A New Beginning

I have set the alarm on my phone for 6:30am. As soon as it goes off, I open Instagram, move to Facebook, and jump over to my email. I still have not had enough, I then scroll Pinterest, check my Google feed, and then return to Instagram! Before I know it, I have lost 30 minutes and sometimes more of my morning. I am zoned out and struggle to put down my phone and get out of bed. My mind is filled with the content from my little screen, preventing me from thinking about what is happening in my own life. Exchanging morning scrolling for stretching is my project plan to shorten my morning waking up routine and add value to this time of the day. When I decided to change this morning scrolling habit, I predicted I would gain an extra 30 minutes of my day and improve physical flexibility. What I did not predict is how it improved my mental awareness by clearing up mental space and allowing for self-reflection and this created better personal relationships because I am more present for the rest of my day.

I chose to trade morning scrolling for stretching because I have a job that requires sitting at a desk all day and every evening I sit and do homework; this can be up to 12 hours of sitting a day. I found a stretching routine specifically for people who have sedentary jobs. I prepared by laying out a yoga mat and at the top I placed a sticky note that stated “gingerbread coffee” as a reminder of my reward for doing my new habit. Charles Duhigg wrote an essay for the New York Times titled, “How to form healthy habits in your 20s” and he states to change a habit we need to have a cue, a routine, and a reward. Some mornings I was tempted to pick up my phone and the pull to do so was very strong. Laying my yoga mat out ready for the morning was a cue that reminded me that I need to do stretches. The routine was to set out my yoga mat in the evening, add my sticky note so I do not forget my reward for doing the steps to create a new habit. A cue, routine and reward helped tremendously when I am groggy and do not want to leave my bed. The first morning I forgot about my reward, once I read the sticky note, it motivated me to start stretching.

I removed Instagram and Facebook apps from my phone because they are my most tempting apps when I wake up. Even though these apps were removed I still felt a strong pull to pick up my phone and start scrolling. After a few days I realized, I was going to need to move my phone so I could not pick it up from my bed side. This meant my phone was across the room and I still was not ready to bolt out of bed to turn an alarm off, plus this tempted me to grab my phone and fall back into bed. To remedy this, I purchased an analog battery powered alarm clock. This was the key! I set the alarm. I turn it off when I wake up. My phone is not easily accessible to me, so the only thing left to do was get out of bed. It was remarkable how well this worked for me.

A week after I removed apps from my phone, I re-downloaded Instagram and Facebook to my phone. Looking at these apps during the day was allowed. I found the time I spent scrolling in the morning was added onto my evening scrolling when these apps were re-added to my phone. I got lost in my phones screen until 1 am one night on night. I was like a zombie, I could not stop watching Instagram Reels, even though I was tired. The effect was I did not get enough sleep, the next day I was very tired. Cal Newport shared in a recent podcast, “Unplugging and Finding Focus”, that while changing habits we need to find out what is important to us, and experiment with different things to get the results we want. The next morning, I removed the apps. As the project progressed, I had to tweak things so I would be successful in my goal of reducing screen time all together. Newport states changing old ways of thinking to make room for new ways of thinking is the only way it will work.

While stretching I noticed a shift from zone out time to self-reflection, a type of meditation. Keeping a journal allowed me to reflect on how stretching decreases muscular tension in my body and to think about how not scrolling on my phone was changing other parts of my day. A side effect from this habit exchange was that I was spending less time the rest of the day scrolling on my phone. On my work breaks I was walking around, answering friend and family texts, making lists, talking to my husband instead of scrolling on social media. I began to feel my breaks were more productive and I felt better mentally. Cal Newport discusses in his article, “Steve Jobs Never Wanted Us to Use Our iPhones Like This” that technology changed what we see as important and focuses on getting our attention, instead of enhancing the things that are important in our lives. The habit and addiction I have was controlling how I spent my time, on my phone instead of doing something that added value to my life. After a while I was starting to feel in control of who or what had my attention, instead of technology dictating it.

When I spend time scrolling Instagram, I notice ads that are directed at things I am interested in based on my searches and accounts I follow. Further accounts are suggested for me based on this as well. The purpose of those ads popping up and data collection was made more evident to me after watching Zeynap Tufekci’s TedTalk, “We are building a dystopia just to make people click.” This data that is being collected is then turned around and used to keep me scrolling. The data is collected and sold to other companies and used to gain our attention and keep us on their sites longer. Tufekci shares that people in power are using our data to watch us and use our weaknesses for their purposes, such as for their political gain or to spend money on their products. Learning this made me really analyze who I am giving my data to and made me take a closer look at why I spend hours on Instagram. Realizing that it is designed to keep me on their site, and I am their product they are selling made me want to take back control of who has my attention.

There is a fear social media has instilled in all of us that we will be missing out on what is happening in social media land, and if we are not “up” on the new thing, we are old-fashioned. I was relying on my phone as a crutch to zone out and not have to think thoughts and it became addicting. I can counteract this is by controlling my own actions by monitoring the time that is spent using a screen. Based on my classmates’ discussions, it is a problem many of us are dealing with. More people are writing about how it affects us mentally in negative ways if it is not treated like any other addictive product. Many of us have turned to social media during the pandemic, but is this really filling the void we all have felt? The data that is starting to come out is showing that it is not. This project has made me realize I was missing out on life by scrolling mindlessly. I have gained a quieter mind, stronger relationships, better physical health, and feel more control of my life. I plan to keep this new habit I am still forming and using the skills and information I learned. The benefits I have gained far out weight anything I have felt I missed out on.