We hardly make a call to our friends, relatives and even our immediate family. Ironically we are 24*7 available on our smartphones.
If you were raised in the 90s or even before that, you can’t deny that evocative sickness of “oh what a great time I had spent during those days.” Typewriters, a computer occupying the whole table, walkmans and a peaceful nap in the courtyard in winter days, no social media can give you back that sort of entertainment.
It is quite evident that all these social media platforms are designed such that they have a potential to keep us distracted throughout our day, increasing their profitability by just wasting our time luxuriously.
We follow the pages on Facebook we think might be helpful, we follow celebrities on Instagram to know about their lives. But we don’t give a second thought about this very idea, that why do I need to know what’s going on in a celebrity’s birthday party?, How is it going to change my life?
According to a study of Cornell University’s Steven Strogatz, through social media sites we think that we are connected with the world, but in the true sense, we are not even connected with ourselves, we don’t know what do we want in our lives, what should be our aims and how to become a better professional, a better person at relationships.
These addictions do much harm than what we think of. Reports suggest that they keep us engaged with multi-tasking which leads us to lose our concentrating ability gradually.
These short spans which we spend on switching between the apps on our iPhones or Androids take a control of our day, stealing a major chunk which we could have utilised productively.
These are some of the basic disorders we may suffer:
- Loss of concentration
- Anxiety issues of checking how many likes or how many followers you got
- Disruption of your time
- Lack of self-control
- Eventually, loss of friends and family who are physically present with you
So have some fresh air in the morning, maybe with your pet instead of your lifeless device. There will be some people who can discourage the detoxification of your mind as they are themselves can’t get away from their devices. So ignore them all and try to take control of your time and your life.
Tips to utilise your time with minimal use of technology:
- Don’t use a smartphone: Yes you heard it right! don’t use it. Instead, use a basic phone for calling and texting purpose. Don’t worry, people could find the addresses even without the Google maps.
- Find something you’re good at for your leisure time, you may opt for swimming, hanging out with your friends, you can work out at the gym, can read some good books or the things you’re interested in.
- Don’t compare yourself with the people who have expensive devices and don’t feel inferior to them.
- If you’re using one, don’t sign up to too many apps.
As you’ll be detoxified in the beginning of your addiction, it may cause depression, keep your rigour patiently, and you’ll realise that you can do wonders with constructive work and you’ll be even better with relationships.
—Afreen Pervez Hussain