Over the last few weeks, I’ve been taking a break from infinity wells.

I’m off social media, Reddit, gaming, or movies. If it’s something I could do forever, I’m holding off on it.

There’s just no stop to these things.

You can’t reach the end of Reels. Reddit always has something you can check out. And Threads/Bluesky/Mastodon/Twitter/X go on forever. It’s to the point where it’s easy to refresh every few seconds throughout our lives.

It’s insanity.

That’s not to say there is no value at all in these things. They’re mixed. And for many of us, it’s hard to separate value from rubbish.

So, in taking a month-long break from this, I’ve developed something interesting. Maybe it’s withdrawals, although I’m uncertain if we can truly call this an addiction, but regardless, I’ve found myself wanting to check my phone for something, anything, that can give me something new.

When you’ve got a politically fueled argument happening online, or something news-related on the other end of the world, or in-depth discussions on a specific niche topic that you care about; frankly, it’s hard to spend time on something slower.

Why would I read a book when I could watch or read something shorter, more stimulating, and that cuts straight to the punch?

This is part of the reason I’ve struggled with reading. My attention span is limited.

Audio has been the great saver for me here. I can still do something while listening.

There’s probably some negatives to multi-tasking, but I’m grateful for podcasting and audiobooks. All that said, I’ve found something unusual these past days. Despite all that’s going on in my life, many wonderful and chaotic and amazing things, I find moments throughout the day where I’m bored.

Maybe it’s just a few seconds, or a few minutes, but still, those moments arrive.

Because I don’t have any apps on my phone, I tend to go to Safari and, through habit, start typing in the name of a social media app. I usually catch myself a few seconds later. The next attempt my brain makes is to find something new in the existing apps.

The one app I’ve allowed is Reeder, an RSS feed.

If I were watching myself from a distance, it’d probably look hilarious. I open the app dozens of times throughout the day, and because of the small amount of feeds I’m following, I tend to see something new only a few times an hour at most. And in those cases, it’s usually an article by an author I follow, not the short bits that I’m used to on social media.

And therein lies the beauty.

Because of the opportunity for boredom, of not having an instant answer for my twitchy fingers to refresh Threads or watch something on YouTube, I’m resorting to other things.

It’s not that these things are better, but they’re calmer, they’re quieter, they allow time to build up.

Because of all this, I’ve been reading a book in the evenings on my Kindle.

It’s been a long time since I did that.

Instead of lying in bed doom scrolling, I either listen to a podcast or audiobook, or grab my Kindle and start reading a novel. The novel, in my opinion, is amazing. But it’s also calmer. It has periods of quiet, time to build up, and payoffs that take chapters to happen. Minutes and hours in real time, not seconds.

I like this.

My life is less driven by instant gratification and more by calmer, slower means of reward. I’m no psychologist, but based on what I’ve read, I have to imagine this is helping.

What will happen at the end of the month? Who knows, but I’m thankful for it. Thankful for the chance to slow down and pause, even when life is continuing as normal.

I still have my job, my amazing family, and social activity in my community. None of those have stopped, so from the outside, it would seem life is as busy as before. But in those seconds and moments, there’s a calmness. Instead of grabbing my phone to read something new, I have the chance to do things that are creative, calmer.

Another outlet I’ve found is iMessage. I’ve spent more time texting friends. Maybe too much in their opinion, but the energy has to go somewhere. Experiments like this aren’t about shaming myself to improve, at least not anymore. They are more about exploring ways to have a peaceful, meaningful, beautiful life. 

Also, I’m writing more. So that’s a plus.