So I didn’t use my phone for five days in a row. No scrolling, YouTube, emails, nothing.
This experiment sort of just happened. I didn’t plan it or anything. One day I couldn’t use my phone for maybe like till 9 pm because I was out the whole day and then by the time I came back home I was so tired I just crashed on the bed.
The next morning, I woke up earlier than my usual 7 am. And I felt different. I felt like I had slept for a thousand years. My head felt so light. And calm, kind of very balanced. I actually felt relaxed after waking up. And rested, very rested. And the only math I could math was that my screen time was not more than 2 or 3 minutes at most the day before.
Also, I had like no thoughts in my head.
So in my regular routine, I would’ve made coffee and sat at my desk to write and all. But that day, I did something non regular. I decided I would do nothing. I put my phone on DND and locked it away in my desk. Man, I felt so proud. Like I had mastered the seven chakras or something.
Anyway, the phone was gone. Now what? I thought. So I made myself a cup of green tea. I skipped coffee because I thought coffee would trigger the same old self in me. And I might start thinking about writing about what I was feeling. So I skipped it and made green tea instead.
I was in the kitchen. And then, I kinda started noticing things. Things I hadn’t noticed, maybe in years. Like while making that tea, I was so aware of how aware I was. My movements were slow. My hands moved like a kung-fu master. Precise tea measurement. The spoon held absolutely still in my hand. Slipping the plate to cover the pan without making any sound.
While the tea brewed, I would usually start pacing around the room or scroll on my phone. But not that day. That day, I observed.
An ant was trying to figure out a way to get into the honey jar.
I looked up and saw this one spot where the sun rays made a kind of painting on the kitchen wall. And it flickered now and then as light moved through the leaves.
There was also this gentle fragrance of tea that filled the kitchen. It had only been maybe five minutes, but I felt like everything was happening in slow motion, and I had been standing there for three hours or something.
Then I picked up my old ‘Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’ and moved to the balcony with the tea. The book was really old. Like old, old. Worn out. I had taped the spine to stop the pages from falling out randomly. It’s such a pain to constantly have to put the pages back while you are reading something interesting. And out of nowhere, I had this need to smell the book. I hadn’t done that in years. So I exhaled all my breath out first. And then took a big sniff. Damn, that smell. It touched my soul or something. It really did. You kind of start enjoying the book extra when you have smelled it and now that old paper smell lives in your brain.
It had rained the night before. So the weather was very cool and fresh. And I started craving a walk. So, I picked up my trainers, and I noticed I always put on the left shoe first. I had never noticed that before. It wasn’t that important or anything. But still, I guess it mattered in some weird way.
So I was outside now, and where I live, there is this huge park lined with trees. It’s rectangular and out of those four sides, there is this one side that never gets trimmed or anything. It’s raw and wild, like a full grown jungle. And the best part, nobody goes in there. I was excited for that long, straight stretch of mini jungle.
The moment I walked into it, I noticed it was more silent than the other 3 sides of the rectangle. Felt like I was on Pandora from that Avatar movie. That last Avatar part was crap, by the way. Too much AI and graphics. It had no soul.
A blue butterfly flew past me. Little angels, they are. Squirrels hopped around. Then, I heard a breeze rustling the trees. I closed my eyes and listened to it and it felt so calm. I won’t say it was better than the book smell, but it was pretty close.
I was feeling good, so I sat down on the grass and took off my shoes. Touched grass with my feet like a 4-year-old. Rubbing them in the grass and all. It was very calming.
Then I kind of started imagining. I imagine all kinds of things. I guess it’s something to do with being a writer.
So, I imagined I was like this caveman living in the jungles. I just walk around, and swim in the river, roam around all day smelling flowers and all. And I started feeling more grounded. A sense of relief. It really feels good to live with no responsibilities. Even if it’s just in a moment of imagination.
After sitting there for a while, I didn’t feel like walking. So I just sat there for half an hour more before coming back home.
