MM#119--The (Good!!) Digital Hangover

Welcome to the theory to action podcast, where we examine the timeless treasures of wisdom from the great books in less time to help you take action immediately, and ultimately to create and lead a flourishing life. Now, here's your host, David Kaiser.

Hello, I'm David and welcome back to another Mojo minute. In our last Mojo minute, we discussed how awful our relationships with our smartphones were, and how we needed to set some boundaries and lead by example, for our kids and our grandkids. And our author for those nuggets of wisdom was Catherine price and her very intriguing book, how to break up with your phone. In addition, in our last Mojo minute, I said I would offer up some tactics and tips to help start our digital detox. But before we go into that, let me share Katherine's first step in her digital detox journey. 

Quote. My first step was a personal experiment, my husband and I decided to do a digital detox by taking a 24 hour break from our phones and all other internet enabled devices. As we sat down for dinner one Friday night, I lit a candle. We gave our cell phones one final glance, and then we turned them off, all the way off. For the next 24 hours. We avoided our tablets and computers to from Friday to Saturday night, we completely didn't disconnect. Or we completely disconnected ourselves from our screens, unquote. Dang. 24 hour digital detox. Now 24 hours, that's a legitimate move. Kudos to you, Catherine and husband. I might have started twitching about minute 52 of that 24 hours. But if I have to be honest with with you guys. 

But let's go back to the book. Quote, It was an eye opening experience, both in terms of how unusual it felt and how it made us feel. At first, we were constantly tempted to reach for our phones, which we convinced ourselves was out of concern that we would miss an important phone call or text message. But if we were being honest, we would actually understand it was a sign of dependency that we resisted our urges. And when the time came for us to turn our phones back on, we were surprised about how reluctant we were to do so. And how quickly our attitudes had shifted. Instead of being stressful, the experience had felt restorative. So much so that we decided to do it again. Unquote. 

Oh, how refreshing there is some hope for us, smartphone addicts. And yes, I can imagine, imagine how restorative it would be to that's a great word restorative. But finally, let's end with a final paragraph from the book because it is the icing on the cake and it's the nugget of today's Mojo minute. Quote, we call the ritual a digital Sabbath. And by the second or third time we've done it, we've settled into a rhythm and worked out all the kinks without our phones to distract us time seem to slow down. We went on walks we read books, who ya how about that? They read books, Katherine and her husband read books, good stuff. Maybe you can subscribe to be a mojo minute listener, Catherine and husband. Back to the book. We talked more. I felt healthier and more grounded as if I were getting back in touch with a part of myself that I haven't even realized I had gone missing missing. Interestingly, the effects of the Sabbath seem to linger for several days afterward. A sort of digital hangover that actually felt good. Unquote. 

How cool is that? I love when I find these nuggets of wisdom, a digital Sabbath that goes into a digital hangover. That actually feels good. I love it. So just a couple of other tactics and tips. If you didn't want to go 24 hours without your tech like Katherine and her husband,
you can turn you can try what is now being termed as a digital fast. And one of the major items to fast from is social media, and its many addictions. Now, over the past five years, there has been an increase in studies assessing how excessive social media can impact negatively on health. And many of the studies on social media use for the majority of individuals is that they are associated with several psychological problems, including anxiety, depression, loneliness, attention deficit, and hyperactivity disorder, and many addictions. 

Now, in the last five years, my social media consumption has actually slowed to a crawl, whereas 10 years ago, I was a complete junkie. So there is hope for anyone consumed in the social media craze, you can unwind yourself very, very well. In addition to the social media addiction, there's just a general compulsion addiction that's out there with long amounts of web surfing, watching videos, playing games, checking news feeds, checking email for the 290/8 time in the last minute. Seriously, who has not done that, we should all be raising our hands. So the moral of the story is we need to find ways to unplug, we need to find ways to detox digital detox. 

So in today's module minute, let us understand the benefits of creating that digital Sabbath in our lives. Where even if that's not feasible, just a digital fast for a an hour or two every day, because the benefits are just overwhelmingly good, we will be more productive, we will be more present in certainly more in the moment with our friends and our family, we will be more able to focus for longer times we will be much more relaxed, and we will have improved relationships. So let us create that digital Sabbath. Where if we can't do that, let us create a digital fast in our lives. Because when we do, then we're going to achieve that digital hangover, the good hangover of course. And thereby in the end we will be living, a flourishing and much more rewarding life.

Thank you for joining us. We hope you enjoyed this theory to action podcast. Be sure to check out our show page at T Mojo academy.com where we have everything we discussed in this podcast as well as other great resources. Until next time, keep getting your mojo on