Zero Screen Time: My 24 Hours Experiment.

I’ve always wondered how it was 20 years ago where having a mobile phone was such luxury only the rich could have afforded one. I remember how it was a trip on a Sunday evening to the phone booth with my family to make an overseas call. Look how far we’ve come right? Now even toddlers are almost pros in skipping to their favourite programme when the adverts come on.

I was inspired to do this experiment purely because I tried to always drift to a place where I can be alone with my thoughts and regain my inner source of energy – Its God's gift to the introverted. I just love it. This desire showed itself up as a love for traveling. I love going to new places where I could just blend in and no one would recognise me – celebrities I do feel for you!

But anyway, it also helps that I work in the hotel industry. So I was always taking advantage of our discounted rate to stay in any city that a brand of the company would be - oh how I miss those trips away – I could be a traveler and tourist for the day and night.

I was also inspired after reading a book – the author decided to do a 5x day retreat in her own home with no distractions - she wouldn’t even answer the telephone and so I thought to myself – I've always wanted to literally switch off for a while but then I thought to myself too many people would need an explanation and I was worried someone might send out a search party for me – Shawna who always return calls, always respond to messages, always sharing on social media something is wrong.

Nevertheless, with this in mind I thought to myself why not do it for only 24 hours? At least it wouldn’t be a big deal if I don’t respond in a day, and also its lockdown, I've since been spending most of my time indoors, I’m single and I have no children. So why not? I’ll never know until I put my theory into practice, right? To see if I would survive without checking my phone screen every couple of minutes; if I had missed a message, or an email I would have to respond to.

We depend on mobile technology for almost everything nowadays. We depend on it to keep us updated, to keep in touch, connected and we could add sane to the list too because according to psychologists if someone loses their phone it's the same as going through withdrawal symptoms as if addicted to a drug. Can you believe it? Its the fear of the unknown almost. You never know what you could be missing out on. So in spite of all this what have a got to lose?

So the first thing, I depend on my phone to wake me up – this time I got up at 8 am, earlier than usual since the lockdown with no alarm at all just body clock. I got up thinking it was midday because the sun was so bright I had to check my analog watch to check the right time – thank God for it – couldn’t do without it.

Secondly, I don’t like being woken up from deep sleep during the night so I even switch my internet off as I used to get random calls from numbers I don’t even know via social media. Back in the day when data was limited I did use to switch it off to save it through the night also.

Thirdly, during the lockdown I've been using up even more data because all my church meetings are now online – Tuesday was the best day I could use to switch off as I didn’t really miss anything important.

There were thoughts about my emails, I thought it would have to wait until the next day, I thought about people who were wondering what's happening to me – I wanted to check the phone, I wanted to check my bank balance but that also was an app on my phone – couldn’t have called because again that was my mobile and I don’t memorise my the number of my bank – why would I? I got the app, right?

Inspirations to write about my experience while doing the experiment I would have done it on my laptop – so I had to revert back to pen and paper to keep track of my thoughts – I didn’t mind this part because I always get excited when it comes to putting my thoughts down on paper – it is so therapeutic for me.

During the day sitting in the living room, so quiet - I thought to switch on the TV to break the silence but I decided to read a book instead and really think about my life – Who am I? Why am I here? What do I want? Now that for me was more profound than anything else – with all the gadgets we now have it has stopped us from thinking.

When we think we are able to make sense of what’s happening around us and even make decisions about what we really want out of life rather than stuck on autopilot.

We no longer have time for ourselves because there’s always something to know, to do, to watch – all distractions from listening to our bodies to realise that it's stressed, dehydrated, out of balance, run down. So we run to the doctors and ask him or her to give us some medication to ‘fix’ our physical problem when in fact it is sometimes our soul that’s so empty and sad but we’re too busy to recognise it.

Who wants to dig deep to find out things that are unbearable to talk about, to admit, to face it head-on and be courageous enough to really do the work to improve ourselves emotionally? It is hard, it is difficult and I’m sure that even in this lockdown that’s why there are so many problems at home because we choose to be distracted with our technology so that we don’t have to sort out our real problems.

One thing I’ve realised from this experiment is that I was not anxious about anything. Any thought that came to my mind to make me worry I would remind myself it's only for a day- but then again with all the request from others around me and I wasn’t able to respond to them – I could have been six feet under so what's the big deal? But life still has to go on. Nothing really stop changing or evolving.

I've also learned that my time on this earth is numbered – I don’t know when I’ll depart but when I do – I want to make sure that I would have made peace with myself and with those around me and also inspire others to live as though today was all we have left. Because in essence, today and now is all we have. Tomorrow is a promise – today is a present – a gift.

Let us use it to shine our light so others may also have the courage to do the same. With peace from within and open arms to give and receive the very same love we so desire.

I am so happy I did this experiment. It was well worth it. I didn’t have to go to the hills but my flat became my hill, my quiet place, my sanctuary to be completely alone with me. And you know what I think I liked my own company- my thoughts were kind to me, my thoughts were uplifting, my thoughts were full of gratitude, my thoughts were full of praise, my thoughts drew me right back to God where I belonged all the while.

Until next time.

PS. I’m thinking to invest in a phone book for my contacts – a physical one. Just in case I would need to get in touch with someone somehow. Oh! and also a real alarm clock.

If you were to be stuck on a deserted island what would you want to have with you? Let me know in the comments section below.