that I had more time in the day than usual. I was able to utilize and effectively use that time on schoolwork as well as self-work, physically and mentally. I was less distracted from just doing whatever I am doing. This was great for a weekend day where we might not have as much to do and all we had to deal with was boredom, but I feel that daily life without my phone might cause problems logistically speaking. Perhaps less multitasking is better for the quality of activities whether it be work or leisure.

The society that we live in now demands us to be everywhere at once. Smartphones might provide a major benefit regarding connectivity, convenience, and efficiency, but has it changed us for the better or left us more fragmented and with less meaning? We always talk about smartphones as one of the main points of problems in our lives, but I never actually had the experience until this exercise. The time I spent away from my smartphone was a struggle but also enlightening. When using technology, we often focus optimistically on all the things it does for us. But where might it do the opposite, taking away our human abilities?