Signs you might need a digital detox (and how to fix it)

Good morning. Welcome back to the Moments Podcast. I'm your host, Lexie, and today we're going to be targeting you, attacking you, stabbing you in the heart, and I might make you mad. I might piss you off. I'm also doing the same to myself, but we're talking today about our addiction to social media, how every single one of us needs to learn to put our phone down a little bit more. And you're probably saying, "Lexie, you're literally an online creator. Why don't you want people watching your content?" Well, that's really not the point at all, but it tends to be a common comment that I get when I talk about putting our phones down. People are like, "Why would you ever want anybody to stop consuming what you're posting and creating?" And yada, yada, yada. I'm like, honestly, I want people to be happy more than I want to like or a follower on any platform across any account that has never been what it's about for me. What I want is for people to feel good, to feel happy, to feel content in their own life and inspired and motivated to make their life whatever it is that they want it to be. That's aside from the point, but I guess that's a little bit of an intro to me. So today, we're talking about a digital detox and signs that you might need one. Now, I made an outline for today. Again, if you're new here, outlines aren't always something that I do. I like to just talk in circles and somehow with an outline, I still manage to do the same. But somehow you guys are here and you're listening, so hopefully you're loving it. The first thing, the first sign that you probably need a digital detox is that you clicked on this episode to listen to it. I think that subconsciously, most of us know that we're struggling with some kind of addiction to social media. And it might not just be social media in the way that you think about it. It might not be just that you can't stop scrolling on TikTok or Instagram Reels. It might be that you constantly need a source of connection or attention, whether that's constantly needing to be Snapchatting somebody or texting somebody or on the phone with somebody. Obviously, I think those are better addictions to have than just being stuck in the doom scroll. But regardless, we are way to attach to our phones. Now, I don't know my demographic of who's listening to this. Usually, it's girlies my age and a little bit younger. We have unfortunately had access to social media for pretty much as long as we can remember. But unfortunately for this generation, I guess you could say, it is now even worse, you know, people are having access to social media at freaking six years old, seven years old. My cousins who are nine years old are constantly talking in TikTok sounds and in TikTok dances. And there's kids I know that age whose parents have told them that they can't be online, but kids will be kids. They will find a way to get on the internet. I think back to when my mom took away Snapchat for me because she thought it was a really horrible idea for seventh graders to have access to an app where you can just send disappearing pictures and think that nobody could screenshot or save them in any way shape or form. She was right. But guess what? I found my way to get on Snapchat. I made secret accounts and then I would delete them and then I would go on my friends phones and I found a way to be on Snapchat the same way that kids are finding a way to be on social media. And like that's a conversation for a whole nother time because I know that there's not seven year olds listening to this thinking that they need to take a digital detox. But what I'm really saying is that our world has gotten and gone too far down the rabbit hole of an online world so much so that we are completely forgetting what is going on in the real world. And I think that's another sign that you might need a digital detox is that you are always thinking about what's going on online so much so that in your real life you're not really paying attention to what's going on. You're not appreciating small moments like you used to. You're not even aware of your real life. You're only aware of what you're online consuming or you're so addicted to other people's lives that you really don't care about your own. And I know that sounds really deep and dark but it's something that I've faced. It's something that I've experienced. I get so caught up in watching other people online that I'm like oh I'm just like living through them. I'm just living their life is great. I'm just going to watch them and that's good for me. But the truth is that we have our own lives to create. We have our own life to go live and experience and enjoy and appreciate and just to be present in. So neither of those things were on my bullet pointed list. So now to get into my bullet pointed list the first sign on my list that you need a digital detox is that you're embarrassed of your screen time. Let's say you're in a group of people. I feel like I'm talking really fast today guys and it's only 8 a.m. I'm going to slow it down. You're in a group of people and everybody pulls up their screen time and it's your turn to go and your screen time is four hours on TikTok. Obviously what feels like a lot of screen time to you might be very different than what feels like a lot of screen time to somebody else. Like me for example I'm always trying to justify my screen time by being like well I'm a creator. I was probably editing drama. No you probably weren't. I was probably scrolling. My screen time is disgusting. Hence the need for me to record this episode. Like I said everything I'm learning I'm sharing with you. I'm learning that I'm addicted to social media. We I mean we all could have known that. But if your screen time feels high you maybe you need a detox a little bit. Okay maybe you want to be able to be confidently in a group of people and say guys look my screen time across all apps an hour and a half. Slay slay slay slay. A lot of you guys might be listening to this with no addiction