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all right thank you all for coming so
some of you might know this but I'm
doing like a month right now where I'm
off social media I've been doing a lot
of realizations on my own of how much
time I spend and I want everyone to feel
the torture than iPhone because I think
a lot of people don't know how much time
they actually spend on their phones so
if you have an iPhone pull up screen
time right now and I want all of you one
by one to start saying how much how many
hours you have spent on your phone on
average every day this week four hours
and 45 minutes five hours 11 minutes 7
hours and 46 minutes 5 hours and 50
minutes 7 hours and 15 minutes so much
time that I turned it off how did we end
up here where phones always meant to be
taking up so much of our time and why
are they becoming more and more to the
problem let's go back to the start of it
all when Steve Jobs introduced a
first-ever what Steve Jobs had in mind
for the iPhone wasn't something that you
depended on but simply a device that you
could listen to music and make calls
from but over the past 12 years internet
and social media usage has absolutely
skyrocketed today 3.4 billion people use
social media every single day in just in
2017 we spent on average over 2 hours
per day on our social networks alone let
that sink in for a second psychologists
and therapists are noticing massive
increases in anxiety and depression
partly because we're constantly filling
every single second we have alone with
time on our phones and so a few weeks
ago I asked myself the question as we've
gained in connectivity what have we lost
time is the most valuable resource we
possess so it's so important that we pay
attention to how much of our lives we
trade for the various activities we
allow to claim it and so to finally make
time for the daily habits that I know
will significantly make me happier and
healthier I decided to take a more
drastic approach ok so the thing that
has caused this entire situation was me
realizing that I was spending way too
much time on social media let's see what
I have this week I'm averaging three and
a half hours per day on my phone and
this week I've already tried really
really
to not use it for hours per day that is
28 hours a week which is is this even
possible it's 60 days a year on my phone
60 days I have built my entire life on
social media it's my job and most of my
friendships happen through social media
these days but I've decided that for the
next 30 days I'm gonna delete all my
apps all social media from my phone and
see how that changes how I feel on a
daily basis how much time I have on my
hands and have a present I am in my
daily life
hello Instagram I'm about to do a full
digital decluttering so I will be
deleting Instagram for the next 30 days
to all my friends you can reach me
through text and all of you who don't
have my phone number I'm sorry you won't
be able to reach me all right here we go
Instagram good bye YouTube good bye
Twitter good bye
snapchat good bye I'm officially off the
main social media platforms that
apparently take up about 1 to 2 hours of
my day every day so I don't know what
I'm gonna do with all this time now
maybe I should start reading some of
these books that I've bought and haven't
started I'm excited and I'm scared and I
wonder how many times I'm gonna like try
to open this app today and then realize
that it's not there anymore let the
challenge begin
hey guys a deleted social media what you
guys are supposed to like support me
I've been sending you so many cool
videos when yeah barely a bunch of
surfers have been hitting you up
so yeah I got like a few DMS from girls
saying that oh why just Thomas not
responding we've been hitting him up you
want to ask him a ton dates and stuff
and then also Kelly Slater trying to get
in contact yeah he said he could only do
something within the next month but you
have to answer it I'm taking up surfing
now so I'm answering all my DMS from all
the surfers and we're gonna go read what
I think he can come but we'll just
coordinate the time to diem it's like a
big DM group but guys just 30 days
please all right that is end of day two
but I have some good news I logged onto
my screen time and I've only spent an
hour and 35 minutes on my phone today
which is two hours less than my average
two entire hours less of my day was
spent on my phone the entire day it's
hard to record those moments but I would
pull out my phone
an Instagram used to be down here and I
would just like pull it out and press
here and then realize oh my god what am
i doing like Instagram is not here it's
such a reflex every time I go to the
bathroom I sit down and I pull out my
phone and I stare at it and I have
literally nothing to do so I just put it
back in my pocket it's pretty crazy to
see already day two that I've saved two
hours of my day from my phone the most
important thing I wanted to do this
month was to live with intention I
hadn't had any kind of set routine of
the past few months so I wanted to use
all the time that I saved from this
experiment had live and create my dream
morning routine first I'm deciding to
wake up before I have to every single
morning by getting up before 6:00 a.m.
