I was inspired by The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry, where the author describes how his family observes the Sabbath every week: they literally lock their phones up and spend the day doing family stuff. Bren has also been wanting to try a so-called “dopamine detox” to get away from the addictive nature of his phone.

I really like the idea of spending one day a week resting—in the sense of doing things that refresh me mentally and spiritually, not just taking naps, although perhaps a nap may also happen—so I suggested to Bren a “Digital Sabbath” where we would put away our phones and avoid screens.

Here’s how it’s going.

Attempt 1

We did a pretty good job but there was a lot of rules lawyering: can we use screens if they’re in service of some other thing? Can we listen to music? Put on the ambient fireplace on YouTube? (that’s my thing) and so on. These are the kinds of things you need to decide in advance because if you don’t, decision fatigue will get the best of you. I can see why so many people take a strict no-screens-at-all stance.

We also had our phones out and were texting with our parents to try and coordinate something. I also got a few other texts. Although this is technically not ~social media~, I found it pretty draining and it was pulling my attention in different directions—not how I wanted to feel. So I thought maybe part of the day would also have to include putting ourselves out of contact.

Attempt 2

Bren forgot about it entirely. 🙂 As for me, it was Halloween and I had to (“had to”) post pictures of JP looking adorable in her costume and then I also “had to” see all the nice comments and likes affirming how adorable she is.

After that I basically just gave up. It was like when you eat one thing off your eating plan so then you decide to just binge the rest of the day. Not the best way to react, but it’s what I did. 😛

Plus, I mean, it’s Halloween—I gotta watch Paranorman.

Attempt 3

This time we decided to literally lock our phones away in a lockbox. We did make allowances for 15-minute checks in case we did get important texts or the like, although I didn’t take advantage of it. I still like the idea of completely being out of touch—we are actually considering getting a landline so people can call us if there is true emergency.

We decided that we would be allowed to use non-phone technology in service of some other active activity. The point of the day is to cut down on pointless scrolling and passive consumption, not to hate on technology itself. For example, I take dance class online. I always leave class feeling refreshed and energized so I think it falls in the spirit of the day, but obviously I have to open my computer to do it.

Of course, this can be a little dangerous because it does require extra discipline not to “just check one thing” while you’re doing the other thing. I am getting better at mono-tasking so I feel OK doing this.

This experiment also really highlighted how much we use our phones—it’s how we access the baby monitor, baby tracking, and eating plans. None of these have desktop versions. It’s a bummer that reducing phone usage also cuts you off from certain services. We still haven’t solved how we can listen to music. I shouldn’t have gotten rid of my ancient mp3 player. 😉

Lessons Learned (and Still Learning)

Decide what the point of the day is and how you want to feel. This will help you determine if you can use some technology or if it’s better to just cut it out all out (including connections to other people, such as texting). It will also help you decide what kinds of activities are acceptable (eg, do you want to spend your day doing all the chores you didn’t get to during the week? I don’t but maybe some people do)

For us, the point is to reduce demands on our attention and allow us to focus on our various projects/pursuits. In some cases that means I have to use my computer (full disclosure: I wrote the first draft of this post during Attempt 3 :)).

As JP gets older and more interactive I imagine the point of the day will shift away from solo pursuits to family activity. At that point, we may decide to have a hard “no screens” rule to encourage us to hang out with each other rather than going off and doing our own things.

Aside: In The Power of Moments they talk about creating moments (memories) and use the example of a spontaneous Saturday where the family just gets up and does something different. I really like the idea of doing that with JP; maybe once a month can be our random/surprise family activity day.

You also might want to plan ahead for things you usually use your phone for. For baby tracking, we are using the advanced technology called “the whiteboard on the fridge” to keep track of when we last fed her. At this point she’s consistent enough that we don’t really need to specifically track nap length or diaper changes, but obviously we could write those down too.

Same thing with the eating plan—write your meals down ahead of time. I’ve been on the same plan so long I’ve memorized it, so it’s not so bad.

Unfortunately, no alternative to the baby monitor other than going into the nursery and using my own God-given eyeballs. 😛

Video Games

I’m still on the fence about whether it’s OK to game. I “feel like” people would be OK with board games or puzzles, so why not video games? I guess, unless you’re doing online multiplayer, most video games are solo activities. But if doing a puzzle would be acceptable, why not a puzzle game? Is it the fact that a puzzle is out in the physical world? I’m still deciding….