to social media at all and for that I applaud you. Maybe you can listen and share these tips with a friend or maybe you could just turn this episode off because good for you. You're doing wonderful. Next you're subconsciously scrolling and then you end up in a deep rabbit hole or on a deep dive. Now what happens for me I also struggle really badly and truly with ADHD not just in a fake way in a real diagnosed with three different types of ADHD kind of way. What will happen for me is I'll go on my phone say I am in communication with a brand and I'm trying to organize some kind of deal with them. Oftentimes I'll have to DM them first to get in contact to get on email thread with them and somehow I will never make it to my DMs to DM that brand. I will somehow end up on my explore page looking at people's proposals from across the world or saving recipes that I'm not ever going to make or end up finding a new brand to like and scroll through and just go and I go and I go and I go. So I think that that's what a doom scroll can look like but I think a doom scroll can also just look like not moving from one place and just simply scrolling and scrolling and scrolling through your feed for what you thought was five minutes and then you look at the time and it's been 30 minutes. Every single one of us our days look different, our jobs look different, our school looks different. So I might say here like people scroll on the internet for two hours in the morning before they get out of bed and you're like well how is that possible? I have a job like I have to get up for work. Okay maybe you find your doom scrolling at night or in the middle of the day or on your lunch break. Never judge another person's doom scroll to your own because if you're still listening you probably are doing it too. The next one is that you're feeling emotionally drained or constantly exhausted. Being online is not for the week. You are constantly just consuming and consuming and consuming these little short bits of information and we'll get into short form content versus long form content in a second over here but when you're constantly just consuming little bits and little pieces of this and of that and of recipes and of outfits and of relationships and of friendships and of travel what do you think your brain is going to do? Our brains are not designed to consume that much information and then on top of that you're probably in school or you're probably working or you're probably trying to create a business or run a business or whatever it is that you're doing in your life that should be your priority but instead our priority in our brain what it's pouring into is just constantly consuming all this nonsense information that really isn't adding much value to us. I think a lot of times we think I fall victim to this. I'm scrolling and I'm scrolling and I'm like oh my gosh I learned something from that. I love that girl's outfit I'm going to remember that for sure and I think that I'm learning things or grasping on to things or putting them into like a little save for later section of my brain but then I want you to think about how many videos you've saved that you've never gone back and looked at. Your brain is doing the same thing. No wonder you're exhausted. Next you're not sleeping well. One of my very very very wonderful friends in my life one of my best friends in the whole wide world she falls into her doom scroll at night and I used to have this problem too and I honestly I really think my fiance gave because he was never a nighttime scroller and I had to fix my sleep schedule because especially when we first started dating I was like well I can't be up till 3 a.m. if he's going to bed at 9 p.m. you know if you're on your phone until two three four even one o'clock in the morning even if you're on your phone at night before you're closing your eyes you are messing with your sleep okay there's a statistic that says and I wrote it down 47% of people have their sleep negatively impacted because of social media or because of screen time or because of being online as we get into it later we need to work on putting our phones down before bed we do not need to be consuming straining our eyes straining our brain straining our whole body and mind just for a couple videos to watch before we go to sleep it is messing with your sleep another sign you need a detox is you're constantly multitasking you can't do one thing at a time anymore used to think that was a superpower now if I'm physically doing one thing I like go crazy I'm literally jittering freaking out I'm like I need to be doing something else because I don't feel like that one thing is productive enough and that is a result of being online too much being chronically online next comparison is eating you alive I silent pause because I think that is something from the feedback that I've received from being a creator for so long from experiencing it for so long that is one thing that social media has really proved to screw us up with we compare ourselves to everyone and everything people across the world people at completely different points in their life suddenly we feel like we're supposed to be at the exact same points that they are wrong put your phone down you can't do nothing okay this one is hard because listen listen I'm going to be brutally vulnerable and honest here for a second I know that I struggle with social media and my consumption of it but I go in phases of like detoxing from it and then I get addicted again and it's kind of like this endless loop but I'm just proud that I'm trying and you know what something is better than nothing but when I get back on my little addiction wave I can't even go to the bathroom without my phone or without like subconsciously I'm opening apps I'm opening Instagram I'm watching stories I'm opening tiktok and I'm watching videos or I'm doing a whole bunch of nothing so this morning actually I have not gone on social media and I think that's maybe why I'm so alert and I'm so excited and I'm so happy this morning to be talking