27. Are you addicted to your phone? or is it just me?
Apr 17, 2024
Christina Kohl
If you’ve been on a career break and are ready to land a job you love, you may be a good fit for my Career Comeback Coaching program (1:1 private coaching).
This is for you if:
✅ You are ready to transition from staying at home with the kids to step back into work that fulfills you and lights you up!
✅ You want to learn from another stay-at-home-mom who created a successful career AND who just so happens to be a certified HR professional who knows EXACTLY what employers are looking for in a “return to work” resume and in interviews.
A couple of weeks ago when I ran into a mental block at work, my boss (hi, I'm the boss) let me take a much needed break with the caveat that no phone scrolling would be allowed during the break.
Addiction is a strong word, but not allowing myself to zone out on my phone was much harder than I thought it would be. Once I noticed it, the constant urge to check the screen was quite eye opening!
Over the past week I've set some boundaries for myself around my phone usage and am finding that I'm much more focused and productive. Surprising, right?!
Curious to know the strategies that have been working for me? This episode dives deep into this topic - don't miss it!
If you’ve been on a career break and are ready to land a job you love, you may be a good fit for my Career Comeback Coaching program (1:1 private coaching).
This is for you if:
✅ You are ready to transition from staying at home with the kids to step back into work that fulfills you and lights you up!
✅ You want to learn from another stay-at-home-mom who created a successful career AND who just so happens to be a certified HR professional who knows EXACTLY what employers are looking for in a “return to work” resume and in interviews.
A couple of weeks ago when I ran into a mental block at work, my boss (hi, I'm the boss) let me take a much needed break with the caveat that no phone scrolling would be allowed during the break.
Addiction is a strong word, but not allowing myself to zone out on my phone was much harder than I thought it would be. Once I noticed it, the constant urge to check the screen was quite eye opening!
Over the past week I've set some boundaries for myself around my phone usage and am finding that I'm much more focused and productive. Surprising, right?!
Curious to know the strategies that have been working for me? This episode dives deep into this topic - don't miss it!
I know there's a lot of you in this community who are current stay-at-home moms who are thinking about going back to work, and I know for me, when I was ready to go back, it took me a couple of years because I was stopping and starting. I just didn't have the confidence, wasn't sure what to do and it was just really challenging. Once I hired a coach, everything changed. I had that accountability partner, I had focus and I got a job and I am excited to offer that to you. If you are feeling ready to jumpstart your career, my Career Comeback Coaching Program can help you rebuild your confidence, identify and leverage your strengths, master your skills inventory, uncover the skills even the ones you've forgotten about that make you valuable to employers and help you develop the right mindset to get clear on your goals and banish self-doubt. Plus, of course, we'll tackle all the tactical stuff. So, your resume and your cover letter revamp, getting those up to speed and getting you noticed by the right employers. A LinkedIn makeover If you don't have a LinkedIn account, we will help you create one. Interview preparation. T his is something that I excel at - helping people with interviews. I've been on the other side, the hiring manager and interviewer side so many times and I've learned so much and I can't wait to share with you. And then, finally, you've got the job offer. Let's make sure that you get what you're worth, so I'll be able to help you with salary negotiation tips. This is all built into the career comeback coaching program. Don't let a career break hold you back. I have two openings for one-on-one coaching clients this month. Let's get your skills back in gear and jumpstart your dream career If this is of interest to you. If you are ready, send me an email at christina@ hernextchapters. com, or send me a direct message on LinkedIn. All right, on to today's episode.
Christina:
Hi and welcome to Her Next Chapter's podcast. I'm your host, Christina Kohl. I'm a mom of three and soon to be an empty nester. I'm also a certified HR pro who restarted my career after being a stay-at-home mom for over a decade. I created this podcast to connect with moms who have an empty nest on the horizon and are wanting to redefine their identity outside of motherhood, which might include a job search. On this show, we'll have raw conversations about our ever-changing roles as moms. We'll hear from women who restarted their careers and share tips for a job search after a career break. So if that's you, you're in the right place. Friend, let's get started. Hello friends, so glad to be back with you this week.
Christina:
I am talking about something that you might be surprised by. This week I want to talk about phone addiction. And I'm not talking about our kids, not talking about the teenagers or the college kids. I'm talking about us moms, specifically me, and maybe you can relate. I didn't realize how much I had become attached to my phone. I mean, it's one thing to pick it up when I leave the room and put it in my pocket and always have it with me. It's another thing to always be checking it and I don't know. Maybe you can relate.
Christina:
But the other day and this is what prompted me to talk, to share about this, because maybe maybe I'm not alone Tell me I'm not alone. I just again, I work from home, I work for myself and you know so I'm the boss. So if there's something that's not done, well, then I'm the one who has to deal with that. But I just kind of hit a wall that day. I just did not feel like working. I knew what I needed to do. I had several things that needed to get done. Like working. I knew what I needed to do. I had several things that needed to get done, and what typically happens is if I hit a wall, it's during the day, and then I wound up working late into the night. I say late, I mean like 10 o'clock to two o'clock in the morning. So 10 o'clock at night until two in the morning, kind of late, is when I get the most done, which is crazy.
