I gave up my smartphone for a flip phone.
We were sold a bag of lies about smartphones.
Day 0
We were told they would make our life easier, combining a GPS navigation system, an iPod/music player, a digital camera, and a computer in a package as small as a deck of cards. Don’t know the name of that awesome song that is playing on the radio? Shazam it, and stick it on your workout playlist, which you will stream from your phone to your bluetooth earbuds at the gym next time. Depositing checks on mobile eliminated the need to run extra errands and Uber made getting a cab so accessible and cost-effective, some people have eliminated the need for a personal car. We can access more, plan our lives better, have tools that make our lives incredibly easier right at our fingertips.
These aren’t the lies. These things are all true. Smartphones are nothing short of a modern day miracle and all I can say is: hell yeah. Smartphones have made life easier and better and simpler.
The lies were the costs of having those things.
No one tells you that to have all this modern convenience at your fingertips, your attention span will wane, your loneliness will increase, and your nervous system will be fried. If those costs were posted next to the dollar amount in the stores, how many of us would sign on?
There’s a lot that’s being written about our addiction to our phones and the effects on society, namely about the disconnection we feel in spite of being “connected” 24/7. Articles about loneliness, questions connecting smartphones to depression, and the anxiety of 24/7 news, 24/7 work connection and FOMO life. For years, I have read these articles with great curiosity, usually agree, and then resume my normal life.
But it’s like a constant nagging inside of me: what does my phone addiction mean for my own life? It’s hard to understand what phones have done to our brains because the change was gradual, everyone else around us was doing it at the same time (so it all seemed very “normal”) and it’s really hard to be self-reflective.
But I’ve noticed some things that I don’t like. The initial elation around social media has lost its luster. I almost never see anything in my feeds that leave me feeling better than when I started. I have carpal tunnel from constant texting. But I keep texting because I don’t know how to stop. Instead of being fun, constant texts and social feeds interrupt my life all day long with no discrimination — some texts are important, but they all interrupt with the same little ding that causes my brain to send me running to check. After I put my daughter down and finally get some “me” time, I always mean to read, but I usually tank at least 45 minutes running through my phone. At the end of every single 45-minute session I’ve ever spent, I could not tell you what improved my life or even made me happy. That’s ok, I tell myself. You’re just unwinding. I’ve come to a breaking point with stress and wondered, how much of that stress has to do with my phone? Even if I’m just texting friends and checking email and social and reading a few articles. What effect does that constantness have on me? On my brain? On my body?
And I’ve noticed behaviors in other people that I dislike. When I’m hanging with my friends, conversation will be interrupted as they check their phones and even though it’s unintended, I feel…dissed. When I fly home only once a year, my family often sits around in the living room together — looking at their phones. My nieces and nephews are in their separate rooms — on their phones. My 3-year-old daughter cries and whines for a “video” on my phone every time we’re at the grocery store because I used to put one on so that I could shop in peace. I can’t get away from it.
I grew up in the Jesus tradition and part of that tradition is a long-standing commitment to what we call Sabbath. Sabbath was a day of rest for the ancient Hebrews. It was the wild idea that after six days of working hard, people need one day of pure rest. This always struck me as a really good idea and one of those ancient traditions that would be helpful to hold onto. In the ancient world (and in the not-so-distant-past in our world) if you weren’t physically at a worksite, you couldn’t work. So they all just stayed home and hung out together, ate stuff that mom cooked the day before, and played Monopoly (also a sacred ancient tradition, of course! ;-)).
What is work and what is rest in today’s world?
Could it be that checking social media, texting, taking pictures of my cute kid, and reading news articles register in my brain and body as “work”? I’ve read some research that shows that our body releases the same chemicals when checking phones for work or for play. And doesn’t that line blur all too often? We post a photo to our social feed and then just think, oh, might as well check my email real quick while I’m here. When I bought my smartphone, I didn’t realize that part of the cost of the phone was giving up my weekly Sabbath. That feels like a deep personal, spiritual, and cultural loss that I don’t want to part with.
And so, after my beloved Motorola’s screen inexplicably went black yesterday, never to turn on again and never to be refunded due to a draconian warranty policy (seriously, could the phone companies rake in any more cash on these things?), I took it as an invitation from the universe to take action on all these articles I’ve been reading and thoughts I’ve been thinking and behaviors I’ve been disliking for years. I’m going march straight into Verizon tomorrow and buy a replacement: a flip phone. No more smartphone.
What does Sabbath — a healthy rhythm of work and rest — look like in 2019? I’m about to find out. (Leave me comments below on your thoughts about work and rhythm, I live for them!)
Today — in 2019 — I bought a flip phone.
Day 1
I had held onto the flip phone longer than most. At the time my tech startup launched in 2011, I still had a flip. I was debating whether to get a smartphone and asked a group of colleagues if they had good reasons to switch to a smartphone. Our cofounder looked at me stunned — why wouldn’t you? he asked.
