Getting back into the groove of waking up with the sun and remembering to pack everything I needed for school was a challenge, but as many times as I’ve forgotten my computer charger or a pencil, I’ve never forgotten one thing: my phone. Therefore, when I realized my phone was nowhere to be found halfway to school, I seriously considered turning back around. Using all my willpower, I decided not to be tardy in the first few days of being back and instead suffer through an entire day without sending a single text.
My walk around the baseball field and through the faculty lot felt like the longest five minutes of my life. By step three I was already reaching to scroll on Tiktok, constantly having to remind myself that my phone was nowhere in reach. By the time I entered the building, I was embarrassed by the amount of thought I had wasted thinking about how badly I wished I had something to entertain me as I walked.
By first period, the first rush to phone pockets was greeted by several curious looks from my classmates as I sat there with no phone in hand. It’s hard to notice how odd something feels when it’s so entrenched in your daily routine, but I was surprised by how normalized it was for everyone (including me) to have a phone, and how singled out I felt as a result of not having mine.
By the time lunch came, I was a solid four hours phone-less and, surprisingly, I was coming to grips with breathing through the idea that I wasn’t going to be able to doom scroll for a few more hours. It was almost freeing, being able to re-discover the art of real life interaction throughout the entire lunch period. My lack of a phone. forced me to have real conversation with my friends for the full 30 minute lunch, a rarity as we all often devote plenty of time catching up on everything we missed on the internet in the first few hours of school.
When the day was finally over, I actually found myself stressed out about the thought of getting back home and having to respond to everything I missed. In the six hours I spent without my phone, I went from dreading a school day without a constant ability to check the internet to dreading having to go back to checking the internet.
I won’t say that I have decided to leave my phone at home for the rest of the school year as, unfortunately, it’s so normalized to always have your device out and with you at all times.
However I will say, being without my phone taught me how valuable it is to spend time away from scrolling constantly. I weirdly felt free-er. I had more interaction and interesting conversation throughout the entire day. Not having my phone did make made me feel like I was “missing out” even though I was only offline for six hours, but, I found myself more attentive in class once I got over thinking about what I needed to do on my phone. After
the first 30 minutes, I was never tempted to check the notifications I could hear from my backpack. I never got distracted by a new post. I talked to my friends instead of texting with them in a group chat while they were sitting right next to me.
My forgetfulness taught me that I should focus on spending more time away from my phone, something I recommend to every teenager who, like me, wastes hours a day that could be used to create and further real life relationships.
