(Applauses) Thank you.
This sculpture by Sophie Ryder
in the UK seat of Salisbury.
Had to be moved
because people
visit texting on their mobile phones
kept bumping their heads on it. (laughts)
Does it happen to you to text , phone,
check your facebook timeline
or maybe catch a pokémon
while you're walking
and Who does that?
(laughts)
How many of this time
do you actually have to go on line?
Well, we check our devices
about 221 times per day
according to Tecmark
or about every 4.4 minutes
of the time we don't sleep
what is going on?
Well, we live in the economy
that is based on destruction.
The more internet pages you browse for
the more advertising
An Internet company can show you
And so the more money they make.
The success metrics are based around
how much time you spent using their app
or you are in their website.
Not on how productive
or focus you are.
Two years ago
around the same time of the year
I decided to give up my smartphone.
I replace it with a very basic,
no internet phone
At the time,
I was working in a senior position
in digital marketing industry
Which means that
I was connected pretty much 24/7.
I slept with my phone
and I kept checking it all the time
And even I felt it vibrate in my pockets
when, I didn't have any pockets.
Given up my smartphone
was one of the best decisions
that I have ever made.
And today
I want to share with you
My key learnings
from the journey of taking back control
over my time and my life.
But, before we do that.
I want to give you a little challenge
Even, that We check our device
about every 4.4 minutes
this means that you will feel an urge
to check your device
for three or four times during my talk.
So, I want to challenge you to resist
this urge and count how many times
You will succeed in doing that.
So, Lesson no.1
You are more addicted to your device
than you think.
But, You're also much more resourceful.
Now, why can't we go for 4 minutes
without our devices?
An U.S. psychologist David Greenfield says
“As internet is like a slot machine
you never know
what you're gonna find inside
and this variability of the reward
releases dopamine.
The new hormone of pleasure
and anticipation of the reward”
The problem with dopamine
is that excessive stimulation
of your brain
that is caused by dopamine
creates addiction
This is exactly how drugs work.
The first meal you feel excited
but, then
You have to go back
and take new dose
to feed it to have the same feeling.
So, devices
use the same principles.
You never know
what you're going to expect
in your mailbox on social media, right?
One day you get a like
and then the next day 50 likes.
Bam!
Dopamine releases
You feel great!
But, then
the excitement fates pretty quickly
and you need to go back
to your device
to feel good again
Technologies purposefully designed
the way to make
you use it over and over again.
We also feel dependent on our gadgets,
because we have all source
too many important functions to them.
Has it happened to you
to go to google maps
or any other kind of phoneline maps
and look up your way
even though you kind of knew
how to get there?
This is exactly what I mean
We easily get into the habit
of not trusting ourselves.
Well, You know what
I discovered it's not actually
very easy to get lost in London.
There are maps all around
and all I needed to do
was to look up my way once
before leaving the house
and then
I could always ask people in the streets
I realize that
I have outsourced to technology
too many things that were important to me
that made me human
like my sense of orientation and direction.
My memories of spaces and certain events
and it felt great to get them back.
All I wanted
when I was given up my smartphone
was to have a little bit more
clarity in my brain
and not to feel so overwhelmed
and what I unexpectedly gain
was the feeling that
I will find my way
No matter what
both physically and metaphorically.
And of course
a great chat up line
to make new connections.
Sorry, I don't have a smartphone
Could you please help?
Lesson number two
If you want to change your digital habits
Do not rely on your willpower.
Instead create structures around you
to support you in that.
Our brain is very lazy.
So, When we repeat a certain action
over and over again.
It's that's organizing
our brain cells urinates
into particular chains
so that it is easier
to pass the information
through this chains.
This makes your behavior automatic
and unconscious
and this is exactly what notifications do
the prompt you to come back
to your device over
and over and over again.
Up until your behavior
becomes automatic and unconscious.
According to Kahuna report
87% of android users
and 48% of iOS users
opt-in for receiving
app notifications on their devices
or in other words all these people
allow their devices
to decide how they will behave.
Once these chains are formed
it takes quite a long time
and effort to undo them.
And relying on the willpower
doesn't help.
I certainly learned it twice.
For the first time,
When it took me five months
from the decision of
giving up my smartphone
to actually doing it.
And for the second time,
When after about a year of not owning
any smartphone
I got one back.
Which I thought,
I would only use a spirit device
in case my laptop breakdown
and I need to talk to clients over Scott
and in no time,
I found myself using it all the time.
The URL path was still there.
Now, It felt incredible embarrassing,
because at the time
I was already conducting
digital detox trainings.
(laughts)
So, I obviously was not walking my talk
but, It also gave me great insides
into the real challenges
that people who do not want
to give up their devices, altogether face.
So, I developed 4 principles
that help me take control over my time
and my life.
And I want to share
this principles with you
These are :
Time management
Space management
Relationship management
and Self-management.
These principles help
restablished boundaries
that technology removed between our work
and private life.
Or between our public and private lives
So, let's talk about them
Time management,
We need to give up on the idea
that we have to be connected
or accessible 24/7.