Christina:
But I, on this particular day, did not feel like working and it was more like I don't know 10 in the morning and I'm like, okay, Christina, you can take a break and not sit down at your desk and waste a bunch of time because you're obviously not able to focus right now. But you can't hang out on your phone and I don't watch TV during the day, it's just a habit, something I don't do. So I wasn't going to watch TV and I wasn't going to go on my phone. Like, well, you know, I'm going to grab my journal, grab my notebook and sit by the couch with a nice sunlight coming in and just journal for a while and help me maybe clarify my thoughts and kind of get the creative juices going so I can get past whatever this mental block was that was preventing me from doing my work.
Christina:
So I get out the journal sitting on the comfy couch, got the dog on the floor next to me and I start writing and all of a sudden I think of oh, I wonder, in my Facebook group I think there's some people that were like trying to get in and I haven't let them in yet. I created that a couple of years ago and I've been so active on LinkedIn. I haven't done anything with my Facebook group, but I bet there's people like I could help that are in that group. So I just put the pin down. I grabbed my phone, I go into Facebook to look and, sure enough, there's like seven people. So hey, y'all, if you're listening, I'm coming. That's on the agenda for this week.
Christina:
But in the meantime, because I'm on Facebook, I didn't just check out my group which, by the way, if you're curious, it's called Mom's Next Career. So I didn't check out. I did check out the group and you know, thinking like some strategies and posts and all that that I could do. But then I'm on Facebook. I started scrolling and scrolling and after it was probably only 10 minutes or so, which was like eight minutes longer than I needed to I came out of the fog the Facebook fog, we'll call it that. I was like wait a minute, I wasn't going to be on my phone during this time, so I set the phone down, I started writing again and acknowledged it in my writing. Like well, that didn't last long, you know.
Christina:
I went and I wound up writing four pages in my journal, and there are three more times where I referenced the urge to pick up my phone and I really had to struggle to not touch it. And here's the thing I was not expecting a text, I wasn't expecting a phone call. The phone wasn't even making any noise, but I was drawn to it and I think, oh my gosh, how much are our kids drawn to that? I'm an adult parent of young adults and I'm struggling with this. And so for the rest of the day I made a point.
Christina:
So I didn't just journal all day. I did get to work, but I made a point whenever, anytime, I wanted to look at my phone. I'm like what time is it? I look somewhere else, not on the phone and see what time it was and tell myself, not until the top of the hour, because I didn't really have a purpose in looking at the phone in those moments. I'm just, I'm trained like Pavlov's dog, right, like you know, salome, and I gotta check the phone. Gotta check the phone, gotta check the phone, even though there's nothing to check. And on one hand, I think, well, maybe I should just put it in a different room, which is what I do at night when I go to bed. The phone is in a completely different room on a charger. I don't hear it, I don't see it, I don't touch it. That's one of the, I guess, phone hygiene, if you will, things that I've put into place years ago.
Christina:
But during the day, there's so many times when I I need it, and need is a strong word. Okay, go with it here. I'm, I'm an addict for the phone. I admit it. Um, but it might be. I'm logging in for something and it needs an authenticator, which is on my phone or there might be. I do a lot of screenshots of things that are of interest and oh, that's a great idea for a post, or a great idea for the podcast, or I want to, you know, track something. So I'll take pictures, screenshots, and I'll be like, ok, what was that screenshot of and whose was it? And so I need to go back and look at that. So there are times when I use the phone I don't want to say need, but I use the phone for appropriate purposes. But the problem is here's an example we're using the phone for an appropriate purpose, sucks me in and steals my time, or I give my time away.
Christina:
My husband and I share a grocery shopping app on each other's phones. We have one account and we share it, and that's how we manage the inventory. Well, both of us. So if we're low on dill relish and I see that, oh, we're down to toward, we're scraping the bottom of the jar, let's put it on the shopping list so that when we run out we'll have another jar are. So in that example, I would pick up my phone from my pocket, because you know it's usually on my person pull the phone out of my back pocket, open up the app and add dill pickle relish to the app. But what happens is I might pick up the phone and go oh, there's notifications in my Outlook email. Let me check and see what those are Okay. And then oh, there's you know something, there's a messenger notification in Facebook. Let me just see what's going on in Facebook and 10 or 15 minutes go by and I finally come out of the Facebook fog, put the phone down and go back and go oh, that's right, the jar of pickle dill relish is almost empty. That's right. I was going to put it on the grocery list and I didn't.
