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Earlier this year, I read a book that changed my life: Jenny Odell’s How to Do Nothing. First published in 2019 and gifted to me by a friend and colleague shortly thereafter (thank you, Emily Chan), I had initially resisted opening it because I’d assumed that it was a self-help book that would tell me to switch off and decamp to a yurt in the countryside, living off the land and staring at the sky for entertainment. But no: Odell’s tome is actually an art book disguised as a self-help book. She is an artist, writer, and academic who uses examples within contemporary art to make us consider the mechanics of the attention economy—how it keeps us absorbed, addicted, anxious, and unable to fully focus on anything beyond our devices.
It is, very staunchly, not a book filled with tips and tricks, but one which seeks to reframe your thinking and make you more aware of the digital stimulants constantly competing for your attention—the ads glowing brightly in an attempt to catch your eye, the apps designed to keep you scrolling endlessly, and the bombardment of notifications that compel you to work through them before you can do anything else.
Since reading it, I’ve become so much more conscious of how I interact with my phone. It’s all well and good to be on it, or on your laptop, when you actually have something to do, but what about when you don’t? Why am I listlessly swimming through a stream of content when I don’t need to be?
It’s how I realized that I love the Letterboxd app—it’s generally pretty dark, unstimulating, and free of notifications, which means I can pop on to look at it and easily pop out again. It’s also how I reassessed my relationship with Duolingo. The latter is an app designed to keep users coming back daily, with its emphasis on streaks and leaderboards, but I came to understand that I could just tap into it when I wanted to learn something and then choose to put it away at other times. Yes, the app punishes me for not maintaining my streak (I have often seen the green owl mascot crying at my lack of consistency), but this is my small, intentional act of resistance.
Which brings me to screen time. Mine stood at an average of two and a half hours per day, but I noticed that I felt significantly better and happier when it was lower. Turning my notifications off completely felt too drastic—I sometimes like to look through them en masse and making mental notes of who I need to reply to—and the “brutally effective” trick of using grayscale mode (which turns everything on your screen black and white) just felt incredibly depressing. I tried putting my phone away or turning it face down, but then I found myself wondering if I would miss something important as a result. Cue retrieving it yet again.
But now, I’ve found the (stupidly simple) thing that works for me: turning my screen brightness way down when I’m not using my phone. It sounds silly, but the notifications that come through no longer light up my screen. When they did, I’d find myself unconsciously turning towards them every single time, but now, I just don’t see them. Then, when I’m actually taking a break, I can pick up my phone, turn the brightness up slightly, and trawl through what I need to.
In doing this, have I ever accidentally missed a phone call? Sure, but I’m a millennial who rarely speaks to anyone on the phone anyway; basically all of the missed calls were spam from phone or energy companies. Have I sometimes missed messages? Sure, but then I’ve seen them, like, an hour later. Usually, those things aren’t the end of the world. I also have to acknowledge a level of privilege here—I do not, for instance, have children or parents I’m caring for who might need to reach me for emergencies, or have a job where I’m constantly fielding phone calls that I actually can’t miss. Those things may come in the future, but for now, I am actually able to put my phone away. If you happen to be in a position where you can too, it’s worth trying.
Now my screen time stands at an average of about an hour and a half per day, a level which, for the moment, feels about right. I also look at my phone with more intention, rather than just out of curiosity. Sometimes this trick leads to pretty hilarious encounters: recently, Emily, the same colleague who unconsciously precipitated this lifestyle change, saw me staring into what looked like a blank phone screen and asked if I was okay. (I now sometimes forget to turn the brightness up if looking at something quickly.) But still, I’m grateful that those constant head tilts from laptop to phone screen, more often than not only to see some random forwarded message or pointless update, are (mostly) a thing of the past. And my mind feels quieter for it, too.
