I've been busy writing, developing, editing, illustrated, formatting, and publishing 600,000 words, 350+ non-A.I. illustrations, four *gorgeous* cover designs, a robust website, and 12+ video teasers. 💪😎✌️ That's been my 2018-2024, and I'm going to release DD5 & DD6 over 2025 & 2026. 🐲✨🐲✨🐲✨ "Time is the only resource for which no creature may bargain..." --DD1

90% of my wardrobe is quality, second hand items that someone once payed good money for. I’ve had great luck finding classic clothes with the muted colors and earth tones I like on EBay.

What provider do you in Canada? Will Rodgers and Bell work?

I removed all social media accounts from my phone and just have work apps I don’t even have KZbin. I have a iPad that I also removed a lot of stuff from but KZbin is on the iPad. Everything else is on my iMac 🖥️ Removed all subscriptions and music and streaming services as well, I listen to vinyl and DVDs, I try to walk daily and attend gym sessions with PT x1 a week and adventure touring on weekends.

4:08 That 23 minute number comes from "How long it will take you to return to a task after a distraction."

Thanks for sharing all the good ideas. I have deleted my social media apps from my phone and just check them online with my laptop. this way I have limited access to them. I also set specific time for checking social media accounts and try to avoid them for the rest of the day. I plan to buy a camera so I won't need to rely on my phone for taking pictures.

Nice one. You absolutely can make your Smartphone into a tool that just serves you. I did it. I'm so not addicted, that I almost forget my smartphone at home in the morning, because the first time I think about it is the moment I want to start the music for my commute. A real good strategy is to fight social media addiction is to have a desktop PC (a low power consumption, low cost Linux device will do) and move every social media and endless entertainment App to that desktop PC (yes, you can install Android Apps on a Linux desktop PC with Waydroid). You have all the brain rot at your fingertips but it doesn't follow you around anymore. You have to go to the place where it is waiting for you.

I'm getting the slowly. I always have my phone on silent now to avoid the noise but have my smartwatch on vibrate so anything I need like calls or texts I will feel come through. Loaded my ipod up with some cds I got this year so that's good to go as well 😊

Single purpose devices are the easiest way to go honestly. You don't have to manage your use or your time because switching between single use devices mindfully already creates enough friction. I would go as far as having a laptop exclusively for media browsing and social media and putting your productive stuff on a desktop or another laptop just so there's an airgap of friction between using them

Best thing I ever did, just delete social media, deactivate fb insta snap everything, fb is cool cuz you can leave messenger on while fb is deactivated so you can still talk to friends without the social media black hole. Doing that alone just instantly buys you so much time back, the truth is do I feel left out sometimes when people are talking on different apps and have group chats and send memes on apps i dont have, yes, do I sometimes crave the attention of posting a cool pic or seeing what my friends are doing yes but honestly once you get past that you realize its way more worth it to not have socials and just focus on life, life is short spending too much time looking at a screen instead of experiencing life for what it is , is probably not worth it when you think about it

Sometimes the doom scrolling apps are just a trigger click and I don’t even realize I’m doing it, so apps like One Sec or Opal are GREAT for kicking you out when you do that. I use one sec and it’s saved me hundreds of hours (literally)

Leaving your phone at home defeats the purpose of the phone in a sense of if there’s an emergency.

I got rid of my social media, games, and streaming services. It's worked pretty well for these months, and I keep a pocked Bible with me for when I have a few extra minutes. I put up a simple background, and put all the apps I use (calendar, maps, photos, messages, bank, music, settings, email...) on my home screen in the new iOS dark app icon mode. What works even better is having the grayscale color filter on, because then no app is fighting for my attention with fancy colors and what not. You can have this setting in control center for a quick change when you may need to view color photos. Only 6 apps send me notifications, and 3 of this are on do not disturb.

I have my social media apps set to a 1 hr limit per day. I’ve removed all main sm apps from my main Home Screens. And I try to avoid going on my phone first thing in the morning, as I find that the earlier I start doom scrolling, the quicker my attention diminishes for the day. Loved the vid btw!

As a product designer, sometimes I feel really pressured of being connected with my tech devices (like, it's what I do, make digital products). But I also love doing hobbies such as writing, reading and making yarn bracelets. Next year I will go back to my offline routine, without any judgment if I'm on my phone in any time. Now, you were on my yt recommendations and I wanna thank you, it was a friendly and great reminder to me to keep going through what I authentically love, thank you so much!

Great video brother, I definitely need to use some of these tips to kick my smartphone addiction

"If an application is free, you're the product". Not true. Today, we can find plenty of examples where even if you pay for something, you're still scraped for data.

very good advice. keeping my phone away from me keeps me from constantly checking it while working on my desk, but I keep it at a walking distance where I can hear if someone calls me and I go answer. so ditraction free, but also reachable for work/emergancies.

Thanks for this video This subject is so important I never thought I would see the day people live with there phone in there hand . What have we become we all should go flip phone . Great job

I gotten myself an Nokia 3210 4g with extra prepaid number. Then I forward the calls to that So I still can have my smartphone but leave it at home when I feel like it. I also gotten myself a Minidisc. Its so fun recording CDs to that thing and then listen to the songs, typing in the track names xD

Hey Spencer, I have a few tricks to avoid falling down the rabbit hole : - smartwatches (at least the Apple Watch) can store music for offline listening with a Bluetooth headset - use digital assistants (Siri, in my case) to interact with your smartphone (add items to a grocery list, get directions, send text messages and call people) - use RSS feeds reader to keep up with your interest (blogs, KZbin channels, etc) Finally, use your phone with a purpose in mind is the key.

