Time

March 2023

Have you ever looked at the screen time tracker on your phone?  My Iphone breaks it all down – I can see how much time I average on my phone each week as well as which categories and apps I’m looking at most often on a daily basis.  It also shows me how many times I have picked up my phone on a given day.  Whoa.  When Apple first added the screen time reports years ago, I was basically disgusted with myself.  Sure, I use my phone for work and sometimes I’ll talk to a friend in Hawaii for nearly two hours.  I don’t think there is anything intrinsically bad about cell phones.  Well, we could get into a discussion about the effects of electromagnetic fields, how screens can affect sleep health, and the postural habits that looking at a phone often create, but that’s a conversation for another day.

Let’s just stay focused on the one thing the vast majority of humans feel they don’t have enough of – TIME.  Do the math.  Are you on your phone for two hours a day?  That’s fourteen hours a week.  That’s 728 hours a year.  That’s over a month of your life spent looking at your phone!!  Yes, learn a language on your phone.  Sure, get a hit of inspiration from Instagram.  By all means, call your aunt in Virginia.  But it’s time to get honest with yourself about the time suck in your life that doesn’t add anything other than rounded shoulders, bleary eyes and a momentary vacation from what’s actually happening in the moment.  All I’m saying is, check yourself.   Mel Robbins says that our most valuable commodity is our attention.  So the question you need to ask yourself is, do I wish I had more time in my day for the things that really matter, and if so, is your cell phone robbing you of these precious moments?  We only get this one life.  I don’t know about you, but at the end of my life I won’t be saying I wish I had stayed in better touch with my facebook friends.