How to unhook from your cell phone: 10 tips to gain freedom

Practical and simple tips to stop being hooked to your smartphone.

The cell phone has become almost an extension of us. We have it so internalized in our lives that it has become an element from which we can hardly detach ourselves, sometimes to pathological levels.

There are more than a few people who have an obsession with this device, causing them to waste several hours a day checking notifications or the latest post on social networks.

It is for this reason that many people wonder how to unhook themselves from the cell phone.. Well, here are some ways to do it.

How to unhook from the mobile?

Nowadays the idea that someone can live without a cell phone seems to us like something from the Middle Ages.. Thanks to more and more functions, cell phones have become an indispensable part of our daily lives. They have so many applications that they are like electronic Swiss Army knives. They have a calculator, alarm, clock, stopwatch, you can download Instagram, Facebook, Twitter... They even serve to make and receive calls, what a thing!

Whatever it is that we use these devices for, the truth is that they have become something bordering on obsession, and not a few people really have a problem. Although statistics vary quite a lot depending on the country and age group, it is estimated that we spend between 4 and 10 hours a day (not weekly or monthly, daily) hooked to the mobile screen.

The fact that we waste so much time on our cell phones and do not spend it on other more productive thingsThe fact that we are not always on the go, whether it's work or family, or simply "screen-free", has made many people want to learn how to disengage from their cell phones.

However, this is not easy. In fact, the fact that there is already a name for the fear of being without a cell phone, nomophobia, suggests how real the dependence on this device is, and as with tobacco or alcohol, it is not easy to stop depending on them. In fact, it is believed that about 80% of the population with a cell phone has, to a greater or lesser extent, a fear of being without it..

Here are 10 strategies to stop being so dependent on cell phones.

10 ways to disengage from the smartphone

Although the cell phone is not a drug like tobacco, alcohol or cannabis, it is difficult to disengage from it, either for fear of being disconnected from the world or because we have established a daily dependence routine. Here are some strategies to prevent your cell phone from stealing so much of your time.

1. Know when to use it

The first thing to do is to be critical and know when it is more appropriate to use the cell phone. Every time we pick up the cell phone, we should ask ourselves a few questions such as:

Why am I opening it? Am I going to check something at work? Am I going to talk to a loved one? Am I going to check Instagram/Facebook/Twitter...? Can what I was going to do wait?

Each of these questions, and any other that may come to mind, has a very clear answer as to whether or not the reason for opening the cell phone is a priority.

Unless it is a priority, any action with the cell phone can wait.. As we have already mentioned, the time that this device can rob us is quite a lot, being able to be up to ten hours.

A good way to avoid using it so much is to rethink the perception we have of it, and think that stopping using it, far from depriving us of one pleasure, will mean gaining another, such as spending more time with the family, reading a good book, exercising or simply living.

2. Turn off notifications

A very good way to avoid being so aware of the mobile is to disable notifications, especially if what we use most often are social networks like Facebook or Instagram.

Also It is also important that, in case we have them enabled, we filter the notifications, choosing the people before the ones we want to see.choosing people rather than SPAM or notifications. That is, yes we can consult Whatsapp notifications, but those sent by X company by email or other application better leave them without consulting.

However, it should be noted that this point is sometimes very difficult, especially if we are victims of the increasingly famous FOMO syndrome or "Fear Of Missing Out", a problem in which the sufferer has an almost pathological fear of missing out on anything new on social networks.

3. Keep your cell phone away

The best way to avoid the temptation to open your cell phone is as simple as keeping it away. Sometimes, its mere presence makes us irresistible the impulse to gossip, making us lose time while we are doing more important things like, for example, working or studying in our room.

Checking all the time what we have been sent and what we have not been sent is very detrimental to our performance. In fact, several studies have indicated that having a cell phone nearby while doing activities such as studying reduces attention, working memory and slows down our thinking..

But it is not only advisable to keep the cell phone away while studying or working. A simple, everyday action such as eating can be spoiled by abusing the cell phone. It is best to keep it away if we want to enjoy our day-to-day life.

4. Before going to sleep, no cell phone

The screens of cell phones and tablets have a very negative effect on the quality of sleep. That is why it is it is totally contraindicated to use these screens in the two hours before going to sleep..

