Your phone, maybe without you even realising it, is taking over your life, consuming your time and thoughts and potentially even skewing your perception of reality. Checking our social media is becoming an addiction for many of us. We cannot allow ourselves to be ruled by this technology, we need to take back control of our lives.
If this hasn’t convinced you enough, here are 25 reasons you cannot let your phone take over your life:
- Social Media is damaging your attention span.
Have you noticed how you can’t read more than a paragraph without checking your phone? Can’t finish a task without looking at your notifications? It’s like we are afraid of missing something and this distracts us, lowering our attention spans and making us less efficient in getting things done.
- Fake joy.
Every like you get, every positive comment, every heart on a comment you’ve written gives you a dopamine hit that is addictive. You’re living for likes, and you know it. Don’t live for likes, live for life.
- You’re falling into the trap of the marketers and advertisers.
Every platform is basically an ad network, and your eyeballs has become their profit. Even if you think marketing has no impact on you, you’re still being used by these networks for profit, and subconsciously these adverts might be leading you to make purchases you otherwise wouldn’t have considered.
- Your creativity suffers.
Real creativity needs empty space, but your brain is constantly filled with noise and that noise is suffocating the creativity within you. The world relies on creativity, innovation, new ideas and thoughts, otherwise we would stagnate and never move forward. Don’t let your phone subdue your creative side.
- The comparison trap is brutal.
On social media and even in blogs, everyone’s life looks perfect… except yours. We draw a comparison that is unrealistic, something we can never live up to, which leads us to feel jealous, unfulfilled, unsatisfied and miserable. But it is unrealistic. Nobody’s life is perfect, we only share the perfect moments, you don’t know anyone’s full story online, you know only what they want you to know.
- Almost everyone spends too much time on their screens.
Let’s say you spend two hours or more scrolling on your phone , over the course of a year, that’s a whole month you’re losing to your phone. - Ever found yourself in the middle of an online row?
You’re not alone, it’s common to get into arguments with strangers on social media platforms, but it is completely pointless. Has anyone ever changed their mind from a comment war? No! It’s a waste of your time and energy, so why do it?
- The algorithm knows you better than your partner does.
That’s just creepy. It shows you posts it thinks you’ll like, products you might buy, it knows everything about you, its like a digital stalker and you’re giving it all the information it needs to manipulate you.
- Privacy is basically a joke at this point.
Every tap, pause, and scroll is tracked. Your phone is Big Brother, it knows exactly what you’re doing, when you’re doing it and where you are at the time. Our apps have access to our pictures, personal information, location, bank details… is there anything our screens don’t know about us?
- Content is designed to trigger outrage.
Notice how angry you feel after scrolling? Why do you do it to yourself? Why would you want to anger yourself and then carry that anger around with you?
- Your camera roll is full.
Full of food no one remembers eating, screenshots of posts and comments, pointless photos instead of pictures of the people you love.
- Memories
Memories are for experiencing, not documenting, life is for living, not blogging. By hiding behind a screen, living online, you’re missing out on actually enjoying life.
- FOMO (fear of missing out) is manufactured.
Most of what you “miss out” on isn’t even happening as shown, and in reality, when you’re on your screen desperately trying to keep in the loop, what you’re missing out on is life.
- The news cycle makes everything seem urgent.
But it’s not. Remember the days when you’d turn on the television to watch the news, or read the newspaper at a time that was convenient for you. Not anymore, now you’re flooded with “Breaking News” notifications all the time, and most of the time, the news isn’t even worth knowing, let alone urgent.
- Actual friendships need real face time, not video chat.
Texting, calling and video chat all help us to keep in contact, but they aren’t a replacement for actually spending time with someone and building a real-life connection.
- That endless scroll before bed is wrecking your sleep.
Before bed you should be unwinding, letting your mind empty so you can drift off into a peaceful sleep. But instead you’re scrolling on your phone, reading news updates, checking social media, getting annoyed with other people’s comments, or jealous of other peoples lives. By the time you do go to sleep your mind is buzzing, preventing you from getting a decent rest.
- You’ve forgotten how to be bored.
Boredom sparks creativity, but instead of embracing that creativity, you fill every spare second with games, apps, social media and pointless media online.
- Personal conversations should happen over dinner, not in DMs.
You can’t talk properly digitally, you miss out on things like body language, paralanguage and context, causing misunderstandings and preventing a genuine connection. To really get to know someone you need to be able to see them, all of them, hear them, touch them, even smell them.
- Your kids are watching your relationship with your phone and social media.
Your addiction to your phone is going to become normality for your children. Think about that.
- Time is precious.
Time moves faster when you’re scrolling, and time moves fast enough as it is. Have you ever lost an hour without realising it? Don’t do it to yourself, don’t lose even more time to your phone. It’s the most precious resource you have.
- The trending topics rarely matter a week later, so why bother?
What’s the point in putting everything you have into a trend… just wait a week and it’ll be something new anyway.
- That “quick check” is never quick.
There is always one more interesting post, or captivating video, or notification that needs addressing. It’s never a quick check so if you don’t want to spend much time on your phone, just don’t bother opening it in the first place.
- Your are the product.
You are not the customer, you are the product. As we said, privacy means nothing, your information is all known, your online activity is all known… it’s not about you, you’re not important to them, it’s your data the companies are after.
- Digital connections often prevent real ones.
While you’re wasting time on your phone, trying to make connections with people who might not even be who they say they are, you could be missing our on making real relationships, with real people.
- Life happens in 3D, not on a screen.
Why watch random videos, when you can live out your own? Go live your life, put down your phone.
Don’t be a slave to your screen, take back your life and live it to the max.
Inbound Tom 2025