I guess this phone habit has put us into the constant thought loop of “what to do next”. I was sitting by the window and kept on thinking what to do next. So I decided on watching a movie. And then I kinda had to fight myself for justifying that a movie was not like the phone, and it was more like a book where your mind is focused on a story for 2 hours and all. I finally convinced myself, and then deciding the movie was another battle.
You have so many goddamn movies now. It really gives me a headache. So I just took out my hard drive that has my personal curated collection and started going through it.
I was in the mood to watch something slow. A slow burn movie. I’m a big fan of slow burn. Like the kind of movies where they tease you for one hour and forty-five minutes, and then in the last 15 minutes, reveal the big mystery and blow your mind through the roof kind of movie. So I picked Parasite.
After the movie, I stared at a wall for maybe 20 minutes, thinking about how good that movie was. And imagined I could have made that movie. And then, the thoughts slowed down.
Even though I had nothing to do, and I was feeling some sort of itch I couldn’t scratch, there was still this low-key calm inside me. I was feeling very patient in myself. Like everything can wait. I can take my time. I don’t have to rush. I can just exist without doing something “productive”.
And that’s when I finally saw it. What that damn phone had robbed me of. And I’m sure you must have read about it somewhere or scrolled past it. But honestly, nothing you will ever read or watch can come even slightly close to how it feels when you actually experience it yourself.
And it was the beauty in the ordinary things.
Like after waking up, I just sat in my bed for 20 minutes. Just thinking about how I had no thoughts in my head. The clock ticking. A bird chirping outside. I was there in that moment. And feeling a soothing calm wash over me.
Before, I was looking at so much information in a single day, that my brain was always overloaded. There were like these 100 tabs all open and running at the same time in the background. The tiredness, overwhelm, mental fog, or constant anxiety all of these were symptoms of an exhausted brain and an overloaded nervous system.
Now, I was there with no open tabs. Just me and that moment. And every little thing felt special.
Another thing I noticed was the memory recall. It was so detailed. Like I could walk through the whole day in my head and I was able to remember every single detail. Sometimes, I even forgot what day it was or what I had for dinner last night, or what I wore. But after these five days, it felt like I had a brand new high speed memory stick installed in my brain.
Now it kind of started making sense how the older generations created such great works of art. Because they didn’t have these 100 tabs. They had more energy and brain space to focus deeply on something.
Take the Sistine Chapel, for instance. Michelangelo worked for 4 years on this. Imagine if he had notifications coming in every 5 minutes and scrolling Instagram in lunch breaks.
Now reading 5 pages of a book feels like a mountain. That’s what the phone has taken away from us. The ability to Focus. Sustained laser sharp focus.
I will not explain it more because some things are meant to be experienced, not to be told about.
Will I ever go back to using the phone like I did before? Probably, I won’t. I actually tried at the end of day 5. I was just sitting. It was night, and it was quiet, so I picked up the phone and scrolled a bit. I felt like puking… I’m not kidding. It was just too much. This is my most honest reaction. I literally felt like puking.
I still read things from the writers I love. I still watch videos from the YouTubers I love. I still use the internet. I’m not moving to a cave.
I just don’t want to consume everything anymore.
I don’t care about celebrity gossip, the latest outrage, the new fake promises of politicians, or the new AI that will change everything from the Silicon valley tech bro.
I don’t care. I’m done. Simply because it’s just brain rot. It adds nothing to my life.
If this world goes into a dystopia, I’ll be the resistance. But not a guy fighting machines in a dystopian future.
Just a guy who can sit under a tree without reaching for his phone. A guy who can walk through a park and notice a butterfly. A guy who still likes the smell of an old book. A guy who can sit with boredom and not try to fix it. A guy who still writes these letters with pen & paper.
The ordinary guy who still notices ordinary things…
— Karun
If you liked reading this, you will love my little book ‘Depth over Noise’. It’s free. Get it here.