to you guys because I have not compared myself to anybody yet today I have not exhausted my brain yet today and it's getting me taking me a really long time to get through this episode because instead of just giving you the bullet point list of signs you need a detox I'm like really deep diving into them next your relationships are suffering this I think can happen for a lot of reasons one you're not even being present in your relationships because you're online so much or two you are comparing your relationship to so many other online relationships and it's making you feel like your relationship isn't good enough it isn't strong enough it's not as good as that couple that you follow in Australia's relationship mind you that couple literally creates content for a living okay comparison will kill you in a relationship and this isn't just intimate relationships or romantic partners this is your friendships this is your family relationships this is so many things like if you are just constantly comparing yourself to online relationships or online relationship dynamics instead of like working on your own relationship you're just going to deteriorate because you're just getting more and more mad about what you have instead of actively working to try to fix it if you do see somebody that has something that you feel like your relationship is lacking instead of making an effort to add that into your relationship you're just getting upset with the other person and not communicating why you're feeling that or why that thought even came to your mind tea next your mental health is lacking I think a lot of us are struggling with our mental health mental health has just gotten worse and worse and worse in the last few years and I strongly believe that social media is a huge reason for that again going back to the comparison going back to the lack of attention span the need for constant dopamine hits the second that we stop scrolling our dopamine goes away and our mood gets lower that's science it's how it works we don't feel well mentally none of us how many of you are listening to this and have struggled with bits of anxiety bits of depression bits of just like feeling down a lot of this can come from social media and I'm not saying that just because if you put social media down and you do a digital detox that you're going to be happy and you're never going to struggle again that's really not how mental health works that's not how the brain works but I do think it'll help you feel better I think it'll help give you more hope I think it will push you in the right direction next even in your free time you're going online now I mentioned this one because a lot of times on tiktok once in a while I'll get on there and I'll make a video saying like hey put your phone down for the rest of the day it's like a challenge kind of because it's really hard for all of us to do and sometimes if those videos perform well a lot of the comments will be like well I'm on my lunch break just let me scroll or well I just got off of work I want to lay down and go on my phone I don't think there's anything wrong with those things I think that there's something wrong with that if like that's all you're doing in your free time okay say you are somebody who is in a really really grind heavy era of your life okay you're waking up you're working out you're going to work and then you're taking classes whatever it may be and you only have a little bit of free time in your day if you're feeling that free time strictly with being online I don't think that's necessarily the best thing for you I think maybe you need to walk you need to read a book you need to not only fill the time that you have that is your time just for you with other people's lives you know what I mean moving on next you feel isolated a lot of people go to the internet for community for comfort for friendship so much so that when they are offline they feel even more isolated than they did before I think that both online community and in-person community are equally as important I think each and every one of us needs to really evaluate if social media went away tonight right now what does your community look like who do you have in your real physical life that is in your corner and on your side okay do you have a church group that you go to or a book club that you go to or a cooking class that you go to or friends in your local town or a coffee shop that you like to go to what do you have in your real life and I think if you can think of at least three things then you're you're doing great you know because online community is also important but it's just something to think about because I think for a while maybe this has to do with being a creator myself I felt like I had no community honestly this didn't even happen for me until I got to wedding planning and kind of creating a guest list and I was like wow all my friends not all a lot of my friends are kind of across the world they're different social media creators I don't really talk to them every day but part of me feels like I do because we're always interacting with each other's stories but I have no idea what's actually going on in their head or in their life and I realized that was kind of a problem and then I was like wow I don't even really have that many things that I do that are offline things so then I joined a bible study group I've been really building my at-home community I've been working on blossoming friendships that I have that are here and it's been a really really incredible experience for me and I really do highly recommend it creator or not I think a lot of us kind of have this struggle okay moving on that's my list of signs that you need a digital detox and before we get into how you're actually going to take one I'm going to tell you some of the impact of a digital overload honestly we've talked about most of these things already but excessive screen time show signs of leading people into a deeper moments of anxiety deeper depression and then again think about how much you're consuming