Your Body Pays the Tech Toll

Check your phone's screentime right now.

Is it over 4 hours?

You gotta make some changes, fam.

According to two different sources, the adult spends about 3 hours and 45 minutes on their phone per day.

If you're thinking, "That's not too bad," your perspective is fucked.

Listen, I'm not gonna say that's never happened to me, even after I became way more mindful of my phone usage (Dragon Ball memes are a fucking magnet for me), but you MUST be aware that this isn't good.

Why isn't it good? Glad you asked.

I'm sure you're aware of the brain-rot that occurs from indulgence of most mobile experiences, so I'll most touch on the physical effects of too much phone usage:

Your sleep gets absolutely decimated.

How many of you fall asleep while scrolling through your phone in bed? And how many of you wake up the same way?

You need to stop using devices that radiate blue light about 90-120 minutes before bed, preferably more. These lights tell your brain that it's not time to sleep yet, like some cursed artificial sunlight. 

If you absolutely cannot stop scrolling in bed, FOR NOW, try some blue light filtering glasses. I personally use these really effective ones that are still light enough to be comfortable. And here's an even lighter pair of glasses that is slightly less effective, but looks much cooler. Whether you're a screen addict or not, you should still be wearing glasses like these at night.

Not only do the lights not let you sleep that easily, but whatever you're looking at is stimulating your brain to the point where it's nowhere near tired enough to sleep.

You know how babies keep their parents up by crying all night? Pretend your brain is a parent and your phone is a baby.

Your posture morphs into that of a hunchback’s.

If you lean forward to look down at your phone all the time, the front half of your body (the anterior chain) becomes a bit overactive (tight). Because our body loves balance, this means that the back half of your body (the posterior chain) becomes a bit underactive (loose). 

What do you think happens if your front is tight, but your back (especially your upper back) is loose? That's right! You become a hunchback!

Also, with your terrible posture, you'll probably need to pay for a walker to support yourself properly. 

Your memory becomes worse.

Out of the dozens and hundreds of YouTube Shorts and TikToks you've watched, how many do you remember? 1%, if that?

What do you think constantly "swiping away" uninteresting things does to your brain? 

You're teaching it to dump any information that isn't "useful" to you in 0.3 seconds. Next time you need to remember a set of instructions, you're fucked!

At the same time, you're overstimulating it to the point where it can't retain information, even if it wanted to. 

Imagine a bucket trying to hold water after it's been torn apart by an industrial water hose. It's gonna be a bit tough.

Anyway, try this:

1. Discover how much time you’re spending on screens via app-tracking or site-tracking.

2. Then, choose an amount of time lower than that.

3. Think about what your screens are absolutely crucial for, and reduce/cut the rest.

4. Once you hit that lower amount of time, consider lowering it even more over time.

5. This will then require you to rethink how you spend your time.

6. Get blue light-filter glasses for when you have to use a screen at night so that you can sleep better.

Maybe you can put your phone down for a bit after reading this.

Wanna try?