According to an interesting, but not so surprising study millennials felt agitated and uncomfortable without their cellphone for specific periods of time. It gets one thinking about their own cellphone use and how tethered we really are to these things in our day to day lives. We use them for our address book, picture taking, reading, social media posting, business, banking, and occasionally we talk to other humans on them! While cellphones provide a lot of benefits to our life, they can also cause grief and pain especially when it comes to distracted driving.
It got me thinking about my own cellphone use and how attached I am to the darn thing and I realized something. I rely WAY to much on my phone for multiple reasons. I feel very uneasy if I’ve misplaced my phone or left it at home because it contains access to many important things and, of course, all my contacts for family and friends. When was the last time you physically wrote something in your address book? It’s been a few years probably.
My phone is my connection to the outside world because it acts as my computer, I can post on social media, and most importantly, it’s got YouTube on it! How would I be able to watch Russian dash cam car crash videos and silly cats without my phone? Somebody asked me “Cody could you live without your phone?” The answer is yes, but it would require me to retrain the brain and I’d probably go through some major YouTube withdrawals, making me irritable and agitated just like the respondents in the study I mentioned above. Oh the joys and challenges of being a millennial!
We can live without our phones if forced to I suppose but it would be rather difficult when you think about it because we’ve gotten so used to using them thanks to the times we live in. There are so many things geared towards using our cellphones thanks to new technology and new apps that make cellphones nearly essential nowadays. However, there is something freeing and relaxing about being untethered from our cellphones!