think about how rapidly you're consuming things of course you're going to feel anxious about your own life okay when you are sitting at your house you wake up in the morning you go on your phone and within five minutes you've seen somebody who just hiked Mount Everest had somebody who seen somebody who just had their second baby somebody who's planning a wedding somebody who just read 150 books in three weeks somebody who is in school getting their PhD somebody who just got a promotion at their job somebody who just got married so and so and so and so you see all that within five minutes you are going to feel behind in your life naturally that's a human reaction that's going to give you anxiety about your future it's going to give you anxiety about your past it's going to make you unhappy with where you're at and it's not your fault it's not any of our faults it's literally the dark hole that is our phone that is what society has turned into and it often feels like we don't have the power to change those feelings we don't have the power to turn off that anxiety but but we don't give ourselves enough credit you do have more power than you realize okay next information fatigue we kind of touched on this you're being fed a million things at once i promise you're not remembering any of them you ever go to try to tell somebody a fun fact that you learned and it's just nowhere to be found in your brain maybe that's because you learned it um on your 20th video out of the 75 that you watched in a 20 minute span crazy right and then you think about why can i go back why can i think about that random fact that i learned in ace marine science my sophomore year of high school why is it that you remember everything from that class because it was slow learning your brain wasn't exhausted from having so much information so it was able to hold on to it now is that science i don't know it's personal experience again i am no professional the tips and the tricks and the things that i talk about are things that i have experienced but most of us are experiencing the same thing so i digress do you guys know that our attention span microsoft did a study okay they did it in 2000 and they did it in 2015 in 2015 our attention span is eight seconds let's do an eight second pause eight seconds my seconds might have been a little bit fast that is less than a gold fish our attention span is less than a goldfish and we think that we don't have an addiction to social media we think that we don't have a problem eight seconds next we talked about all these things but the last thing that i wrote down here on like a digital overload impact is that we genuinely feel less joy we're so so so stuck in over consumption of online media of online things of talking about social media that we don't even know how to appreciate the grass on the ground the flowers that are blossoming the breeze in our hair the sky being blue the clouds passing by we cannot appreciate anything that is real we can't appreciate our family time we can't appreciate conversations with our partner we can't appreciate trips that we go on because we're like well this person did a better trip this person went here this person did this gosh we don't know how to appreciate anything anymore all because of that dang phone you're going to feel less happy if you're addicted to your phone like i warned you guys in the beginning this is this is a personal attack kind of episode and if some of these things don't apply to you i applaud you i think another big problem that we have in another like sign that you might need a digital detox is if your your most viewed apps or your most heavy consumption apps are short form content places i think if you're a long term long form youtube watcher if you're a show watcher a movie watcher i think that you you're doing good clearly your attention span is longer than eight seconds me personally i don't do well with long form content i'm really coming for myself right here i if for whatever reason i put on a youtube video i have to watch it in two times speed and i usually only make it about five minutes into the video i've never been a long form content watcher but i'm going to start challenging myself to watch it because the problems lie much heavier in short form content than they do in long form content too much of anything is bad but short form content is literally such a highlight reel you know we're seeing the best moments of our life we're seeing these videos that people are creating but short form content is the worst the worst we're doing surface level learning we're decreasing our own creativity and this is one that i experience really really deeply i will talk about this a little bit further down but we need to be creating more than we consume whether you're a creator or not you always should be creating more than you consume whether that's in social posts or in the real world because the moment that you're consuming more than you're creating is the moment that your creativity goes away and you just start to become a circle of other people not in a healthy way but in a way that you don't even have your own creative thoughts anymore and it is really hard to turn that off it is really hard to turn that off as a creator myself in the past five years of creating there have been so many moments and eras of my life where i have been consuming more than i've been creating and then i go to create and i don't even know where to start and i don't even know how to do it anymore and i feel like i know nothing and no thoughts are coming to my mind i'm going to give you a really silly example for me i used to be really good at creating a video and finding a sound for the video i'm telling you this was like my specialty any video i could find the perfect sound now i can't and that might sound really dumb but it is a really clear sign to me that something has gone wrong something has gone wrong something has lost touch my brain has lost a bit of itself because of its consumption of other things so you might be saying now that you've personally