It was Fourth of July weekend, we had just gotten out on the lake. The first beautiful sunny day with family to start the long holiday weekend. And splash, there went my phone. Right into the bottom of the lake!
I immediately freak out because hello, my life is on that thing. Plus how can I take pictures of my son’s first 4th of July without it? 
What I came to realize that weekend was just how freeing it was to not be attached to my cellphone. I spent every moment truly soaking in every moment and memory and I didn’t aimlessly scroll through social media or worry about posting the perfect picture. I genuinely enjoyed my weekend. Afterward, I got into bed and went right to sleep to do it all over again the next day – who would’ve thought it’s possible.
By losing my phone, I was able to see how easily my time was spent consumed being on the internet or picking my phone up just because it was near me.
To be quite honest, it scared me a little with how many times I went to grab the phone that I didn’t have. The internet is an amazing invention with great resources, I mean aren’t we all on the internet right now? But it is so easy to become obsessed, whether you believe you are or not, you probably are even a little bit.
Once the weekend was over and a few days had gone by, I will say that I was happy to finally have a phone back. It was my connection to the outside world, especially since we are all living during a pandemic. I really did feel like I knew nothing that was going on. But now I have been trying to be more conscious of the time I spend on my phone.
A little tip I learned is that you can put time limits for yourself on your iPhone for different apps and when your time is up, the app will not let you get into it. This has been a game-changer for me. I allow myself one hour of social media per day now and it’s made a world of difference. With everything going on in our world today – I realized that I was letting it start to consume me when I would get onto the internet.
Whether it’s social media, games, shopping, whatever your cellphone vice may be, I challenge you all to put the phone down for a day and see if anything changes like it did for me 🙂
