I’m a bit (a lot) addicted to my phone. Apps are made to be addictive (see Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products by Nir Eyal). I worry about this – for myself, for children, for mental health, for relationships, for the opportunity costs.
I spend too long staring at a screen. It’s not good for my eyes or my sleep or my stress levels or my ability to participate in other things that would be time better spent.
This needs to be a focus of my personal development.
When I first read about the possibility of hooking people into doing things, back in my corporate days, I thought it was all very clever. A way to help them to build good habits. But it can also be manipulative and lead to bad habits. I experience that now, as I have fallen into the trap of being manipulated by the dopamine hits of reward and the fear of missing out.
In theory I know how to limit my use of my phone, but I (or the apps) keep overriding myself. I gave up Facebook for a while, taking it off my phone because all I was getting was adverts and stuff I didn’t care about. Very few of my friends post anymore. But somehow I got sucked back in. My good intentions just weren’t strong enough. I’m with Cal Newport’s Digital Minimalism ideas in theory, but I am not following through.
In a recent CoachTech Collective session, hosted by Sam Isaacson, we were talking about new technologies and the possibility that Smartphones would no longer be a thing. Given my concern about my own addiction and also about the overwhelm I often feel in this information-rich or information-heavy (depending on how you see it) world, I asked how/whether new technologies might make things worse for us.
I breathed a sigh of relief when Sam shared his perspective that tech designers of today will want to clean up this overload. I hope he’s right as I am having a hard time doing this for myself. I need/want designers to treat me and my limited capacity with more tenderness.
In the meantime, I read a recent article by Carol Braddick called “Technology: Empowering or overwhelming your clients…and you?”
She writes: “In 2024 you will continue to hear the “embrace technology for coaching” message.
Coaches have a multifaceted role: choose tech in service to their clients; model digital wellness; and integrate digital tools and digital wellness into coaching.
Through baseline digital awareness, contracting on the use of tech and ongoing review of the value of digital tools, coaches can help clients cultivate purposeful, balanced digital use, enhance their overall wellness and realize the outcomes they seek from coaching.”
I need to cultivate my own purposeful, balanced digital use, modelling digital wellness!
This series is inspired by Julia Carden and Elizabeth Crosse, whose research into personal development has got me thinking and stretching myself!
