Scrolling Sobriety
Illustrations by Chloe Blair McMullen
The following entries are unfiltered, social-media-deprived musings of a 22-year old who regularly spends about 7.5 hours a day on her phone. Yes, you read that right.
Just last week, my total screen time was 53 hours (almost a third of the time I spend existing in a week) -nearly 14% of which can be fairly attributed to TikTok.
Go ahead, call me a crazy person (it’s nothing I’m not already exceedingly aware of myself). I’ve always known my problematic social media consumption was probably rotting my brain, but my phone has supplied me with just enough of that sweet dopamine to justify ignoring that.
Anyway, here I am, finally deciding not to be Pavlov’s little pup anymore! For the next 7 days, I’ll be unshackling myself from the constant notifications and scrolling, and recording how I feel throughout this detox.
Here are the rules:
No use of TikTok
No use of Instagram
No use of Twitter
No YouTube videos
Going into the challenge, I’m nervous but excited. Getting in control of my scrolling habits has been on my to-do list for years, so I’m glad I’m finally taking action towards it! But part of me is almost worried -- will I be able to hold myself accountable, or will I let myself down? And spending all that time alone with my thoughts, with no content to consume… what will I learn about myself?
Wednesday: Getting in the Habit
7:31 am: I think my brain has actually cemented the neural pathway of turning off my alarm and immediately swiping over to the TikTok app. As soon as my eyes opened this morning, I wanted to escape the dread of the oncoming workday by numbing my mind with quick distraction. It was scarily automatic.
But then I remembered that I couldn’t anymore! Because I’m starting a detox! For my own good! So excited! Woo!
7:50 am: For the first time in forever, I brewed my daily espresso without simultaneously being on my phone. I’d never realized how long it takes for the double shot to pour out (around 43 seconds, by the way – I counted, Mississippi’s and all). I also never realized how fun it can be to watch my mug fill up. Makes me wonder what else I’ve been oblivious to.
8:15 am: Just sat down at my work laptop and I’ve already messed up. Agh. While waiting for my emails to load, I accidentally opened up Twitter (we are not calling it X) in a separate tab and began scrolling. I didn’t even realize what I was doing until two minutes in… maybe I needed this detox more than I thought.
8:47 am: How has it been only 30 minutes since my last journal entry?? Time moves s o s l o w l y without Instagram…
11:31 am: I’ve just finished my morning meetings, and noticed how much I rely on my phone to entertain me when I zone out. (In case my employer is reading this, it’s a joke, relax. I never zone out of work meetings...) I think I reached for my phone at least 6 separate times before remembering that I’d deleted all my favorite apps, retracting my hand sadly, batting my eyelashes real slow like they do in the cartoons.
12:46 pm: Today I’m eating my lunch screen-less. Yea I know, L A M E. Normally I’d be watching a new vlog from my favorite creator, but today all I have to entertain me is my food and my thoughts. Where do I even look? At my plate? And what do I do with my hands in between bites?? There’s literally nowhere to place them. I feel prehistoric.
10:55 pm: This is around the time that I’d normally “wind down” to sleep with a couple of hours of solid scrolling in bed until my eyes water and I’m forced to shut off my phone. I’m a little apprehensive about going to bed without this nightly comfort of social media. I wonder how long I’ll be staring up at my ceiling, counting sheep tonight.
The first day of my detox was, as expected, all about getting acclimated to my new reality for the week. It was essentially a series of realizations that there are very, very few daily tasks I complete without simultaneously being on my phone.
It’s like the concept of a two-track mind. One part of me (what I guess should be my consciousness) is living in the present, going through the motions of the day, actually doing things. But another part of me is always engaged elsewhere -- thinking about the funny TikTok I’d just watched, or resenting the jealousy I’d felt looking at Instagram pictures of someone on their vacation.
My brain isn’t just preoccupied with content when I’m actually consuming it, but even when I’m not. I’m not sure that I can consider my social media use “mindless” at this point -- is it really mindless when it’s taking up so much real estate in my head that I barely register real life anymore?
Wow, that got existential quickly. All I mean to say is that I’m tired of not being present in my own life. I want to be more grounded.
On the other hand, it really struck me how slowly time passes without the crutch of colorful pixels to get me through my day. The ~real world~ felt calmer and steadier than the fast-paced chaos I was used to seeing on my phone. It’s like I’d freed up all this peace and time in my day that I simply didn’t know how to fill. Without my phone, I was completing tasks in what felt like two hours -- but were really just thirty minutes of focused work.
As for my screen-less meals -- I noticed how much slower I was eating without my phone to distract me! Interestingly, I also found myself snacking less throughout the day, and feeling fuller with a smaller amount of food.
So far, so good!
Thursday: This… Isn’t So Bad?
6:33 am: Like clockwork, my alarm rang and my thumb began to swipe autonomously to TikTok. Luckily, I caught myself and instead put on my current favorite podcast (“A Slight Change of Plans” by Dr. Maya Shankar) to fill the silence of the morning. God forbid it stays silent, am I right?
10:40 am: My coworkers are discussing how, apparently, Rihanna delivered her second baby with A$AP Rocky yesterday. See, this is one of those things I would have known thanks to my compulsive (read: highly responsible, engaged citizen of the world) checking of Twitter news, but I was totally out of the loop for once.
3:31 pm: I’ve just finished a check-in with my manager that… didn’t go so well. It turns out that something I’ve been working on for the last few days needs to be revised completely. I feel frustrated and drained, and well, lazy and also kind of anxious. Automatically, as a response to that, there is a clear, powerful craving to reach for my phone for some cute kitten videos. It’s amazing how obvious the craving is – my hands are fully prepared to grab and swipe me to the perfect distraction. I’m so convinced a little video will make me feel so much better. But no… No!
6:45 pm: Now that my phone is a useless brick in my pocket, I’ve been trying to find ways to fill my time productively. I’ve dusted off a book that I’ve been meaning to finish for literally half a year now (Deep Work by Cal Newport, and ironically, it’s all about focused work and productivity). Maybe I’ll finally be able to get through it.
7:02 pm: I’m trying my best to focus while reading, but it’s frustrating how many times I have the urge to tap on my phone screen to check for new notifications -- before remembering that I have none to check. Social media has definitely wrecked my attention span.
It’s kind of made me embarrassingly needy, in a way. Like, whatever is in front of me needs to be so dramatically interesting to actually deserve my attention.
11:16 pm: Heading to bed after another day without social media. It’s been so refreshing -- not just mentally, but physically. I haven’t had my usual screen-induced migraine today, and I almost feel… lighter?
I’ve been realizing how much comfort I find in social media use. I’ve treated these apps as an easy, cheap way to procrastinate and escape any undesirable situation or feeling, with every new notification only gratifying my cowardice.
But I am feeling hopeful at the prospect of having more time for my hobbies! I was able to finish a whole book today, work out, and even meal prep. I feel like I’ve gotten back precious hours of my day that I used to spend scrolling. What’s more, I no longer deal with the crippling brain fog I’d experience after each period of doom-scrolling. When someone asks me what I accomplished today, what I wore, or even what I ate for lunch, I can answer them with a quickness that I haven’t had in a long time. Scary, yes, but also eye-opening.
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED DECEMBER 2023
To read the rest of Varenya’s journey, check out our collection: Life in the Scroll Age.
