Roni Recommends - 24/6 The Power of Unplugging One Day a Week by Tiffany Shlain

February 19, 2020 Roni Loren

If you’ve been following my blog for any amount of time, you know that I have a few close-to-my-heart topics that that I keep coming back to. One of those is the role of screens and social media in our lives (and our children’s lives.) Even though I’ve read a towering stack of books on the topic, I can’t resist a new book in that area. I like digging deeper and understanding different angles and perspectives—along with different solutions people have tried. So when I saw Tiffany Shlain’s book 24/6 The Power of Unplugging One Day a Week, I knew I had to read it.

The premise of this book is pretty obvious with the title, but basically, Shlain has, for the last ten years, taken a Tech Shabbat with her family every week. This means that they turn off their phones and all screens on Friday night and don’t turn them back on until Saturday night. Even though she’s using the term Shabbat and is Jewish, she states that she identifies as a cultural Jew and not a religious one, so she doesn’t follow all the other traditional rules of Shabbat like not driving on that day. She also says the day you choose is arbitrary. It’s what works for you and your family. So if Saturday night to Sunday night works better for you, no problem. The point is spending one full 24 hour period a week without screens/devices.

I was a little afraid that this was going to be one of those books that had a high concept idea that could’ve just been conveyed in a blog post and didn’t need to be stretched into a full book, but I’m happy to report that I really enjoyed the read. She lays out the benefits she’s seen from living 24/6, how her children have responded and thrived, how our brains react to tech, the science behind unplugging, and then a step-by-step guide to set you up for success if you decide to try your own Tech Shabbat. I also enjoyed the personal stories sprinkled in. It ended up being a very quick read that I gobbled up in a day.

And man, it left me really wanting to try this whole 24/6 idea. I haven’t done it yet because this will take some preparation. I also may have a hurdle getting my family on board, lol. But I think I can tweak and modify her system to fit us. For instance, Saturday night to Sunday night would be a better fit for my family. And I have mixed feelings about no TV at all because the only time we get to watch a movie or sporting event as a family is the weekend. So I may make the caveat of—no TV unless we’re all watching something together as a family. Also, my husband’s job won’t let him not be available by phone, so he’ll have to be able to take calls. BUT we don’t need to do anything else on our phone besides taking phone calls. So it wouldn’t be 100%, but even if we got to 90% on that one day a week, I think that’d be a big improvement.

As some of you know, we did device-free summer for kidlet two summers in a row, and it was LIFE CHANGING. Like, seriously. My son is now an accomplished guitarist and drummer because of that first device-free summer. And that iPad he used to be so attached to? I don’t even know where it is anymore. Packed in a box somewhere I think. (He does have a phone, though.) We don’t always get to claim a lot of parenting wins, but I’ll take credit for that one lol.

I’ve also personally done 30-Day social media bans and have gotten a lot out of that kind of reboot, too. So I think this Tech Shabbat idea is right up my alley. If we give it a try, I’ll be sure to report back!

As an additional recommendation, I also read Jaron Lanier’s Ten Arguments for Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right Now. This is a small book with ten arguments about social media, including ones like “Social media is making you an a**hole.” I really got a lot out of this one, but I’m not giving it an across-the-board recommendation because it’s written in a very academic/cerebral tone, which won’t be for everybody, and also it’s more of an extreme take. So, your mileage may vary. If you’re nerdy and into this topic like I am, then take a look. :)

Interested in this topic?

Here’s a list of other posts I’ve done about devices and digital distractions:

What are your thoughts? Do you think you could give up tech for one day a week?