The problem with this is that almost nobody complies with it. In the same way that many of us wake up opening our cell phone, many of us also check it the minute before going to sleep. We even check it when we wake up in the evening to go to the toilet.

To prevent this from happening we can do two things: either put the cell phone to charge in another room, such as the dining room or the kitchen or, directly, turn it off.. Whatever we do we will be lazy to check Whatsapp or Instagram notifications because we will have to do more steps.

5. On startup only system applications

It is very common that we open the mobile to look at Whatsapp chats and before we have realized we have spent half an hour looking at Instagram, watching videos of kittens on Youtube and sending an audio to our Aunt Juani.

To avoid this, the best thing to do is to move away from the applications that we most frequently consult.. That is, instead of having them on the "Home" screen, put them in a special folder or on the second screen.

In "Home" we will put the system applications, that is, the ones that will be more difficult to take away our time, such as the alarm clock, the calculator, the notepad, the health app that comes with the mobile that we never use and will never use...

Also it is also highly recommended to put as wallpaper a photo that contains a phrase that invites us not to use the mobile for non-urgent things, such as "Why did you use your mobile for?, such as "What are you here for?", "Is it an urgency?", "Don't you think that's enough for today?"

6. App cleaning

Our mobile comes with a lot of apps already from the factory. To these applications, which are already many, then we are the ones who are responsible for adding all those that have been and there are, some of which we will never use again.

The reason why it is recommended to remove applications from the mobile is, in addition to freeing up space, avoid falling into temptations and also get rid of those that we no longer use.. Many of these applications can be consulted on a computer, a device that is more cumbersome to use than cell phones.

7. Materialize the apps

Before phones had an alarm, humans used to use table clocks, with little legs and two cute little bells on top, which were used to wake us up in the morning. That device is called an alarm clock. It still exists, although if we do not remedy it, it will eventually become extinct.

This case and many more are those of apps that before they were incorporated into smartphones we used in their physical form. This is why they have become so comfortable and so widely used because, effectively, they are electronic Swiss army knives and, of course, the more things they have, the more we use them.

Based on this, and by way of a somewhat regressive exercise, a good way to avoid abusing the cell phone is to materialize its apps, i.e., to reuse the objects that inspired them.Do we still have the alarm clock from our childhood? Let's use it. Do we still have a stereo? Well, let's leave Spotify and listen to a record and, if we are one of the lucky ones who have one that works with a radio cassette player, even better, more vintage.

8. Let's reclaim the landline phone

Closely related to the previous point, before the invention of "smartphones" there were the first cell phones, those that were used to play "snake", send SMS and make and receive calls. The calls really come from his grandfather, the landline, a device that still survives in the dark corners of many homes.

The good thing about the landline phone is that it can help us, and a lot, to prevent us from abusing the cell phone.. Many people are afraid to stay away from their cell phone in case they get an important call, either from a family member or someone important in our personal and work life.

The best way to stay away from our "smartphone" without fear that they can not contact us is giving them our landline, and reminding our acquaintances that if it is an emergency call us that way.

9. Controlling time

Our cell phone is to blame for the fact that we pay too much attention to it, although, of course, we are also responsible for that. The good thing is that the cell phone can become our ally in our struggle to stop using it so much, given that there are countless applications that allow us to know how much time we dedicate to the device and how much time we spend on it..

Some of them are Moment and Quality Time, although there are also applications such as Instagram that have the function of sending us a reminder every time we go over the time we have indicated. There are also apps such as Flipd or Freedom that block access to certain applications during breaks.

10. Set the screen to monochrome

This measure may sound radical, but it is very effective and has a psychological explanation.. Most apps use bright colors in their icons, colors that we have associated with their name and function: red for Youtube, light green for Whatsapp, blue, pink and gold for Instagram...

Setting the screen to monochrome, that is, grayscale, means that we are not impressed by the vivid colors of the application. By simply not seeing them, we do not notice them as much when we open the mobile for anything and, therefore, there will be less chance that we fall into temptation.

Referencias bibliográficas:

• Park W.K. (2005) Mobile Phone Addiction. In: Mobile Communications. Computer Supported Cooperative Work, vol 31. Springer, London
• Reagle, J. (2015). Following the Joneses: FOMO and conspicuous sociality. First Monday, 20(10). https://doi.org/10.5210/fm.v20i10.6064