Left to Your Own Devices - Part I: Rest & Sleep

I was on a podcast recently and someone asked me: “Jay, you’ve been exploring how to build healthier relationships with tech for years, but while many of us are locked down at home with nothing but our screens, it’s kind of a lost cause, isn’t it?”

I almost spit out my tea. Nothing could be further from the truth. Being left to our own devices has made it much more important to maintain a healthy distance from virtual reality. In a world where overflowing inboxes and incessant notifications constantly try to influence you to share, buy, and even vote in certain ways, you need to work harder than ever to reclaim your mind.

I write and speak a lot about the importance of mindfulness in this exponential age we live in. I’m passionate about technologies designed to bring more mindfulness into our lives. But the reality is that wholesome technologies are the minority. Most are junk food for your mind.

If you’ve ever tried to practice meditation and found it excruciatingly hard, you know that mindfulness is hard to maintain. But it’s even harder with ubiquitous influential tech like smartphones, social media, and digital workspaces constantly pulling at our attention without truly urgent reason.

In this day and age, I believe a healthy relationship with tech is a prerequisite for mindfulness. Here are a few tips to help you get the rest and sleep you need to thrive.

Prioritize sleep

Sleep is a basic human need, along with food, water, exercise, and social connectedness. Based on an American study, it’s estimated that 40% of people get less than the recommended 7 hours or more of sleep per night. That’s up from 11% from almost a century ago. Perhaps not unrelated, 65% of adults say they’ve slept with their phones, and 90% of young adults do it regularly. The first step to reclaiming your mind from the attention economy is to reclaim the solitude of night.

Don’t let the internet in your bedroom

When you grab your phone to disable your morning alarm clock, it’s impossible to ignore all the notifications. It’s a trap. Get yourself an old-school alarm clock and kick the internet out of your bedroom. No laptops, phones, or tablets. Books are fine. E-readers are fine as long as you only use them to read books. Not only will this give you space for sleep, it will also inspire you to be more decisive when you shut down your screens and go to bed.

Set time limits on screen time

If putting a space constraint on your tech doesn’t feel like the right fit, try a time constraint. You can set alarms on your phone or even get a handy timer which automatically shuts off your router at specific times. Having the internet evaporate at 9pm will feel frustrating at first, but soon it will become a cherished moment to warm up some chamomile tea and do a few quick stretches before you hit the hay.

Remove blue light from your screens at night

Over thousands of years, our bodies evolved to activate in response to blue light from the daytime sky. Your retinas have specific molecules which break down when subjected to light at blue wavelength, triggering cell signalling pathways which wake up you body. That’s why tools removing the blue light from your screens using tools like Apple’s NightShift and f.lux help you wind down at night.

Jay Vidyarthi instructs our Technology and Mindfulness course. He is an attention activist working toward a society where tools for self-care and mental health are as diverse as the people who need them. He believes mindfulness will empower individuals to reclaim choice in the attention economy. As a designer, Jay has helped launch mindful technologies like Muse: the brain sensing headband, Sonic Cradle, the Healthy Minds Program, Brightmind, and 10+ more. Jay serves on the advisory council for the Mindful Society Global Institute, he’s taught design at major educational institutions, and he has been recognized and featured internationally (Harvard, ACM, MIT, UToronto, Forbes, Vice, Fast Company, TED, etc).