Device-Free Summer 2.0: Why We're Doing This Again (AKA How Kidlet Shocked Me)

June 9, 2018 Roni Loren

First, before we get to today's post, I wanted to let y'all know that THE ONE YOU CAN'T FORGET, book two in The Ones Who Got Away series, is now available! Thank you to all of you who have already bought it, grabbed it from your library, and/or reviewed it. I really appreciate it! And if you haven't gotten your copy yet, here's you're chance. :)

DEVICE-FREE SUMMER 2.0

Okay, on to the post. So if you've followed me for a while, you may remember that last year I embarked on an experiment with kidlet: a device-free summer. No iPad, no video games, no computers at all. The only screen allowed was TV watched as a family. Not gonna lie, I was pretty nervous going into last summer because kidlet was VERY attached to his iPad and Xbox, and I was used to having that to help occupy him. But I felt in my gut it was what was best for him.

Turns out, it was way easier than I had expected and was a resounding success. I think it was truly one of the best things we could've done for all of us. It really did make a lasting impact. Not just with his level of calmness and creativity but also in very specific ways. For one, because kidlet didn't have devices, he took to his brand new guitar/rock band lessons with gusto. It became his new go-to thing to spend his time, and a year later, he's wowing me with his musical skills and his deep interest and love of music. The other day he sent me this audio file. He decided to try to learn Jimi Hendrix's "Purple Haze" by ear. I know I'm his mom and am easily impressed by my kid, but he's 10 and doing this? That seems pretty darn cool to me.

And though we brought devices back during the school year, with limits (100 minutes a week), being on devices never took hold again. The iPad became dusty and mostly stayed in a drawer. He usually used his 100 minutes on the weekend to play NASCAR on Xbox or to watch YouTube videos about music. Devices became a small thing in his life. Honestly, this felt like a miracle compared to where we were. And the only negative side I observed was now he noticed how often most of the other kids are on devices or are overly focused on video games. It annoyed him and sometimes left him out of conversations about Pokemon, Minecraft, and the like. When I asked if it bothered him to not be able to follow those conversations, he just shrugged and said, I wish they could talk about other things, too. But it didn't bother him enough for him to use his device time minutes to delve into those games the kids were talking about. And he still has friends, so it wasn't a dealbreaker for friendships.

So this year, I really wasn't planning on a device-free summer because I felt like the device use was under control. But kidlet came to me mid-May and asked if we were doing device-free summer again. When I said that I wasn't sure, he said, "Can we?"

That shocked me. I asked him why he wanted to do it again. He told me that last summer was "fun" and he liked the activities we did. So he wanted the movie nights and board game playing and cooking with me and playing outside. There are so few parenting moments where you feel like you're getting something right, usually we're just hoping we're not totally screwing up, lol, but this was one of those mom pride moments that I'm going to hold onto. The whole experiment had worked. Devices had lost their hold on him, but more than that, he'd come to enjoy that old-fashioned family time. During the school year, things are so busy, that a lot of those activities fall off, and now summer feels like a special time to do those things with us.

Of course I couldn't say no to his request even though it hadn't been in my plan, so he's going device-free again. But he did have some caveats: he wants to be able to Facetime his grandparents and to use his Ipod to listen to music. Deal!

So that's where we are, we're doing it again. I've also decided to make an effort to slow down our summer some. We are typically overscheduled with camps and lessons and such. I'm feeling the stress of that and want to slow it down for all of us. But I'll need another post for that because this one is already long enough. ;) More to come!

In the meantime, if you missed last year's device-free summer posts, here are the details of what we did, how we did it, and how it all went.

What plans do you have for this summer?

The Aftereffects of Device-Free Summer

November 3, 2017 Roni Loren

If you've been following my blog for a while, you know that this summer we embarked on a device-free summer for our nine-year old son. A number of things prompted that decision, and you can read about that in the initial post (I'll link to all the posts from the experiment below.) And in August, I wrote about ending the summer and how we planned to move forward. A few people have asked me how things are going now that devices are back in play in limited form again, so I thought I'd do a quick update post.

First, in order to limit how devices were brought back in, we set up some parameters. After shifting around a little bit that first week back and trying out different things, we settled on kidlet getting 100 minutes per week to use on devices (Ipad and video games.) Schoolwork on the laptop does not count. Television with the family does not count. What's nice about 100 minutes is that it sounds like a lot to him, but over the course of seven days, that means only a little over an hour and a half is spent on devices.