Christina:
So even though I'm using the phone, I'm opening up with good intention and purposeful intention, I wind up getting distracted and pulled in all different directions and I've never really thought do I have ADHD? I think maybe we as a culture do. Tell me I'm not alone. I just feel like as a culture and I don't think it's just me we have a rule, particularly when the kids are younger no phones at the table unless they're contributing to the conversation, meaning you're looking up. Well, what was the date that we're doing this? You grab your calendar and look, or you're looking up a certain topic to support what we're talking about. We'll actually ask our Alexa app things, and my oldest son hates that. He's like I can find the answer quicker. So if it's contributing to the conversation, then sure your phone can be at the table. Otherwise we have a phone-free dinner table, but even so you'll find us watching TV and I say us, but I'll just not throw everyone else under the bus me watching TV, and generally I'm pretty good about watching the show.
Christina:
But when a commercial comes on, there's this pull to the phone, to the phone, to the phone, and the commercial is only 60 seconds. It has a little timer with a countdown 60. So I've been trying this past week to be more aware and I'm aware of that pull of the phone and not giving into it. Like I don't need to be on the phone for the 60 second commercial. Even if it's a minute and a half commercial, it's okay. I can just be alone with my thoughts, listen to the commercial or talk to the person I'm watching the show with, or maybe pet the dog. So those are some things that I've been noticing about myself being very, I think, pretty vulnerable here.
Christina:
But, like I said, I don't think I'm alone and I was talking to a friend about this last week and what she does on her phone. I haven't figured it out yet, but I'm going to try and I'll try to at least share it with you, at least on the iPhone Now for Android users, I'm sure they have something like this too. But if you go into settings and I'm trying to do this now there's a I don't know the seventh one down for me there's a settings that is called focus and it has a little moon picture on it and I've had mine on set for do not disturb, for like bedtime, so like 10 o'clock I think, even seven o'clock in the morning. It's on do not disturb. The only people that can break through that are my immediate family. So, but what my friend was telling me is that she set up all these other ones and she has one she calls horse blinders. So, denise, if you're listening, I'm borrowing your horse blinders and sharing it with the community here, so you can name this the focus settings, however you want, and you can add different levels of controls horse blinders and if you think of a horse, like a racehorse on their bridle, that has these blinders that go over their eyes, all they can see is straight in front of them, so they don't get distracted, they just run their race. So, anyway, horse blinders, what she came up with as her name, and that the only people who can break through are her husband and her mom. She doesn't have kids. Anyone else cannot break through when she has that focus time set and programmed and apparently and again I haven't tried it out yet so I'm sharing something with you that I haven't fully done myself, but pointing all of us in that direction is to set some focus parameters on our phones so that we don't hear the ding.
Christina:
And then, you know, I get these notifications for all kinds of different things. So the phone buzzes, vibrates, has a little sound, depending on the app. There are ways to set focus limits on your phone so that you can have uninterrupted time, and that might mean putting the phone in the other room. I've been doing that more lately too, and it is a little like, oh my gosh, where's my phone, what's going on? And it's okay. I've been doing that more lately too, and it is a little like, oh my gosh, where's my phone, what's going on? And it's okay, I've survived. So those are my struggles that I'm working on with my phone.
Christina:
Number one is just realizing it, recognizing the tug and the pull, the attraction, and number two is putting some boundaries around it. Like I said, I'm not letting myself just pick it up at any time, not during commercials and if it's during the day, you know, and I'm just feeling this urge, I'm like you can wait until it's the top of the hour. But I'm going to do this next level and put the focus parameters on so that I know that, from certain times of the day that I am working and I can't, the day that I am working and I can't. So by having the focus on, as I understand it, the apps, at least I want to be able to program it. So if you all know how to do this and I'm not saying it right, let me know but that you can program it so that the apps aren't even accessible to you during that time. You would have to overwrite it somehow.
Christina:
I'm working on it. It's my goal and I guess that's my challenge to you, if you're willing, if it's something that you want to take a look at in your own life, just becoming aware of that tug from the phone, from the device, all these apps that we're on. So for me it's LinkedIn, facebook, sometimes Instagram. They are designed to suck you in and to keep you on the app as long as possible, designed to suck you in and and for to keep you on the up as long as possible, and I know that, you know, for me it's far too much time and so it's something I'm working on and if it's something and maybe this has been eyeopening for you as well just to maybe might encourage you just to start having that awareness.
Christina:
When you go to put dill pickles, dill relish on your grocery shopping list, does it take you one minute or are you lost for 20? Anyway, I hope that's helpful and insightful, kind of sharing that with you. And, yeah, let me know, let me know if this resonated with you and what you're doing. And maybe you've got some tips and tricks of how to manage your phone so it doesn't manage you. I would love to hear, because it is something I am working on, all right, well, that's it for this week. My friends have a great one and we'll talk to you soon. Thank you so much for listening today. I hope this episode hit home for you and, if you haven't already, be sure to connect with me on LinkedIn and say hello.