attacked us for 25 minutes like see how do we fix this well here's my to-do list we've talked about this on other episodes we've touched on it a little bit but this episode is going to be your actual guide to getting off your phone instead of just a reminder to get off your phone when it comes to fixing this you some people i'm actually going to give you two options here some people need to start small we have to recognize that you can't fix addiction overnight okay you have to accept that what we are is addicted sorry you can't fix that overnight okay a lot of people what i will see people do and this was going to be my other recommendation for you is to just do a cold turkey digital detox okay no phone other than texting and calling your friends no watching shows no watching youtube no watching nothing being present only for three days or five days or seven days the problem with that is that you will almost always go back to your old ways if you do this quick cold turkey quit because then you're like so proud of yourself at the end of this full detox that you say i get to go back online and then you just go back to what you were doing before then a little bit of time goes by and then you just do this detox again and listen i think that's still very healthy i think any amount of detox is a good thing but i think what we should focus on is doing this slow burn detox getting ourselves less addicted and less hooked slowly but surely the first way to do this 30 minutes in the morning and 30 minutes at night you are not going on your phone first thing that you wake first thing that you do in the morning this is what ruins you this is what ruins your day this is what makes you feel like crud like crap let me tell you firsthand experience oftentimes i do find myself on the phone on my phone first thing in the morning whether that's texting people back getting i'll text in up in my group chat going and answering my emails going and opening checking a post checking my comments it's how you set your brain up for failure you're not going to feel good the rest of the day if that's how you start the day keep the phone down wake up in the morning brush your teeth make your bed make a coffee have a nice breakfast and a lot yourself certain times to be on your phone and the same thing goes with that night your sleep is going to be disrupted whether you want to realize it or not whether your aura ring tells you your sleep was a 90 or not your sleep is not good if you are feeding yourself social media moments before bed i think a really good way to start small in digital detoxing is no phone in your bed that's kind of like my next thing make certain places in your house tech free places in your house okay not just your house in your car in your car if you're scrolling on social media in your car you have to change something now i know nobody wants to admit that because nobody should be texting and driving we shouldn't even be changing the song while we're in the car and i'm sure a lot of people are good at that i have been a car scroller i'm not proud of it i finally don't do that anymore but you should not be on your phone in your car no scrolling in your car no scrolling this one's hard on the toilet on the toilet i bet you you could be in and out of the bathroom in three minutes for some of us don't know what your stomach issues look like but instead we stay in there for 10 minutes 15 minutes my fiance can stay in the bathroom for 30 minutes and his dad gives himself one hour in the morning to sit on the toilet now that system works really well for him but i think that you'll notice how much time you're wasting when you make things that are supposed to be quick when you take your phone away from them okay you'll realize how much time you were wasting on your phone more than you needed to be same thing goes with meals i think that when you're eating do not be in your phone there's many reasons that this is a huge benefit one it makes you a more mindful eater it makes you more of an appreciative eater you enjoy every bite you actually have awareness of what you're eating it helps a lot with intuitive eating as well i used to just scroll on my phone while i would eat and i wouldn't even register that i was full and i would just keep eating and eating and eating and then after i ate i felt sick and i went into like a food coma because i was even paying attention to what i was eating i was only paying attention to what i was watching put your phone down during meal times okay at the kitchen table i really challenge you if you have a partner or you live with a roommate even friend whatever it is make these set these goals together okay what really stemmed me wanting to do this was gave and i saw a tick tock of course of this couple that does not allow the phones in the bedroom in the bathroom and at the table and gave and i are going to start doing that we started a little bit but we haven't really honed in on it um so like when we're not together we're not really following it but we're going to start doing it constantly because it really does make so much of a difference so much of a difference i feel your day doubles in length the second that you stop going on your phone at each of these times and also recognize all of our schedules are different okay if the morning is really the only time that you have to answer your texts and your emails figure out what works for you okay don't take what i say and apply it and be like well that didn't change anything for me because so and so and so and so think about your own life evaluate your own life and really just be honest with yourself when are you scrolling that you should not be scrolling the key to all of this is just being honest with yourself having self-awareness accepting that something needs to change i think another good way to detox yourself a little bit is to turn off your notifications not your text notifications or your call notifications but turn off your snapchat notifications turn off your instagram notifications and your tiktok ones anytime