Now, every kid is different, but mine loves a system. So he has a little dry erase board on the fridge, he writes his 100 minutes at the top at the beginning of the week, and then deducts as necessary. He's also taken to planning his minutes upfront, which surprised me. "This week, I'm going to use 30 minutes on Saturday morning and this much on Sunday afternoon." He thinks about his schedule and decides where his minutes will fit best. He also is able to delay gratification and not use up minutes as soon as he gets them (because they reset on Monday and he often doesn't use them until the weekend.) But beyond the logistics...

How has it been going?

1. The iPad is basically dead to him.

This was kind of a shock to me. The thing he used to carry around everywhere has lost its shine for him. It's rarely even charged anymore. The few times he's used it, it was to film movies of his toy cars or watch a YouTube video on a topic he was interested in. He doesn't play the games anymore.

2. He'd rather use his allotted minutes in two big chunks so it naturally ends up being weekend time.

Since he's using the time for video games, it makes sense to spend bigger chunks of time instead of breaking it up into little bits of time. So usually he just plays for about an hour on a Saturday morning and then uses the rest of the time on Sunday. School days end up being device-free by his choice.

3. The limits let us all relax.

He knows what to expect. He has a timer that he uses, so it's not a fight to get off the game when it's time because we all know the rule. (I do let him finish a race or whatever if his timer goes off during his NASCAR game as long as it's not going to be some epically long time.)

4. He's self-monitoring.

I don't know if it's just because of the way my kiddo is, but he handles his own timer and turns off the game. Unlike before where it was a fight to turn things off and a bad mood afterward, he turns it off without my intervention. It's SO nice.

5. The obsession has been broken.

He's not itching to play on the devices. He doesn't complain about wanting more time. It's just this thing he occasionally plays now, not the center of his entertainment. He'd rather play his guitar, play a board game with us, or play with his cars most of the time.

6. His mood is so much happier.

I can't convey how big this change has been. Not that he doesn't still have grumpy days like anyone else, but he was getting angry a lot before--usually when it was time to get off devices (which was part of what prompted the summer experiment.) He's back to his fun-loving self again.

7. We're spending more time all together as a family (not just all together in the same room but doing our own thing.)

His device-free summer had inspired my husband and I to dial back a lot of our online time and social media as well. So we're all more engaged when we spend time together at night and on weekends. Our screen time is watching shows together as a family--something we hardly ever did before.

So y'all know I'm already a believer in doing this. The change has been pretty miraculous in our little household, but I continue to be surprised by the longer term effects of it. Now I just wish I had done this a long time ago. So many hours lost to that iPad...sigh. But we can't change the past, so onward!

And if you'd like to catch up on what the experiment was and how it went, here are all the posts:

Previous posts on the Screen-Free Summer:

Research Reads from a Device-Free Summer: The End of Absence

August 7, 2017 Roni Loren

If you've been following me this summer, you know that we embarked on a device-free or screen-free summer for kidlet. (Device-free is more accurate because we allowed watching TV and movies as a family but screen-free summer had alliteration, lol.) Here are the previous posts:

The experiment has gone so much better than I expected. I anticipated much more push back and problems. I expected it to be HARD. In truth, week one was hard. The rest has been...surprisingly easy. We've developed new routines and habits. Kidlet knows he's going to get his devices back in very limited quantities (20 min max a day) once summer is over, but he hasn't complained or asked for devices. The pull they had on him before (what inspired this screen-free summer idea in the first place) has disappeared. So I'm thrilled that we decided to take the leap and go cold turkey all summer (as scary as it seemed at the time.)

In addition to helping him, this whole experiment has opened my eyes a lot and helped me as well. I've wrangled a lot of my device time and social media time and have developed an aversion to things that are stealing my focus. Part of that is because I'm the type of person who wants to know ALL the things about a topic when I'm interested in it, so I have read A LOT of books about smartphones, social media, internet addiction, the changes technology has caused in how we interact, how our brains function, and how we live our lives.

