Fix Your Analog Life First - by Katherine Martinko

The Analog Family

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Fix Your Analog Life First<br>It's a prerequisite for curbing screen time.

Katherine Martinko<br>Dec 08, 2024

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Go for long walks in the woods.<br>Cal Newport is one of my favourite writers on the topic of technology. His 2019 book, Digital Minimalism, had a profound influence on me, opening my eyes to the necessity of putting digital media in its rightful place and not letting it take over every aspect of our lives. I appreciate how practical his approach is; he is a computer science professor, so he recognizes technology’s utility in our lives, while advocating for a cautious consideration of its trade-offs.

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In a recent email newsletter, he offered advice that I think is critical to any discussion about how to establish a more balanced relationship with our devices:<br>“Fixing your relationship with digital tools requires that you fix your analog life first. It’s not enough to stop using problematic apps and devices, you must also aggressively pursue alternative activities to fill the voids this digital abstention will create: read books, join communities, develop hard hobbies, get in shape, hatch plans to transform your career for the better. Without deeper purpose, the shallow siren song of your phone will become impossible to ignore.”

We talk so much about the necessity of reducing screen time and getting off one’s phone, but we don’t talk enough about what is supposed to replace it. With adults spending an average of 2.5 hours per day on social media alone (not counting other forms of phone-based entertainment), that is a significant amount of time that suddenly needs to be reallocated toward something else.<br>It makes sense that many of the popular “phone-life balance” hacks don’t last. They are temporary solutions to a bigger problem, which is that we have forgotten how to do other things. Unless we can spark that interest again, we don’t stand a chance again the frictionless allure of a device that offers instant gratification as soon as we feel the slightest inkling of boredom.<br>Things vs. Devices

I sometimes wonder if our society’s precipitous decline in mental well-being is linked not only to the dramatic increase in screen time, but the corresponding loss of doing real things . Author Matthew B. Crawford argues that the experience of making things and fixing things is essential to our flourishing as humans, and that something vanishes “when such experiences recede from our common life.”<br>Crawford quotes philosopher Albert Borgmann, who says “things” are different from “devices.” Things are objects we master, such as a musical instrument. Devices are objects that do work for us, such as a stereo. Borgmann says, “A thing requires practice while a device invites consumption.”<br>In other words, we need more practice and less consumption in our lives. But reducing consumption does not automatically lead to practice; it must be actively sought, and that requires conscious choice, persistence, and stubborn adherence to routine.<br>Speaking of (literal) practice, every November I dust off my violin to start preparing for what is possibly the world’s most unusual production of Handel’s Messiah—a concert that takes place in the bowels of an old barn, surrounded by cows, horses, and sheep. For several weeks, I dedicate my evenings to practicing an hour of violin. Most of the time, this is not what I feel like doing, but the reward is getting to be part of such an exhilarating performance.

Yes, that is a real cow in the background.<br>Related Article: On Reclaiming Leisure

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What Did We Do in the Past?

We need to ask ourselves: What did we do before smartphones dominated our time and attention? When I think back on my rural TV- and Internet-less childhood, I remember hours of playing outside, going on long hikes with my parents, visiting the library, playing board games, and countless baking projects. My cousins and I would have at-home spa nights and dance parties in the kitchen. We ate a lot of popcorn.<br>When I left home at 16 to move overseas and eventually attend university (without a cellphone or TV for the first couple years), I spent free time writing, reading, listening to music, practicing instruments, and hanging out with friends. I studied foreign languages and spent a lot of time walking around strange cities. I bought groceries, cooked for myself, and invited new friends over to eat so I wouldn’t feel alone.<br>Now, I have a busy family with three kids in elementary, middle, and high school. There’s very little free time, but in a way, that makes resisting the smartphone even more challenging because it would be so easy just to dip in and out whenever there is a slight lull in the chaos. Instead, I stick to a rigid workout schedule, going to a local gym 4-5 times a week after work, making dinner, reading books in the evenings, and going to bed early. (I have a no-Netflix-during-the-week...