A Healthier Relationship with Technology: The Mindfulness Approach

12.12.2016

Mobile technology is wonderful. It helps to keep us safe, let’s us find pretty much anything we want to know quickly and easily – and it means we’re contactable 24/7. That is a double-edged sword.

 

Constant access to our mobile devices means that we’re always plugged into our work or social networks, and are only ever one tap away from real time world news. It’s no surprise that many of us feel harassed and that our thoughts are, to some extent, not our own.

 

The dark side of technology

Research suggests that we spend as much as 46.9% of our waking life thinking about something other than the task at hand. As Killingsworth and Gilbert tell it, “A human mind is a wandering mind and a wondering mind is an unhappy one.”

 

If the mind is wired to wander, then mobile devices enable an escape from the present moment. Shambare et al (2012) cite mobile phones as, “probably one of the biggest non-drug addictions of the 21st century.”

 

With one in three people admitting to checking their phone in the night, and arguing with their spouse about it, it’s clear that many of us find it hard to switch off.

 

Our relationship with our devices can give rise to anxiety and a wide range of other psychological symptoms when we overuse them: insomnia, OCD, stress, depression. One neuroscientist speaks a kind of brain fog he has called ‘digital dementia’. There are also many physical symptoms too.

Developing a healthier relationships with devices

There are many practical life-enhancing ways to use technology in a healthier way:

1. Keep your mobile device out of the bedroom, so you can get plenty of uninterrupted rest.
2. Check your emails a set number of times, i.e. three times a day.
3. Limit social media to a set time in the evening.
4. Turn off email and social media alerts.
5. When you are engaging in a conversation, or spending time with someone, keep your phone out of reach and keep focused on what’s being said.
6. Join a mindfulness meditation course, or read a guided mindfulness book, to learn to quieten your mind.

Mobile devices have become inextricably linked to our everyday lives, so it can be difficult to limit use. Some small changes can make a big difference to the wellbeing of yourself and those around you.

Mindfulness Training and Mobile Technology

The information we obtain from our mobile devices can affect what we think about, how we think about it, and the pace our thoughts move at. Mindful leadership thinker Jeremy Hunter suggests that we live ‘too much on gas pedal, too much on brake’, and that we can use mindfulness to find the ‘zone of resilience’ between the two. He suggests using mindfulness meditation to control the stress and emotional responses, to manage the nervous system. The next stage he calls ‘focusing the attention’. This involves cutting down on multi-tasking and focusing in on receptivity, curiosity, and openness. By keeping in the present moment and observing thoughts, more choices can be made about where the mind goes to.

 

As Paul Spiegelman, an ex-Blackberry addict suggests:

“There are many advantages to this connected world we now live in…. But it does make sense for us to slow things down a little bit, to focus on the conversations we have, and to cherish all of the relationships in our lives.”

To learn more about how mindfulness to help you develop a better relationship with technology, contact michael@mindfulnessworks.com or call (+44) 01223 750430.