What I learned after switching to FLIP for a month

On the day of April lie, I called my mother. I told her that for a month, I was “going to the phone” – meaning, giving up my iPhone for one of them without access to social media applications. Not, it was not a joke.

My resurrection with the screen time reached new tops in late March after a long time in physical therapy and a series of rainy days near the fixed.

But first, some context: stare on the screens throughout the day for a livelihood, and I am not a stranger to the life attached to a computer, the size of the palm or not. It grew up in the first decade of the twentieth century, and I played Neotes and The Sims 2. She later inherited that IPHONE 3GS from my mom in 2011 as a student in the eighth grade, goodbye to my country LG Lotus Flip Phone. I have been on Instagram a year ago.

For more than a decade, I lived the idea of ​​”good screen” and “bad screen”. That is, the bad screen is the work/related to the school, and the good screen is only dedicated to feelings, such as spending an hour or so in a Wikipedia rabbit hole. I felt a good screen as if it was reclamation for my time.

It turns out that a good screen is actually a farce. We did not know this at that time in 2010, but the increase in the use of smartphones and social media Perhaps it was bad for my sophisticated property at the time. According to October 2024 CDC report, The percentage of adolescents with symptoms of anxiety or depression was higher among those with four hours or more than the daily screen time.

For me, the decision came because I realized that my phone was hindering the act of anything else literally. Like going to a café with a friend. Or play evening football and get a drink yet. Or host dinner parties. If there is one thing you learned while working here along with Allie Volpe, then the key to good life is to get some sun in the early day, do regular movement, and social communication often.

So “Dumbphone” was.

My managers said the rules were simple. I had a budget of $ 100. (To him: “I mean, it is better to be less than $ 100. He will not do anything.”) And I had to go forward. This means that I could not switch between phones. The only exception was to use the iPhone for dual -factor authentication applications.

“I wonder if you have any friends who finally left,” my manager, editor -in -chief Bian Walsh, encouraged me. “Or maybe more because you will contact them on your phone. Maybe you will get new friends, better.”

The strict budget acquired a fantasy but is still free from the Internet like a light phone. My colleague Adam Clark Estis tried last month. So it first turned into old phones.

My father had an old Motorola Razer’s partner in a drawer, and I always wanted to do so when I was a child (or a T-Mobile Sidekick or LG chocolate). But hours after trying to know if the phone was compatible with my transportation company, I learned that the US infrastructure for 2G connection It was closed this year. I couldn’t use anything that was at least 4G. I am effectively king For a new phone.

Of course, I chased the best online resource to make financial decisions: Reddit. I have reviewed a lot of publications R/dummphonesAnd I finally decided to go to (at that time) $ 90 HMD Barbie Phone. She had maps, texts and camera – but there is no application store. Technically, it contains the Internet, but it is so impossible to use it that it may not be there.

When my friends heard about my little experience, they were worried, happy, partially, and wondering how we were planning to watch Watch Formula 1 on the ground.

I did not identify any intentional goal of the number of times that you should communicate with people or make plans. But in the absence of passion without Instagram or Tiktok, I was excited to reach people.

However, my text was very reserved due to the digital keyboard. Some of my friends were upset about this within a week. Someone wrote me to ask about my thoughts about the definitions, and I answered, “They are Hard Hard 2 says.” A few hours later, I wrote to me some personal news that justifies a quick phone call. “I can feel yourself restricting your thoughts in your texts! It is good to hear your voice now,” she said in that call.

This friend lives in a different city, so I can’t see her much. But since we did not see what the other was on Instagram, we called each other a lot more than we were usually.

Talk about Instagram … What a double -edged sword! It is either a black hole of endless and meaningless scroll or is how to know the latest parties, the book version or the opening of the restaurant. Certainly I missed a lot of potential pendants by the lack of IG, but at the same time, were you actually gone automatically to any of them? I am not sure.

I checked slightly by choosing to send a text message to friends via my personal computer whenever I have the opportunity. This also allow me to participate in some group chats because the Barbie phone does not have this possibility.

And I called my mother more. This says something because I am essentially talking to my parents every day with my natural phone. I traveled to see my father in Tennessee and visited my father in Witchester for Easter. I even planned Between generations Return with my grandparents to Portorico for the month of May.

All in all, I have doubled the number of personal characters suspended, although my memory is a little mysterious. I am a person who lives and dies next to my Google calendar, and I am not great in controlling the version between the actual and G-Cal. I do not remind the pictures of what I did.

However, I did not last a full month.

It fell for two days, thanks to that intermittent trip to Puerto Rico. I had to request Uber, consulting with data schedules, knowing access codes, finding restaurants that everyone wanted to eat, and stay in contact with the people we were hanging with. If you are a lawyer or if your work requires to be online around the clock throughout the week, you are not sure whether to get rid of smart toxins is suitable for you.

Frankly, there were some things that I missed from the regular iPhone. Lack of music while running made me terrifying, so I didn’t run for a whole month. I couldn’t wipe the fast response icon lists in restaurants. If I had no written directives somewhere, you are Constantly worry about loss Since Google Maps on the Barbie phone were not all of that. It also took a fewer pictures. (Sorry, bad rabbit, I know I should take more))

However, my life felt full due to the explosion of spontaneity that encourages deeper links with my friends and family. My attention is no longer as if the size of the small peas. Although I did not start this experience out of concern about my mental health, it helped me feel more socially, which exposes people to the risk of depression less.

I am now deliberately estimated in suspicions outside the cuff. Only last week, I went to a pub to watch the Knicks game, and called a friend I had not seen in a few months. And yes, it was on the Barbie phone.

A copy of this story originally appeared in the ideal newsletter in the future. Subscribe here!