I'm not sure I'm capable of summarizing the wealth of information I've read this summer, but I thought, for those interested, I could post the books I've read and share some of the quotes I highlighted while reading. So, that's what I plan to do this week. Each day, I'll post one of the books I read and the quotes I found most interesting or helpful.

Now, a disclaimer, I'm posting all of this without judgment. If you're into your devices and social media and don't feel the need to disconnect sometimes or back off of it, that's totally cool. I'm sharing this because I didn't like how things were trending with my lack of focus and my free time and family time being eaten up by my phone. So if it's not interfering with you or your family, then feel free to skip these posts. But otherwise, I think there's good food for thought in these books even if you aren't looking to make changes right now.

First up is The End of Absence: Reclaiming What We've Lost in a World of Constant Connection by Michael Harris.

This one mainly focused on our ability to be in the quiet, to be bored, to be alone. I thought he had a lot of interesting and thoughtful things to say about how the internet, smartphones, and social media have changed us.

Here are the quotes that stood out to me:

"Evolution (nature) endowed us with minds capable of fast and furious transformation, minds able to adapt to strange new environments (nurture) within a single lifetime—even within a few weeks. Therefore, we’re always products of both inherited hardware and recently downloaded software... The flip side of all this, though, is that young brains, immersed in a dozen hours of screen time a day, may be more equipped to deal with digital reality than with the decidedly less flashy reality reality that makes up our dirty, sometimes boring, often quiet, material world."

"we now need to proactively engineer moments of absence for them. We cannot afford to count on accidental absence any more than we can count on accidental veggies at dinner. Without such engineered absences (a weekend without texting, a night without screens), our children suffer as surely as do kids with endless access to fast food. The result is a digital native population that’s less well rounded than we know they could be."

This is part of what spurred me to do the device-free summer. I have an amazing kiddo. I knew he was capable of more than running to his Xbox or Ipad every free moment of the day.

"It’s becoming more and more obvious. I live on the edge of a Matrix-style sleep, as do we all. On one side: a bright future where we are always connected to our friends and lovers, never without an aid for reminiscence or a reminder of our social connections. On the other side: the twilight of our pre-Internet youths. And wasn’t there something . . . ? Some quality . . . ?"

This one above really made me think because I think sometimes what we chalk up to "nostalgia" may be more than that. There was a quality to my childhood and those pre-internet years that's missing. I've learned this summer that it's not something that can't be reclaimed. Doing things like playing old school board games with kidlet or teaching him how to cook or watching him make up his own games has recaptured some of what I didn't even realize was missing.

"Children do need moments of solitude as well as moments of healthy interaction. (How else would they learn that the mind makes its own happiness?) But too often these moments of solitude are only stumbled upon by children, whereas socialization is constantly arranged."

I loved that line about how would they learn their minds make their own happiness.

"Despite the universality of this change, which we’re all buffeted by, there is a single, seemingly small change that I’ll be most sorry about. It will sound meaningless, but: One doesn’t see teenagers staring into space anymore. Gone is the idle mind of the adolescent."

Things I'd never thought about, but so true. Everyone has their heads down looking at their phones now.

"Solitude may cause discomfort, but that discomfort is often a healthy and inspiring sort. It’s only in moments of absence that a daydreaming person...can receive truly unexpected notions."

Sound familiar, writers?

"What will become of all those surreptitious gifts when our blank spaces are filled in with duties to 'social networks' and the relentless demands of our tech addictions?"

"I fear we are the last of the daydreamers. I fear our children will lose lack, lose absence, and never comprehend its quiet, immeasurable value."

God, I hope this is not the case. As a writer who makes her living in the world of imagination and daydreaming, I hope a new crop of writers, artists, creators is behind me.

"Every technology will alienate you from some part of your life. That is its job. Your job is to notice. First notice the difference. And then, every time, choose."