your phone buzzes even when i'm recording this episode these episodes i have to turn my phone my phone on do not disturb because if it buzzes once my brain is immediately thinking about what that notification is and honestly this can be really toxic because a lot of times if my phone buzzes and i don't and i hear it buzz but i can't check it my mind just goes to the worst case scenario i'm like somebody's calling me because something happened to somebody that i love that's a whole other issue that i'm working on in my brain but anyways turn off your notifications next have a list of go-to things when you find yourself captured in these moments a lot of times we don't realize that we're in a in a in a deep scroll until it's kind of too late and then at that point we tell ourselves well i'm already here i might as well just like keep seeing what's going on wrong stop it while you can and have a list of things that you do whether that is going for a walk these are going to seem basic but if you have them on the top of your mind i promise you they will feel better than scrolling will feel maybe not directly in the moment but for your long-term sanity and health these will be better walk journal bake call someone read those are the things that i wrote down your list might look different just have a go-to list of things that you do after you found yourself scrolling too long okay next digital declutter okay this means we're gonna unfollow we're gonna block we're gonna get rid of what is not serving us this is not personal to different creators this is not personal to anybody it is just that if you are following people that you know every time you see their videos it makes you upset it makes you compare it makes you jealous it makes you angry it makes you heartbroken i don't know whatever it is unfollow it if you are going through a breakup right now or you are working through some hard times in your relationship unfollow all the couple accounts unfollow all of them it's not going to be healthy for you to see it's not going to be good for you to see you can go back and follow them at a time in your life where you can handle it but you do have the power to unfollow things or unfollow people or block people that are not good for your mental health and i think the way that you start realizing what is good for you and what isn't good for you is to just mindful scroll okay as you scroll go slow and try to register what you're feeling as you watch each video you'll be able to tell the difference on things that make you feel good and things that don't make you feel good next plan more real hangouts have things scheduled in the books where you are forced to go outside and talk to people and have conversations my social anxiety has gone through the roof ever since i started actively being on social media and i don't know why that is i just get really nervous to have conversations i can't public speak anymore i just tweak out over everything but that one might be personal but if anybody else struggles with that me too and one thing that has helped is just forcing myself into situations that make me uncomfortable i went to an all-women's night at my church a couple weekends ago it was horrible i mean it was amazing but it was really hard for me because i went all by myself i had to go sit at a circle table with a bunch of people that i don't know i had to introduce myself i had to talk that freaks me out sometimes other days it's like really easy and fun for me i don't know why that is but create more than you consume okay this can be not making your own videos for the internet but it can be journaling more it can be taking more photos and keeping them for yourself always just create more than you consume if you like to play music play more music than you watch tiktoks if you like to cook bake more or cook more than you watch tiktoks just always create more than you consume i think that is a really essential key and i think that will really help you from getting super super stuck in the loop okay the last thing that i have written down is to reflect pay attention to the difference in how you feel when you get offline we often forget how important it is to reflect and we simply don't do it because we're on such a fast-paced schedule we like don't take the time to think about our feelings we just keep moving in loop we keep doing and doing and doing and doing get a journal dedicate it to your digital detox and at the end of every day even if you just write down a sentence even if you don't even write out the sentence but you see the journal and it makes you think and reflect think about how you feel the more that you register that you're feeling better when you're online more the more that your mind will remember that and you will actually apply it to your life but if you don't give your mind the reflection and you don't give your mind the time to think about how much better you feel it's just going to go back to its old ways you know what i mean anyways you guys i really love you i really hope that you can take something positive away from this and that you can put your phone down because that is my goal i think after this today i'm going to try to be really really light on the digital media front today and i hope that you do the same and i hope you know that i love you and i hope that you know that i'm proud of you and i want the best for all of us and i just want us to be happy people and i want us to chase our dreams and be the best version of ourselves possible thanks for tuning in you guys can follow me across all platforms at lexadalgo my accounts will be in the description if you want but don't follow me today because that's going to get you online but yeah i also have a journal for whatever reason if you really want to get into journaling i have a guided journal that has prompts affirmations it is good for any beginner or anybody who's been journaling for a while but i really really really love and appreciate you every single one of you. I hope you have the most beautiful amazing day ever. Bye now!