Alarmed
Every night before I go to bed, I turn my phone off, and plug it into my charger which is left downstairs in my living room. Then I do whatever small tasks I may need to do before the night ends, maybe doing some dishes, random organizations or just thoughts on life…then I head upstairs to my room and I go to sleep. To wake up, I have a small digital clock that has pretty much zero special features of any kind other than the fact that you can set an alarm. A shorter way of describing what I have as opposed to the previous run-on sentence would be to say that I have an alarm clock. I set it, and go to sleep until it wakes me up in the morning.
When it goes off in the morning, I turn it off, get up, (realistically I hit snooze like 7 times but in this article I am prompt, responsible, and eager to start my days with a positive attitude and outlook on life and existence) and bring some clothes downstairs to change into after I shower and brush my teeth. Then I make breakfast, which most of the time is eggs. I consume the hell out of my breakfast, AND THEN…I turn my phone on.
I end the last 10-15 minutes of my evenings without my phone (sometimes I try to make it more than that but it’s at the very least 10-15 minutes) and I start every day with at least 45 minutes to an hour without my phone. Now if I’m being honest, I pretty much always have some sort of video of interest playing that I’m listening to as I make and eat breakfast, but I’m intentional about using my laptop for that. I don’t scroll on my laptop. I open it up after I’m done in the shower, pull up youtube and usually the video I want to watch is right there at the top anyway and play it as I start chopping up some vegetables.
I have many questionable qualities but this one is one of my favorites. I got in a really bad habit over COVID of starting and ending everyday with my phone. It was never ending. My mind never got a chance to really wake up on its own…and honestly it never even really got a chance to go to sleep. Ever. And it inevitably sent me into a pretty glorious downward spiral. I already spend enough time looking at it throughout the day, I just don’t need to take it to bed with me. I’ve become hyper aware of that groggy, draining, tired feeling I get when I spend too much time looking at my screen.
And lately that hasn’t even been limited to just my phone. Last night I went out to eat at a new pizza place I’ve never been to and while the food was great and everyone was very friendly, there were tv screens everywhere all playing different shows or sporting events and it was like it was actually impossible to face any direction without being inundated with a screen of information. And that’s not a knock on this particular place I visited. I think most food establishments are like that, but it was like the only possible way I could not see a screen is if I just looked straight down, and I hate that.
And I hate the argument that “well the things you see on social media can be inspiring, if you follow artists you admire or other art accounts you can gain some real inspiration for future creations”. I don’t know, I kinda think that’s shit. Not that there aren’t amazingly talented people out there putting out some insanely creative things that truly are inspiring…but I find that whenever I see something that piques my creative interests, I save it and then I keep going because I want more. And then I scroll and scroll and scroll waiting for the next thing that’s going to inspire me. And before I know it I’ve been sitting there for an hour not actually doing anything creative at all. Just numbing my mind, tricking myself into thinking I’m doing some kind of prestigious research that’s going to help me forward my own genius. But then I get done and I’m struck with that same, numb and uninspired feeling.
Breaking Boundaries:
The reason I felt inspired to construct this article is because recently, for the first time in a while, I broke the routine that I outlined at the start of this diatribe. My girlfriend was away this particular evening and I made the huge mistake of ending my evening routines, and then for some stupid reason I took my phone with me to bed and just scrolled. As if I was going to miss something between the time I turned the light off downstairs to when I got to bed.
I remember seeing a video of Jordan Peterson angrily disputing that nobody should celebrate pride month or anything pride, because pride is a sin and it’s shallow. I saw a group of police officers entering a building with dogs and assault rifles. I saw Aaron Rodgers defending the integrity of RFK Jr. in a conversation with Tucker Carlson. I saw a vlogger from Rafah. I saw a mom who accidentally set her whole kitchen on fire when she poured water on an oil fire. I saw a clip from John Mulaney’s Netflix show. And I think something about Daniel Radcliffe?
For the next several days after this evening when I did this stupid thing…I felt particularly despondent and hopeless for humankind.
What the hell are we doing?
And what are we going to do?
(but seriously…)
Those feelings are still lingering in me but I find that time away from my phone helps. But why is it that I can feel less bad just being in the world and existing with the people in front of me and so much drastically worse when I’m watching the world through my screen? Well that’s a dumb question I guess I know how. I don’t experience all of the atrocities and tragedies that the world experiences everyday but I can see them on my phone. I don’t engage with people in particularly divisive political or cultural conversations with those who have differing opinions but I can see those people ranting on social media. (to be clear, I have many people in my life that have different political opinions than I, and differing values in a lot of other ways. I think it’s essential to not just be surrounded by people who think that same way as you. But those people are mostly coworkers or loose colleagues of some sorts and conversations don’t typically breach those topics)
But I also don’t think the answer is to block it out either. I don’t want to block accounts that differ from my views. I don’t want to not see the products of war. I don’t want to not hear the voice of the other side, whatever side that may be. It seems like I have to know what’s going on and how everyone thinks and what kinds of people are out there…but it also feels impossible to digest sometimes. How do you find the balance?
I’m not writing this article because I have an answer to that question, I’m writing it so that I can ask you and seek for an answer. How do you salvage any peace and calm, and allow yourself to think clearly, while still indulging well rounded information? It’s unprecedented what we’re going through at the moment. I don’t just mean current events, but this whole internet thing and our phones and how powerful everything is getting and how fast everything travels and how it’s shaping our minds and unveiling some of our strange, often cruel, and highly impactful human tendencies. We don’t understand it yet and it’s growing faster than we can comprehend….but I’m hoping maybe somebody out there is an outlier and has comprehended it, and can tell me what to do to not go insane while still remaining informed.
Boundaries definitely help, which is why until then, I swear to anything and anyone that I will not be taking my phone to bed with me again. From now on, insanity can be designated to the living room. My room room is strictly for rest