Do you realise how much time you spend online?

Scrolling, clicking, swiping. Hours slip away.

Then you wonder why you feel so unmotivated, bored, or even drained.

Too much screen time doesn’t just waste your day. It messes with your focus, your energy, and your mood.

And it’s not just about endless social media scrolling. Screen time is also:

• reading the news,
• googling every single thing,
• online shopping,
• chatting,
• gaming,
• checking horoscopes,
• bingeing TikToks, YouTube, or random stories,
• tracking everything with apps etc.

You may not realise how much time you spend glued to your phone or laptop, because it’s addictive. It’s like a digital drug for your brain.

It’s fake, it’s unhealthy, and it’s holding you back.

Truth is, if you want to take control over your life, you should take steps to reduce your screen time right now.

Think about it. Do you even remember how you used to spend your time before the internet took over?

If staying away from your phone for more than 15 minutes makes you feel anxious… that’s your wake-up call. It’s time to unplug and get back to the real world, before your screen starts running your life instead of you.

What Screen Addiction Does to You

Spending too much time online doesn’t just eat your hours, it eats away at your life. Here’s what it really means:

• Losing interest in real-life activities;
• Your relationships suffer – less face-to-face time with your friends and family weakens your connections;
• Loneliness – because you’re too lazy to meet people;
• Procrastination – important things pile up because you’re distracted and drained all the time;
• Insomnia – screen time messes with your nervous system and makes it hard to fall asleep. It leaves you tired no matter how long you stay in bed;
• Mood swings – you can be irritated all the time without really knowing why;
• Neglecting yourself – you don’t feel like working out, going out, preparing healthy meals, dress up etc.;
• And the worst part – screen time actually makes your life boring. Yes, boring. Because the more time you spend staring at pixels, the less time you spend living. See how by cutting your screen time you will make your life cool and interesting again.

The very first step? Cut your screen time down to the bare minimum.

That’s when your real life starts getting exciting again.

How Screen Time Actually Ruins Your Life

It gives you the illusion something’s happening

Spending too much time online has two big side effects:

• you stop living in the real world and
• your brain gets overloaded with information

When your brain is constantly bombarded with notifications, posts, and chats, you lose the ability to focus and enjoy real experiences.

That’s why the people who seem to live the happiest, most exciting lives barely use social media. Some don’t use it at all.

Scrolling gives you a fake sense of “being connected.”

But in reality, nothing is happening in your life. If you get used to having low-quality contact with friends via chat, instead of seeing them face-to-face, you will be much less motivated to see them in real life and actually do things together.

It feeds narcissism

Let’s be honest: why do people share their “best moments” online?

• To get validation
• Or to make others jealous

Now be honest, if likes and comments make you feel important, what happens when nobody reacts? You feel bad. That’s how social media traps you.

Worse, when you see someone bragging about their new car, partner, or trip, you start comparing your life to theirs, even though you know they’re only showing a polished version of their life.

It’s a toxic loop: we post to feel important, we scroll to compare, and we end up more insecure.

You should not want to make people jealous, envious and depressed. It’s wrong and it makes you narcissistic. Why would you want to feed those feelings?

If you hate how someone bragging online about their new bf/gf, exotic trip, better job, new car etc., makes you feel… then stop doing it as well.

Another toxic effect – feeding your wrong beliefs that everyone else has it better than you.

But here’s the catch – you’re only seeing a tiny, polished slice of their life. The vacations, the new car, the happy couple selfies… never the arguments, the stress, or the boring everyday stuff.

Informational overload

Social media has become a place where you get bombarded with ads about products you don’t need and news that you don’t want to read.

This informational overload can’t be processed because your brain has a limited capacity. Do you know what happens to your brain when it is exposed to more information than it can take?

• It affects your memory – you start forgetting things;
• You can’t make decisions because you can’t determine which information is important and which is not;
• You become boring – you lose creativity. You get a new idea, when you connect pieces of information. But with informational overload, the information is too much;
• You feel anxious.

It makes you socially inadequate

In my article How to improve your social skills, I said that people are not born social gurus, but the more you socialise, the better you become at it.

If you only “connect” with people online, you slowly get lazy to meet them offline.

When you don’t do that, you forget how to socialise with ease, keep small talk, find conversation topics and focus on the conversation without checking your phone every 2 minutes.

Bad social skills make it harder to meet new people, build friendships and date.

If everybody is lazy going outside and meet, we will all just become more and more lonely and alienated.

You shouldn’t be “connected” all the time

Being constantly online can give you the false belief that you should be available ALL THE TIME.

In no other time in history people were available 24/7. It used to be expensive reaching somebody on the phone. Letters took weeks.

People had the luxury being unreachable and doing their things without someone disturbing them.

Did their relationships suffer because they weren’t connected all the time? Um…no, guess what? They were just fine – often better.

The urge to obsessively check DMs and reply to every notification can make it difficult to focus on any task that requires concentration.

It makes you unproductive

You can’t focus, study, or create if you’re always on alert.

Your brain needs quiet, uninterrupted time. Otherwise, you’re just burning yourself out.

How to Get Your Life Back on Track

Phone addiction can become so bad, you might feel anxious if you haven’t checked your phone for 15 minutes.

Start small: put your phone away for short periods of time, then gradually stretch it out. The anxiety will lessen.

You may not realise but you may take your phone in the bathroom, during meals, in bed and every time you have to wait for something. Most people even do it in the middle of a conversation. Most people do. But that doesn’t make it any less terrible.

Then stop doing it.

So ask yourself: What did I love doing before the internet took over?

Maybe it was reading? Going to the movies? Theatre? Painting? Playing board games with friends? Those things made life richer, and they still can.

Here is a plan how to leave the digital world behind:

1. Stop posting your life on social media. Keeping privacy is better. If you’re interested in your friends’ lives, simply go meet them in person.
2. Set a screen time limit on all your apps for 30 minutes a day.
3. Disable your notifications.
4. Leave your phone behind more and more. Go out without taking it.
5. Engage with the real world.

If you’re feeling low right now, it may not just be screen time. Check out some common reasons for depression here.

The reason you are always dissatisfied

Why you suddenly get depressed for no reason?

What to do when you feel like a failure

Want to know how to fix your social skills? Check this article.

TheThinkAbout is a website based on psychology in practice and experience.

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