Technology Mindfulness Project

Blog Entry 1: On the Smart Phone Compulsion Test, I scored an 8. This means by the test’s standards: “you might consider seeing a psychologist, psychiatrist, or psychotherapist who specializes in behavioral addictions for a consultation” I don’t believe this is the case. Before CoVid-19 I would say my smartphone use was fairly standard. I would mostly use my phone for calling my mom in between classes or messaging my friends from home to catch up with them, and maybe if I was bored or needed background noise, I’d use it for Youtube. But now, with there being nothing to do, can anyone blame me for overusing my smartphone? I think we all have succumbed to the smartphone as a main form of entertainment. I also believe the test was a bit unfair, multiple questions were similar enough to almost require you to say yes to a question if you said yes to another question.

Blog Entry 2: I primarily use my phone to contact friends and family, through different apps other than text and listening to YouTube. Calculating the amount of time I use my phone per day is hard, is it actively using it then maybe 6 hours, but if I were to include time used for listening to music for background noise, I would say 8–9 hours a day. The amount of times I pick up my phone I’d say 60- 70 as I do get a good deal of notifications.

Blog Entry 3: The apps I tend to use the most were expected. My top three apps were Discord, YouTube, and Instagram.

-Discord: I use this as my prime source of communication with my friends, whether it be used for messaging someone, going in a voice call, or even to stream games for each other.

-YouTube: I often find myself using YouTube to listen to music, or watch videos whilst I’m working on something or just exercising.

-Instagram: This is the only Social Media I really have and use. I use it to find inspiration for art, baking, or even ways to improve my Animal Crossing island. I also use it to post art I’ve made.

Blog Entry 4: According to the data I underestimated my usage a bit. I use my phone for maybe 10 hours a day at points and sometimes even more than that. I’m not quite satisfied with that and I would like to lower that. Even my pickups were higher than I imagined. Some were in the margin, but other than that they go into the hundreds.

Blog Entry 5: I used Step 2. Turn Your Phone Off and Step 8. Turn off Notifications. Step 8 was easy, I tend to have my phone on DND for when I’m doing work, or trying to sleep (to my roommates dismay when I have an early night and they leave their keys at home.) Having notifications off did pose some problems when my mom was trying to contact me however. Step 2 was harder as that completely shut off my access to the digital world, and had the same problem with my mom thinking I was ignoring her or kidnapped, no in-between. Next time it would definitely be wise to let her know about the challenge.

Blog Entry 6: I left my smartphone home for the day, my mother and I went jogging, then went to the grocery store. I wasn’t particularly worried or on edge, but perhaps that’s because I was with someone and they had their phone on them. I had more anxiety thinking about the assignment itself, than actually doing it. I did enjoy not being so tethered to my smart phone however.

Blog Entry 7: Using this Meditation, I did feel some disgust toward my phone. Perhaps it was because deep down it could have some association with the secrets it keeps, or the grasp it has on me, or even through the bad people I’ve met through it. It’s given me enhanced feelings toward it, but it’s like a toxic relationship I still can’t get enough of it even though I know too much is bad for me.

Blog Entry 8 Part 1:

Blog Entry 8 Part 2: Looking at my data, I am very surprised by my findings. I understand why it is low in the beginning, as I wanted to keep within my predictions, however as the tracking went on it slipped my mind. Entry 4 was a huge spike in pickups. I believe this was the case because in this time I was talking to my friends more for either help with homework, just for fun, or because of some tense situation. I do believe I have become more aware of my usage and my findings reflect that. Even though my usage builds up, it does yield and lower to more reasonable amounts. Though I’d like to get it to lower more I am okay with just being aware of my dependency for now and working on it later. I know my dependency is not the most healthy for my professional life as it causes me to want to procrastinate and put off work until I can’t anymore. Though I think it helps me strengthen some of my relationships that I can not always connect with, some of my real word relationships. They sometimes falter and struggle, however I can only be accountable for my part, the other people in my family also have their smart phones to account for our possible distance.

Moving forward, I believe I can do better with monitoring. The hardest part with all of this is the impact of COVID-19, as I do believe I can do better with my goals if I weren’t quarantining or restricted to the same people every day. The current state of our world definitely played a role in the results I came up with. I do intend to better myself once the quarantine is over, maybe redoing the project to compare my results and if I truly am the smart phone addict the quiz I took at the beginning of the project says I am.