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okay I struggled with that the first
week but I eventually adjusted my body
to it my goals were to reflect and
journal every single day keep my room
clean and organized and most importantly
start my day with a run or a sir
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my reflux right now would be to pick up
my phone and sit down and just start
scrolling I got no other choice that's a
lie just pick up a book do some reading
instead on social media is I think some
wild benefits I think got the courage to
hop in a cold shower meditated for 15
minutes and took some time to meet and
already within two weeks I genuinely
felt my life changing
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well it has officially been two weeks
without any social media on my phone I
have decided officially that I will
never go back to using social media the
way I was using it before obviously this
is a very tough message for us to give
because we're on social media we have a
YouTube channel an Instagram page and we
have all sorts of things that were even
put content out and we've kind of made
it our mission to make sure that what we
put out into the world has a reason for
being there I think that should be most
people's goals with even how they use
social media it's important that you
have a purpose when you're there and
make sure that it doesn't ever replace
real life conversations this is the most
change I've ever noticed on you uh-huh
ever yeah no social media is there still
I mean it'd be something a lot more
focused I feel like no social media a
lot of meditating it's all good why he's
saying is good stuff and I will
personally try it so usually that's part
of my month I've been told that there's
this community called brick because like
two stories of a bunch of people that
show up and no phones allowed I've been
told that people that come to these
things are here to really connect it's
one way to pass the time at night just
going and connecting with a bunch of
people so he goes
I don't know that game you you get
oxytocin during a fulfilling experience
and the problem with our phones is that
dopamine is this endless searching
neurochemical the endless scroll is
there's no station it's like candy
you can never quite feel our goal with
the BRIC events is to give people
meaningful connections meaningful
experiences in the real world to give
them not oxytocin so when they do go
back to their phone the candy isn't as
attractive to them because they had a
much more fulfilling experience fun free
events I just like finding like-minded
people aware we're all just having a
great time not distracted by all the
[ __ ] bingo I got a tower phone we're
living life right here right now for the
outside realm punk free events is the
way to go human interaction after weeks
of not using social media I wanted to
get an even better understanding of what
was actually going on mentally so we
decided to contact the man who actually
inspired this entire idea Cal Newport
Cal is an associate professor of
computer science at Georgetown
University and in addition to
researching cutting-edge technology he's
the author of six books including the
New York Times bestseller digital
minimalism in his book he challenges the
audience to do what he calls a digital
decluttering which means deleting all
the optional apps off your phone for 30
days which is exactly what I did he
argues that we should be much more
selective about the technologies we
adopt in our personal lives naturally
given his stance on social media Cal is
incredibly hard to reach but after weeks
of emails were finally able to set up an
interview with him at his home in
Washington DC
we're good to go awesome yeah thank you
so much for having this Cal pers happen
one question that I like to start with
do you think there's any benefits the
social media well I see it more broadly
what we have in the foundation is the
social Internet which i think is just
more generally the ability to use the
internet that connect with other people
express yourself and find interesting
ideas and information that's incredibly
powerful so where the problems are
coming from it's what happened at some
point in the history of social media as
an industry where you had a small number
of these companies that had a lot of
venture capital backing them and they
were looking ahead to we have to do our
IPO we have to get our 100x return to
our early stage investors and so there's
this period of reengineering that
started about seven or eight years ago
in which the actual experience of these
apps was changed to try to induce you to
use the law and this is when we got the
rise of likes and favorites and tags for
photos guess this changed the experience
of social media from I'm posting my
friends are posting to a vision where I
hit this and I have social approval
indicators waiting for me then we
coupled that with putting in very smart
statistical algorithms this starts
studying the users like data vectors and
understanding what can we show that it's
gonna make them most likely to keep
staring at the screen that was entirely
for revenue purposes which again is why
we see the like button didn't exist and
there's only is everywhere why it gets
you looking at your screen more and it
gets you giving information about your
preferences all day long which makes
that data vector that describes you to
the marketers much richer they can see
what you're like you know and what
you're not liking so what do you think
some of the main things that we've lost
by just having access to this constant
like you call it it's a slot machine in
your phone where you're always looking
for what you've got right and I have to
say this the slot machine analogy which
it was Tristan Harris the sort of former
Google engineer turned a whistleblower
that was his analogy it's actually
literally the attention engineers
working in Silicon Valley took research
that came out of Las Vegas casino
gambling and trying to understand how to
re-engineer the social media apps on
phones that you use them more both
Facebook and Instagram but artificially
batch likes or favorites to better match
these reinforcement schedules so we
don't want these to be trickled out too
much you're gonna use this more
compulsively if we actually hold these
back so this time you see none and then
maybe we released them in a big bunch
the next time they're actually looking
at the reinforcement schedules from slot
machines and so there's really three
things that seem to be happening
one when you do this all the time to
fill all your downtime it keeps you away
from higher quality pursuits so it's not
that this is bad but if you were instead
you know out there with a friend
training for the Half Ironman right yeah
