I find myself spending way more time than I'd like scrolling this site, Reddit, Twitter, etc. I want to limit my digital use to bare necessities, but when I'm mentally exhausted (poor sleep, after work, etc.) it's kind of all I have the energy to do.
I feel like doing literally nothing, getting lost in my thoughts can be even MORE tiring than using the internet lol. Maybe that's normal, or maybe it's like my depressive/anxious brain refusing to shut off or be nice.
Anyway, if you weren't spending your time online, how would you shut your brain off and unwind?
I basically used Hexbear as substitute for other social media, now I have only one addictive site.
I’m trying this but including some discord’s as well. Day ten. For me it isn’t about unplugging it’s about resisting the emotional conditioning of likes and retweets. Twitter will happily make you feel like dunking on someone matters but it will never produce the meaningful change we need… so I feel like it’s function is to be a heatsink for radical energy.
Before smart phones I would read a book or two a week to the point I would start reading through my collection again when I ran out of new ones.
Quitting cold turkey doesn't generally work. Turkeys are warm-blooded, and also lazy. If you want to quit a thing, instead focus on doing less of the thing than yesterday.
You also can't spend your time not doing something. So if you want to log off, you need to pick something else to do in that time instead. Doomscrolling is pretty fucking bad for you, so you'll still be doing better for your mental health if you play video games, or sit there like a lump watching anime. You don't have to jump straight to using that time to compose the next great novel or whatever the fuck.
Finally, if you're routinely too exhausted to play video games, you need to start working out. Even if that's just three squats and a pushup after work for now, building up that habit will get you better sleep and, paradoxically, more free hours in the day.
Use a redirect extension and set reddit and twitter to something that frequently doesn't work, libreddit and teddit both break quite a lot. I also trained myself to ask if I really want to do what I'm doing or if I'd rather do my hobbies, that helped me cut bad video games a lot. Sometimes I'll have a video playing in the background and that's enough to satiate whatever in my brain likes dumb shit. In my experience energy is absolutely a prerequisite though, if I'm tired then it just doesn't really matter what I do.
Start small: 20 minutes every weeknight toward an [unplugged] activity you want to do but currently don’t.
Yeah this is great! Don't be like "oh I locked my phone for 3 hours" - just replace that time with something else. If you don't plan it out, you won't want to actually unplug- for good reason. Honestly staring at your phone is a much better use of time than staring at the wall.
I don't have a cellphone. Haven't had one for about a decade. I fucking hate the things.
I like it because I spend a lot (A LOT) of time at the computer, so when I need to unplug and get away from the screen I just leave the house.
When I go get groceries or just head to the beach for a smoke I don't get notifications. No calls, no texts, nothing.
I know that doesn't work for everyone; some people need a cell for work or whatever, but it's worked swimmingly for me for many years.
I keep a phone nearby (usually in my bag—never a pocket) for emergencies, but it's never been a smartphone. And my e-mail is set for manual updates only, which I refuse to refresh for days at a time. These principles stop the entire world from keeping me at their beck and call. I'm almost always happy to talk with people, but I'd prefer it to be in person. When the phone company screwed up an installation and took a fortnight to fix it, hardly anyone noticed for the first week. Facetime conversations stopped but most regular contact went on as normal, actually face-to-face.
When I'm online, I avoid bitty stuff—doing a bunch of inconsequential things feels more tiring to me than doing one or two more-involved things well. And, since I have to spend a good chunk of the day at a screen, I'll grab any opportunity to get up and move around. As others have said, exercise is great for the mind. So, remote conversations, watching videos, etc, usually involve walking around in figures of eight (to prevent dizziness).
Outside contact is good, but it should enhance your life. A better experience doesn't have to mean less of that interaction; as with most things, it's a sense of control that you should aim for. But if taking control means stepping away, and tiredness is a constraint, you could try something simple, repetitive, yet constructive. My mum finally got me into knitting after years of telling me how relaxing she finds it. She's right. It requires just enough focus to block other thoughts, but is easy enough to be an anytime activity, and it's completely interruptible. Plus, you get a cool jumper or hat at the end, or you can just unravel it all and make something else.
This hasn't just been one long recruitment post for Knitting Club. You don't have to join. (But, seriously, you should.)
I'll join your knitting club if I can crochet instead. I don't know how to knit but I'm getting better at crochet with each project.
Crafting is crafting! Macramé, embroidery, wire wrapping, soldering, carpentry, 3D worldbuilding: if you enjoy making something then I'm happy for you.
And, yeah, I should have mentioned the feeling of improvement is especially motivating at the start, when you see the biggest changes. I'm still in that zone of wonkiness reduction myself.
When I'm outside l do things with friends such as hiking/trivia, both things where phones are discouraged. Scrolling is all I can get myself to do at home, other than g*me. I don't even watch movies or shows anymore. It's pretty bad lol
I find that observing the sunset and in general being cognizant about where the sun is in the sky to be helpful to my mental health. Practicing this also makes it really obvious that modern society is not at all centered around the sun but rather arbitrary times that's completely disconnected from nature.
Probably watching a TV show, movie, listen to music, play a board game(probably solo), in the summer i work in my garden, and lately ive been finding ways to reduce what i own and be more minimalist. lately ive played a couple games online with friends sometimes.(Deep Rock Galactic and Sea of Thieves)
a never ending list of things that need to be repaired or projects i haven't finished. if my hands are greasy or dirty it makes pulling out my phone harder.
I've tried using some different apps that lock my youtube or reddit off after a certain point but honestly if I want to use them enough I'll just log in on another device or whatever.
Something I have found helps is just making my browsing experience shittier and shittier until it's annoying more than fun.
For example I just logged myself off reddit and changed my password to something I immediately forgot . Now when I go to reddit it's the shitty default subreddits and the awful default UI. The first 50 posts are all either about Ukraine or just videos of poor people fighting in McDonald's. Now I hate it enough to never go there again for more than about 2 minutes.
I use an android app called "Lock Me Out". Basically I have it lock all my fun apps after 10pm, and YouTube after 1 hour of use. It requires a password to break, and I made my partner the password holder. This helped me a lot.