Eight years later, it’s no small feat to march your sassy ass into the Verizon store, filled with sparkling iPhones and gleaming, black, bluetooth-equipped boxes that do all kinds of things, and ask for a flip phone. I felt a distinct sense of embarrassment.
“Josh” saw me lingering around the two flip phone models, and asked if I needed help.
What a loaded question.
Yes, Josh, I feel something is wildly wrong with my life. For a long time, deep down inside, I’ve known something is off, that I’m losing something essential about myself. I’m not exactly sure what it is, although I suspect it might have something to do with my phone addiction. And I’m at a point where I’m willing to do whatever I have to, to find out. Do you know what I mean?
That’s what I wanted to say. What I said instead was, “I’d like to buy a flip phone.”
“Oh. Oh-kay….” said Josh, knowingly.
I was paying $80/month for my single line plan with Verizon. Josh first proposed a $55/month plan for a flip phone. That sounded outrageously high to support the piece of shit I was about to consent to buying. I told him I saw online that the flip phone plans were $30/month. He said, well, that’s for the pre-paid plans and you have to pay $120 upfront for the phone. Doesn’t that make more sense? I asked. Well, I guess, he replied, but then you won’t have a line of credit and most people like to have a line of credit. But what is the advantage of having a line of credit? I asked. So you can pay your phone off monthly, he replied. But after 2.5 months on the $30/month plan, I’d have saved the equivalent of what the phone costs. It doesn’t make sense to be gutted an extra $25/month, which would be $300 over the course of a year and I could have bought 2.5 phones at that point. Right?
“Right,” he said. But he looked confused. He was authentically invested in this line-of-credit option.
When I posed the question in yesterday’s article what are cell phones costing us? it was a figurative question. But let’s actually look at the financial cost for a minute….
Less than 2 years ago, I paid $700 for the Moto Z (the one which completely died yesterday out of the blue and wasn’t covered under warranty anymore) which was the first phone to come out with the extremely annoying USB C charger cable. This after we were told that all phones were industry-standardizing with the micro USB chargers. So, I had to buy an additional car charger and headset converter (um, yea, there was no headset jack, so it all had to go through the single USB C port). About a year into owning the phone, the battery, which was the best on the market, faltered. I spent another $130 on the extended battery pack, and $40 on popsockets and car holders, making my phone the size of a small book. Under a year later, the extended life battery was starting to falter, too. (If only I were composing this on a smartphone, I would surely insert the facepalm emoji here!) Add $960/year for my plan. Then, add more money for any apps or games. Considering that most major carriers recommend that you upgrade your phone every 1–2 years (AT&T just started recommending yearly upgrades), and most phones are intentionally designed to only last 2–3 years, think about how much you will spend on phones over a lifetime. (Side note: why are they called “upgrades” and not “replacements”?)
Huh, I thought. Financially, we’re paying a lot to take a picture of EVERY SINGLE sunset and rainbow, read anxiety-provoking news ad nauseum, take our work home with us so we can work even more after we leave the office, have 24/7 access to post selfies that give your friends FOMO on social media, and completely optimize every drive with Waze because knowing you saved 3–7 minutes on your commute by rerouting through that side street just feels so damn good. Not to mention all the extra cash that you don’t realize you’re bleeding precisely because of the smartphone’s convenience, like ordering from postmates because it’s so easy, but the app takes a cut. Ordering directly from the restaurant itself is a bit cheaper. That adds up over time. You just never do the math.
Who exactly is benefitting from this again? Us? Or the phone and app companies?
Anyway, back to the Verizon store….
So I paid the $120 upfront and got on the $30/plan. I will save $600 this year (not to mention what I saved by avoiding having to “upgrade”/replace an extremely expensive piece of hardware that apparently, is barely worth a fraction of the price because it’s so shoddily built).
Josh told me that the people who switch to flips always come back in and say “How do you put Uber on it?” I giggled. And then, secretly panicked a little, thinking of my upcoming trips to LAX. But I wasn’t going to break my confidence in front of Josh.
I asked him who usually comes in for flips — elderly people? He said, yea, some, but mostly it’s conspiracy theorists who think the government is tracking them.
“Really? So you don’t see a ton of people coming in to rid themselves of addiction?” I asked.
“Well it’s one thing to admit you have an addiction. It’s another to take action. Most people like their addictions.”
That’s true, I thought. I used to.
“Josh,” I told him, “you don’t seem very confident that I’m going to stick with this plan.”
He smiled. “This ain’t my first rodeo. Here’s my card. If you come in and see me next month, I think I can get you a cheaper deal on your old smartphone plan.”
“I’m going to last,” I responded. “I’m determined.”
“Well, maybe it’s just that I wouldn’t last,” he responded, pointing to the wearable computer on his wrist and pulling two giant phones out of each pocket with a smile. “I wouldn’t even make it on the ride home before turning back.”
CHALLENGE ACCEPTED, JOSH.