I mean that's much better the second
thing is a problem is what psychologists
call social snack which is we have a
drive to be social but a lot of people
will replace real-world interaction with
this because this is easy the problem is
is our brain doesn't recognize this the
same way that it recognizes actually
sacrificing time and attention on behalf
of strengthening a connection which is
why we see these paradoxical studies
where increased social media use
correlates so strongly with increased
loneliness and then a third issue is we
need solitude so we need on a regular
basis time alone with their own thoughts
not processing input from other people
and if you get rid of every last moment
of solitude by doing this every time
you're bored it's not good for the brain
and one of the side effects of this is
anxiety which is why I think we have the
sort of low-grade hum of anxiety in our
culture right now then we all just take
for granted is this is just the modern
condition we're really what it is is our
brains yelling out I need time away from
inputs I can't always be processing
inputs from other minds I need to just
look at the things around me and think
and I need to do that every day and the
interesting thing about discomfort that
it's true that a lot of things that are
really important for human flourishing
requires some discomfort so what was the
solution from evolution to get us to
still do homes we got these strong Drive
part of the war we've gotten in the
trouble today is that modern
technologies have given us a way to
short-circuit those drives so we have
the strong drive the sociality that's
supposed to get us out there and do the
hard work of a beam there and connecting
with our community our close friends and
our family but you can short-circuit
that drive by looking at an Instagram or
Facebook boredom is this powerful drive
to get us out there to do high
type of leisure activities or type of
things that make us feel alive as humans
but you have these sort of very pleasing
distractions on your phone and it can
give you an immediate response to the
boredom
it short circuits to drive so we're
short circuiting the drives that are
supposed to push us into the discomfort
which is why I think like the type of
work you're doing with yes theory is so
important is that you have to
essentially re-educate people about hate
these things are uncomfortable actually
be a source of real flourishing now the
Internet can play a huge role boosting
these very high quality activities so
let's say I want a more high quality
hobby I'm into this maker culture going
to build whatever well the internet is
great in the sense that it can connect
you not just to other people who are
working on it but a lot of information
about how to do this but this is the
Internet at its best is where it's
supporting these high quality leisure
activities that give us a huge return
where it becomes at its worst is where
it subverts them it becomes a
replacement and now when you start
adding the technology back you get these
sort of really well balanced lives we're
like you're predominantly spending your
time doing things that are quite
meaningful and then you're strategically
deploying tech giving you these little
boost and supports for this life of
values you've built just to wrap this up
I want to look at the connection that we
made that was the most interesting to me
was that when we're bored we used to
have the motivation to go do things we
have to be careful of as being aware of
not feeling that boredom constantly with
social media because it might actually
reduce our motivation to go out and
create and do more things if you feel an
instinct that's been around for a long
time
be wary of fulfilling it with something
that's been around
thank you so much kal thank you this has
been super interesting yeah yeah thank
you so much my pleasure all right
it is officially April 3rd which makes
it more than 30 days without social
media it's been an incredible experience
I honestly don't really miss it which is
a little bit strange I guess I thought I
would miss it more at this point I'm
like really not looking forward to it
like I've saved so much time and it
hasn't caused any real inconveniences
overall this month honestly changed my
life 30 days ago I was honestly not in
the best headspace whether you could see
it or not at the start of this video I
was anxious on a daily basis I didn't
feel like I was actively pursuing any of
the goals I had set for myself this year
and I never felt like I had any time for
myself but in this month that it first
started as an experiment I ended it
feeling more alive more present and
fulfilled than I ever had in my entire
life there were several times throughout
the day where I'd stop and catch a
breath of fresh air just to appreciate
how calm I felt at the end of the day
for me the main reason why I love doing
what we do is because every single time
we go through an experience like this
one we always come out on the other side
feeling like an evolved version of
ourselves moving forward I've decided
that I'm permanently going to keep
social media off my phone and just
download it every three days for 20
minutes and do all the things I need to
do then delete it back I'm going to
continue experimenting with my usage to
see what works but one thing is for sure
now that I've seen the other side
there's no freaking way
I'm going back to my old ways and now I
challenge you to make a list of all the
things that you've been wanting to
pursue but just haven't had time for
then delete social media off your phone
for seven days to replace the time you
saved by pursuing one or several of
those things for a week coming from
someone who just did this I promise you
it'll change your life I want to end
this by thanking you for watching this
episode and if you're interested in
exploring this topic more in depth we
got our sponsor audible to give you guys
an exclusive 30-day free trial and in a
book of your choice for free I'd
recommend Cal Newports digital
minimalism which partly inspired this
video and taught me how to better
balance social media into my life making
me happier and less anxious
ever since plus with audible you get one
free audiobook and two free audible
originals every month from their
constantly changing list which has
allowed me to listen to more books on
the go every time we travel I download a
bunch of books to listen to which saves
me from having to pack my bags to the
brim with hardcover ones if you're
interested in learning how to control
social media use then you can go find
digital minimalism by Cal Newport on
audible.com slash yes theory or text yes
theory to 500 500 thanks so much for
watching and we'll see you next week
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