Now of course developers
Will try to convince you
that everything is very important
The truth is
very few things are.
Remember what we said before
It is your attention
that is a real car city in
the information age.
It is a little bit like with food,
You can have all the food you may want
to have in your fridge
but this does not mean
that you need to eat all, all the time.
So, my top tip is to disable
all notifications
on your devices.
Use delate email function
to avoid being distracted by emails
and use blocking apps to make sure
that you're accessing certain websites
only at a certain time
and not being distracted by them
on other times.
This way you are in charge
of where you're getting information
as opposed to being dictated by technology
and to give an example,
Eric Schmidt,
Who is Executive Chairman of Alphabet
the googles company
switches off both of his smartphone's
on most evenings during dinner time.
And believe me, He's much busier guy
that most of us.
Also, do not multitask online
so did not switch between different tabs
or between different devices.
A Stanford experiment proves that
the more we multitask
the worse with the coveted.
We unlearn our brain to do that
but, you will still
likely get distracted it.
But, you can blend for it
so incorporate
five minutes of destruction time
every now and then
in your work routine.
But, only after you're done
with a chunk of work and as a reward only.
Again this way
you are taking back control over your time.
Space management,
is all about where
you want to have connected combination
and where you want to have silence.
Have you ever thought
Why the most expensive areas in the city
are usually the quietest once.
Why is it that in airport,
business launchers,
there is hardly any sound or music
or advertising?
Why silence valued so high?
Well, this is because it's only in silence
that our brain gets
an opportunity to process information
that we have been feeding into it.
We cannot take good conscious decisions
or be creative if we are overwhelmed.
And we are only always overwhelmed
when we go online,
because our brain
is not good at multitasking.
So, do not bring the devices
into the areas where you process
information where you have rest
this includes your bedroom,
your bathroom,
and your dining table.
Also, If you keep your phone
next to your bed
this puts your brain
into the state of alarm.
As a research by Harvard Medical School
and of course you will feel tempted
to check out the first
thing in the morning.
Now, It's like keeping a chocolate brownie
next to your bed,
of course you will eat it.
So, get an alarm clock
your device is just a tool
It is not part of you
You can´t carry around
your soror your hammer
you don't take them
to the bedroom, hopefully!
It's any to your devices
need their own places.
For example, I try not to carry
around my devices
and also remove them out of sight,
When I'm not using them.
This way I feel less tempted to check them
Relationship management,
When I was still working
for an advertising agency,
We had a client,
Who kept sending us
hundreds and hundreds emails daily
to make sure that we´re on
the trip with delivering the project.
In fact, It were his emails
that captains away from doing the work,
because all we return was
just reading and answering back.
So, We have built a dashboard
that allowed us
to show to the client the progress
we're making in real time
without any involvement.
It took us about an hour to do so
and in a week's time
the email rate dropped so considerably
that we were finally
able to get the work done.
We still don't have a digital advocate
as to how people can best contact you.
So, you can get
an equally important message.
Why what's up, skype, email you name it
the moral is you need to have
really manage people's expectations
as to how they can't contact you
For example, before I meet somebody
I asked them to send me a text message
If anything changes
Because, I don't have internet on my phone
and it works really well
what do you do however
If you work for a company
that expects you to be connected
and on top of everything for 24/7
Well, first things first,
stop contributing to this mess
by seeing seen everyone.
If you want to receive fewer emails
sent fewer emails
Second, you might want to mention
If you started to your colleagues and bosses
For example, a study
by Harvard Business School
that said that
consultants knowledge workers
who had predictable time off
for all the week perform much better
and were much more productive
than those who didn't
or you can quote
an example of a few companies
for example, one of...
the uk's leading multinationals
recently introduced
a two hour
per week email ban
for all senior management
in the interest of productivity
or a current German common affect your
does not allow sending or receiving emails
30 minutes after the employees
sheet has ended.
If this doesn't help,
then you can try to move
into a different country
like France and Brazil
where they have now
the so-called rights to disconnect laws
where that among other things
regulate whether the person has the right
not to read work-related emails
after the working hours
Self-management
is the last cornerstone
of changing your digital behavior
and the most tricky part
because it does not
how it doesn't work
if you prohibit yourself
from going online
because your brain still needs
an excitement of dopamine
so instead you need to be thinking about
where will you take this dopamine from?
what will you do
with all this free time
that all of a sudden you will have available
and this is where i want to share with you
my last key learning
and why i think I failed for so long
to give on my smartphone
I just did not want to deal
with my own problems
when you don't have
anything that distracts you
then you will have
to start dealing with stuff
you have been running away from
We often go online not because we need to
but because, we have
some uncontrollable trigger to do that
maybe we want to feel Important
or maybe we are depressed.
In fact, a study by Missouri University
of Science and Technology
says exactly that
that people
who spent a lot of time online
tend to be depressed
so the next time
you feel an urge
to check your device
ask yourself
What is really triggering me to do that?
Is there is something I'm trying to avoid
feeling or thinking about?
Once you get alive
and a natural source of dopamine
You wouldn´t need anything
to distract yourselves
from yourselves.
Thank you.
(applauses).