“Let me go get your receipt.” As Josh walked towards the back of the store, I watched him, his pants heavy-laden with two cell phones, his arms sleeved in tattoos, his love handles plopping over his black belt. I found myself wondering how often he goes outside. Like really, how often does Josh go on a walk and enjoy the fresh air? I just wonder.
Interestingly, armed with my new flip phone, I did feel a lot of anxiety on my way home. Dammit, Josh. He was right. I may not make it home. If I wanted to stop at AT&T just to double check if I had made the right choice, I couldn’t because I didn’t know where an AT&T store was and there was no way to look it up. If I hit traffic and wanted to Waze my way out of it, I couldn’t. This thing didn’t even have bluetooth, let alone Spotify. It was just me and the radio for the entire 6-minute ride home. And I felt an uneasiness settle like a brick in my stomach.
Feelings of shame, of not being cool enough, of being left out, had washed over me when our cofounder asked me all those years ago, why wouldn’t you get a smartphone? I didn’t have an answer then — that I could articulate. Eight years later, I am ready to articulate a cohesive answer that question. I don’t know what my answer will be yet, but today, I took the first step.
How would you answer this question? (Leave me comments, I live for them!)
I spent six hours doing a puzzle today. My phone didn’t interrupt.
Day 2
When was the last time you concentrated on something that gave you joy for hours on end without picking up your phone once?
It’s the first full day of my transition from a smartphone to a flip phone, and my anxiety was so great, the space in my apartment so quiet, that I just had to do something. Normally, I’d reach for my phone if I felt alone, restless, jittery or anxious. I guess I could have gotten on my computer, but that intoxicating mix of texting, apps, bitmojis, email, and social feeds isn’t as alluring or intimate on my computer.
So I whipped out this puzzle and really go into it.
Nothing interrupted me.
Well, there was this one interruption. It was a text from a current love interest, actually. ;-)
He texted a pretty involved question about something that carried a lot of emotion for both of us. It was something I needed to get right in my response.
Now, I already was the kind of person who never liked to have deep relationship convos on text anyway. But it’s so easy for the line to blur. It’s just. too. easy. to just write a quick response, then after his response, maybe another response and before you know it, you get sucked into the entire conversation right then and there. We already have a habit of discussing really deep, involved issues via text because we both have kids, and sometimes, we can’t talk but we can steal a few minutes to keep texting without our kids knowing (although, I’m sure they do notice that we shift our attention from them every few minutes and are lost in our thoughts in between). That’s been our pattern. Until now.
I wrote back, “can0u talk ?” with my kindergarten-level T9 skills.
“Maybe after dinner, baths and homework,” he texted back.
I knew there was a good chance he might not be able to call after all that and an even better chance he or I would be too tired to engage in serious discussion at that late hour. #singleparentlife
I felt anxious. I really wanted to talk about it. RIGHT NOW. But the threat of unloading my emotions via T9 gave me pause. I would have to either push through the T9 anxiety or reckon with my anxiety around waiting.
I made the only logical choice.
“ok lets do thati’m typing on t9”
“Shit ok,” he responded.
I closed the phone and went back to work.
I thought about what it means to enjoy this puzzle. To not just consume this experience, but to have it. It was all my own. I wanted to take a quick picture of the puzzle and text it to my closest friends with the caption “So, I’m doing THIS today.” They would have been confused and that would have been fun. However, I didn’t. And that was ok too. I was just a girl in an apartment, doing a puzzle without distraction.
The phone didn’t bother me again. When I finished the puzzle, I felt delighted!
Before my flip phone transition, this love interest and I would have texted on-and-off for probably the next hour (or two). I would have been worried if the tone of my response was communicating truly how I was feeling to him. There would have been lots of backspacing and editing. There would have been some anxiety during the wait for the next text from him, which I may have quelled by texting another contact on my list, meaning I would have been toggling between a serious conversation and casual conversations, switching modes constantly without even being conscious of it. It sounds exhausting when I write it all out like this. But at least I would have gotten my drug-of-choice fix (immediate gratification) and not had to deal with the anxiety of waiting until…when? Tonight? Maybe tomorrow? #costs
I channeled my anxiety into the puzzle. It felt like very important work. It gave me a great feeling of satisfaction. It was tactile and creative, adult play. I could tell I was using parts of my brain and body I hadn’t accessed in a while.
And a few hours later, he called. We chatted for an hour. We had the serious issue worked out in about 5 minutes flat and went on to discuss other things. It was a lovely call. When it was over, it was over. I felt resolved and good about everything. I can’t believe how much time it saved to discuss that topic over the phone instead of giving into the immediate gratification of texting. I have no doubt it would have gone on for two hours via text and not resolved itself half as well. But texting about things like this aren’t possible for me anymore. I’ve gone #flipphone, baby.
Do you sense that being without a smartphone would actually save you time? On what? (Leave me comments below, I live for them!)
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