I was thirteen years old. Maybe fourteen. It was after I gave up on the sparkly purple inflatable chair and moved onto the blue butterfly chair. I was home alone, sitting in that uncomfortable chair in my room reading Pride and Prejudice. I set the book down for a minute to rest my eyes and listen to the sounds of a quiet summer afternoon coming through my open bedroom window—insects, a distant lawnmower, the breeze moving the tulle “curtain” I tacked around the window and the beads hanging outside my closet. “What is this all for?” I asked myself. “Am I wasting my life reading all the time? Should I be out there living?”
I regularly think about this moment when I stress about the impossible height of my To Be Read pile. I also smile back at it, somewhat perplexed. This was a time before FOMO. There was no specific activity I thought I should be doing instead. It was simple existential dread, the sudden dawning on me that I had one life and might spend most of it reading. Oh, sweet younger Kasey, there are much worse fates.
Remember when it didn’t always feel like there were too many tabs open?
At any rate, I had my whistful moment and then went back to the book. I have a lot of memories of reading from this time of my life. There are photos of me in three consecutive yearbooks, sitting on a desk in the journalism classroom, reading a book. It is no surprise that I read voraciously. That love of reading shaped much of my life, leading me eventually to a Ph.D. in American literature. As I moved through my degrees, however, I found that my focus, comprehension, and stamina as a reader took a big hit.
I think I can fairly attribute part of this dip to the increasing work difficulty, burnout, and boredom. I had to read a lot of dreadful works in graduate school and struggled, but when I read a novel for fun, it was like binging on candy. I devoured them in one sitting. Most of the degradation of my reading stamina, however, probably comes from the expanding internet, streaming, and social media reach during this same time. I am not going to get into the details of the impact of social media on attention span here; that is well-documented and there are many articles and books on the topic available.
Healing My Brain
Sometime two years ago, the cumulative effect of scrolling on my phone; listening to podcasts; and multitasking, trying to keep all the plates in the air with a toddler, alpacas, bees, and a grumpy little dog, I had enough. I felt that I was not really present in moments that I wanted to be in, so I started a challenge to spend 1000 hours unplugged—no screen, no phone. It came out to an average of three hours a day. It was hard at first, then easy, then I wanted more.
Last year, I set up a screen time monitor on my phone and set a limit of 4 hours a day. That was mostly doable. This year, I rolled it back to 2.5 hours, which has been a real challenge, but eventually, I will adjust. This infographic from The Guardian offers plenty of motivation. My 2.5 hours a day still adds up to over a month a year on my phone. There are some caveats.
Listening to podcasts does not count. I find that I am listening to fewer of them on a lot of days, I think as a downstream effect of enjoying less distraction.
I received subscriptions to The Atlantic and Vanity Fair for my birthday, and I save anything from them, lit mags, or newspapers so I can read them either on my computer or another device. I don’t think reading good writing should count.
Time on my computer does not count, but given my lifestyle, the computer does not have much opportunity to consume my time the way the phone does. Also, I work there.
The screen time monitor does count both Maps and Messages, which feels a little unfair, but I have not found a way to control it.
I also use my phone to shop, clip coupons, etc. for many of our household needs, but that can be an unnecessary time sink, so I think it is good it gets lumped in.
In the six weeks I have been seeking to strictly cut my screen time again, here are some trends I have found.
Self-interruption is real. My friend Rachele sent me this podcast episode from Hidden Brain: Finding Focus (thanks, girl!) and one of the biggest insights for me was the trend for self-interruption. As our attention spans have deteriorated, we tend to interrupt ourselves even if we are not interrupted externally. I have been trying to catch myself in these moments of self-interruption and resist the call of the scroll, the chores, etc. It has revealed to me how much I interrupt myself when I am working. Room for growth!
The internet can be very boring. A recent episode of Offline, “Are Algorithms Making You Boring?” discussed how social media algorithms are driving everything toward trends, at the expense of creativity and exploration, as platforms like TikTok and Instagram curate for us. Part of why I enjoy lit mags so much is that people sometimes do bonkers things and it is a balm for the same-sameness of the scroll. As the algorithms push more curated content over people and accounts I follow or know, I do find that less social media interests me. Still, the scrolling gets addictive, and sometimes I have to remind myself that I am bored and need to put the phone down instead of wasting my limited screen time. I can be bored and look out the window.
I am sleeping better. I will admit that in part, it could be the season changing, but in the last week, I have woken up, thought it was 3:00, looked at the clock, and seen that it was after 6:00. I had slept straight through the night (and my alarm) without waking once. That did not used to happen.
Less angst. The internet can be lonely. I am trying to build a platform for writing and the homestead. With the algorithms pushing Reels and ads, it can be hard to get any traction if you do not repeatedly go viral. I do not want to engage in the attention-seeking behavior these patterns seem to demand. It is disheartening when you post something you put thought and care into and it feels like no one sees it. So I have posted less on my personal accounts and felt less angst about it overall.
Fewer ads. Algorithms are pushing more advertisements, paid content, and influencers shilling junk as a way to keep making money. (See the point about boredom above). I am also trying to be mindful of our consumption (Less Is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World) and often find that when I am on Instagram, I wind up on a shopping website, asking myself how I got there.
Better communication. One of my younger siblings is in college and they are not on the same social media platforms as me, but I have been enjoying texting with them about things we are mutually interested in and I don’t know that these interactions would happen on social media. Similarly, I have noticed that some of my dearest friends rarely post online anymore, but because I am also online less, when I find something interesting they might like or when I think about them, I usually (not always, womp) send them a message. Maybe this is not revolutionary, but to my introverted Millenial ass, it feels much better than sending memes back and forth.
My brain feels more spacious, with more room for calm and creativity, in a way I cannot quantify. I have been reading a book slowly, with a pen in hand, and it is exquisite. And, yes, healing.
I’m Keeping My Wallet or The Joy of Privacy
Last night, I fell off the wagon, and as I was struggling to fall asleep, I started scrolling and saw an article about how Gen-Z thinks carrying a wallet makes Millenials look old. Excuse?
There are a few underlying assumptions here:
People carry wallets because they are cool, not because they are functional.
I care if Gen-Z thinks I’m old. (As they bring back the worst looks of my youth and watch Friends.)
These micro-trends matter.
The ick I felt was a reminder of why I am trying to get offline, heal my internet-addled brain, and get back to that younger me who read in the quiet of a summer afternoon without a smartphone, only a dial-up modem to connect her to X-Files message boards.
Recently, my college-aged sibling sent a text telling me that they keep seeing Gen-Alpha on TikTok and asking if their feelings are like how I felt seeing them and their friends. I reminded them that when I was their age, Facebook was new and Boomers and children were not on social media. I do not want to eulogize some dreamy past. The internet is useful in many ways. We have so much access to good information. But they reminded me of a time when I could go home, dream, create, and be my odd little self, and no one had to know about it. I want more of that energy in my life. Maybe I should go make a zine. But I have to go shuck the barn.
All of this is just my experience, but if you wonder if you might spend too much time scrolling, I invite you to join me. The links included above (for which I receive no kickback), have plenty of resources to get you started. I would also love to discuss the joy of disconnecting with you, too!
TL/DR: Go touch grass, my loves!
(I wanted to call this post Leaves of Grass, but that title was already taken.)