This quote will stick with me. It's going to make me stop and think--when I look at this device, social network, whatever, what am I looking away from? I'm not a Luddite who is going to totally disconnect from the online world, but I'm becoming a lot more deliberate and choosy about how and where I'm spending my time and energy.

Needless to say, I found this book an engrossing read. I have more to share from other books the rest of this week, but I think this one did an excellent job of making the case for creating time in your life and your children's lives for solitude, quiet, absence, boredom, and blank spaces for your brain to daydream in.

Dream on, y'all. ;)

Morning Rituals: Breaking the Smartphone First Habit

July 17, 2017 Roni Loren

As I mentioned in the last blog post, I took a 3-week social media break while I was finishing writing book two in The Ones Who Got Away series. I didn't post except a little on my personal FB, and I didn't scroll through my feeds on FB, Twitter, Instagram, etc. Part of that was inspired by kidlet and his screen-free summer, the other part was just practical. I needed to minimize as many distractions as possible so I could focus for long hours and stay immersed in my story.

So, one of the habits this fast disrupted was my habit of getting on my phone and scrolling through my feeds, mentions, and messages first thing in the morning. I've read enough habit books to know that a good strategy in breaking a bad habit is to replace the unwanted behavior with a positive behavior instead--habit replacement.

I decided that what I really wanted in the morning was quiet and to ease into my day, a calm mind, so that when I sat down to write, I wasn't scatterbrained with today's news, who said what, cat videos, all my To Dos, and whatever else I may have come across on my phone. So I decided that in the morning, I would read in bed for about 20 minutes before everyone else woke up.

Next question was, what to read? I didn't want to read whatever book I was currently in the middle of, mainly because I'd find it hard to put down an immersive story. Plus, I was so buried in writing fiction that I didn't want to read a novel. I wanted to read short things and something that was reserved only for that morning time. Something I could feel like I finished instead of left in the middle.

So, I found a few contenders: a writing memoir with essays, a short story collection, and a book with small passages about famous artists and their daily rituals. These are the three books that ended up on my nightstand.

I tackled Still Writing first and it was amazing. I'll do a full post on it another day, but it was the perfect selection for me. Short, beautiful essays about the writing life that just made me sigh and think and ponder. It ended up being a centered and gentle way to start the day, almost like meditation. I loved every minute.

I didn't miss the phone. I didn't miss the noise and pictures and constantly swiping screens of information. My lamp was on, the sun was coming up, the other people in my house were soundly sleeping (or my husband was already up and working), and it was just me and lovely words and the start of the day.

I am a complete convert of this new ritual. Even now that I've turned in my book, I have no desire to go back to the obsessive smartphone scrolling first thing in the morning. What exactly am I expecting to be there? What is so important that I need to look at it first thing and then spend the rest of my free time on it? Nothing, is the answer. Email. FB. Twitter. News. Chat. All of that can wait. The day will be noisy enough later. But for those first few minutes, the day is all mine.

Some other ways to replace the habit if reading in the morning isn't your cuppa:

Meditation
Yoga/stretching
Journaling
Having a quiet cup of coffee or tea and just letting your thoughts go wherever they want with no distraction. (That's where the creativity lives--it doesn't show up unless we give it empty, non-distracted space.)
Take a walk outside or sit outside

So, anyone else have a morning ritual that makes them feel great before they start their day? Anyone getting tired of reaching for their smartphone first and then getting lost in the noise?

Interested in this topic?

DEVICE-FREE SUMMER 2.0

How has it been going?

1. The iPad is basically dead to him.

2. He'd rather use his allotted minutes in two big chunks so it naturally ends up being weekend time.

3. The limits let us all relax.

4. He's self-monitoring.

5. The obsession has been broken.

6. His mood is so much happier.

7. We're spending more time all together as a family (not just all together in the same room but doing our own thing.)

Previous posts on the Screen-Free Summer:

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