A while back, I shared a note about how I had cut down my phone usage a lot and what it had changed for me.
And for a few months, I actually stuck to it.
But lately, I've been watching or listening to videos from the moment I wake up to the moment I go to sleep. And for the times when I can't watch videos (like when I'm walking in the street, for example), I will put a podcast or music to occupy the space.
I'm not sure why I went back to this sluggish state when I had been doing so well for a long time, but I think it's because I actually missed watching specific YouTubers and listening to specific podcasts. So I allowed some back into my life and then some more and eventually, it took over.
Which leaves me in a weird situation, because I now know that no YouTube at all is disappointing. There is some content that I actually like and don't want to stop watching, especially since it's only like at most 2 hours per week plus the occasional GeoWizard adventure.
But at the same time, I know that if I let these back in, I won't be able to stop myself, because there is a ton of content that I like, content that I wouldn't miss if I didn't watch it, but that is still nice to watch.
I could try an extension to hide the recommendations, but knowing me, I will probably deactivate it pretty quickly and find an "acceptable" reason why. Worth a try though, I guess.
The other thing that crept back is Spotify. I listen to music (or podcasts, but mostly music) when I'm not watching videos. On the one hand, it's great because I have discovered many new artists lately, but at the same time, I've been feeling more disconnected, irritated when someone is trying to talk to me and I have to remove my AirPods and, overall like my mind can never breathe.
I'd say that the thing that has changed since the last article is that now silence isn't weird anymore. I even enjoy it! But for some reason I always feel this need to listen to something.
Plus, I have been questioning my relationship with music lately, but I will talk about it in another note.
Now again, I'm not sure about what the right thing to do is. I definitely don't want to stop listening to music, I enjoy it way too much. But I don't want it to be constant.
Trying to apply time restrictions won't work because I know that I will find "good reasons" to circumvent them.
Maybe something like "you can only listen to music when you do this and that" could work. This has worked for podcasts already, as there are some podcasts that I only listen to when cleaning and others I only listen to when grocery shopping.
Another idea would be to say "You can only listen to music out loud" and not in your AirPods. So that would automatically limit my time, because there are many situations where you can't listen to music out loud.
So where does this leave me? What about the things I said in the previous note about enjoying life without all this?
I guess it's as with all things in life, I need to find balance.
The approach to ditch all music and YouTube was certainly too extreme, but spending my whole days listening to stuff is also too extreme.
Another thing to consider is the fact that I tend to get absorbed by things, both the good and the bad ones.
So when I get to reading a book or programming something, I will just do it for hours upon hours to the point of forgetting to eat. But the same can be said for playing video games and watching videos, which has a much more negative impact.
And I don't know that I should change this, it's just a part of my personality, but I need to learn to put systems in place to prevent it for things that make me rot away.
I don't have a good conclusion yet. Honestly, I think that what would help me would be to have the opinions from a bunch of different people and see how they deal with all this, to try as many options as possible until I find the balance I'm looking for.
For now, I will try to limit Spotify and I will try YouTube "blocking" extensions. If you have any other ideas or want to share your experience, please email me, I'd be grateful to receive it.
I hope you have a great day, bye.