Been buying DVDs and CDs and ripping them, then hosting them on a local Jellyfin server. When I travel, I can load the movies directly onto an iPad, which works really well for kids’ shows. And DVD quality is just fine for iPad screens. It seems like half the time I would download a movie or show on a streaming platform and it just wouldn’t work when I put the device in airplane mode. Don’t have to worry about that anymore.

Ad blockers for the win.

My man Möbius piercing

Thanks for the insight, I just unsubscribed from you and I'm going to delete YouYube 🙌

6:50 I believe boredom has never been more common, look at all these young people on a train with their phones: they look bored to death basically. And when u take a peek at their screens, u understand why

In my country we get incoming rockets alerts on our smartphones so it's dangerous for us to turn off all notifications. With all the hate I have for smartphones I think they also saved a lot of lives. At least here.

I've spent the last ten years on Facebook and it's only gotten worse. Unlike KZbin, it doesn't help to block off moronic content and let the algorithm curate your daily content; they only fill it up with even more moronic stuff. On the occasions where what gets discussed is interesting and I have insight, I write a paragraph about it letting people know something useful on the topic. However, there will always be people disagreeing about it and have no sense for Necro replies, meaning a popular clip from 2020 might still give me notifications. Even without this conundrum, I notice it's all just a need for chitchat, but that takes place with complete strangers. If I don't know the people and I barely care for their replies, and even hundreds of likes that should please me only starts to get annoying - why am I doing it? KZbin is slightly better but as for Facebook, I really need to stop doing this. It's consuming my life and it's on a platform I don't even like. I would go over to Reddit if it weren't for that I find the interface confusing and that I'd just be even more stuck. Please, de-social media yourself. I will surely try in 2025.

Awesome videos sorry I’m sooo late

I just got back into listening to music on minidisc. Now im only on youtube about 20% of the time i was.

I started my mindfulness journey back in July with the simple action of removing my phone from the bedroom. Since then, I have slowly started to erode my addiction to the smart lifestyle. -I swapped my smartwatch out for a normal watch because the constant buzzing on my wrist was slowly driving me insane. -I uninstalled most apps from my phone, and turned off notifications on any that remain. -I switched to a small phone full time. I still need to send and receive photos over text from work, so that has limited my options on dumb phones but a small smart phone is a step in the right direction for now. -I dug my old iPhone 4s out, uninstalled literally everything, and filled it up with music I already own. It still has a headphone jack, and not having to remember to recharge headphones is honestly refreshing. -I started reading more. All this time I insisted I never had is now filled with books. I'm on track to finish 50 by the end of the year. One thing I still struggle with is the constant need to entertain myself, always having to fill the void with noise. That's my next battle to keep working on as the new year rolls around. I still feel loads better than I did in July when I started this journey, and the road to self improvement continues. ❤

I carry my phone in the back pocket of my backpack. Having that little bit of extra effort to fish it out makes a world of difference.

I just use a flip phone in combination with a chromebook. I only need the phone when I am outside. I do all my banking and investing on the laptop. There have been times when I need to upload good quality pictures of a license , or document . Then I just go to one of many mailing services like Fedex, etc. I hope to never have to buy a smartphone or even a printer. I have always hated the idea of the 'Home Office'. I get frustrated with too many gadgets. Maybe later one day, dunno.

I just bought a little wall mounted phone box which I mounted near the door in the living room. During the day, my phone stays in its box. There is even a hole on the bottom of the box for the charger to go through. I have everything on silent except calls. Basically, I’m pretending that my iPhone is an old school landline that sits on the charger until it rings. I even changed the ring tone to an old timey ring just to add to the effect. When I’m done with any call that comes in, it goes directly back into its box. I tried to do this by keeping the phone laid down on the stand near the door, but for some reason it wasn’t working for me. I needed a real, formal spot for my phone to be in. It’s cut my usage down a lot!

Is it possible to use your smartphone for productivity? I use mine for Japanese studies.

Great video

Isn’t it true that I don’t have to pay an Apple Music subscription so I can still have access to the songs I purchased? Let me know Cuz a friend of mine purchased a children’s movie soundtrack & Disney deleted several of the classic songs on iTunes, back in 2021 smh

Nice synthesis video. I really like the level-headed take. I can definitely vouch for leaving brainrot apps in the app library and leaving your homescreen only populated with apps you want to be using, alongside basically nuking any push notifications besides messages and calendar alerts. I replaced the Reddit icon on my homescreen with a folder full of ebook sources (Libby, Kindle, etc.) and emulators. I definitely still use Reddit, but I do find myself just reading or chilling with a classic JRPG instead in a lot of situations.

3:00 Spencer, I like your idea of a "Brain Poison" folder for various distracting apps and that reminds me of a former roommate I had who, when he moved into his apartment, put a sign on top of his TV that said, "This is furniture" to remind him to not spend countless hours staring at the TV, i.e. staring at a piece of furniture, to motivate him to get out of his place, to go jogging, and to see more of the big wide world outside. It's a great concept for sure. :)

I never got around to buying a smartphone. I use a flip-phone instead; a new model I bought a few years ago to replace a previous model I used for many years, and it's all I need and it fits perfectly in any pocket without any hassle and I refuse to spend endless hours on a phone anyway. I've never been a fan of endless text messaging either. I have my laptop when I need it for work, fun, or online viewing, movies or musical enjoyment, etc. I enjoy my vintage as well as modern audio-video equipment and physical media collection (records, cassettes, reels, CDs, VHS, laserdiscs, DVDs, Blu-rays, 4Ks, etc.) and I use my iPod Classic 7th generation 160 GB device for all of my musical enjoyment when I'm travelling. I love my Canon DSLR camera for photos and videos and I also have a smaller pocketsize Canon camera for greater convenience and portability. I really enjoy using separate devices for specific tasks and for what they all do best. :)

Have been watching you for a while now thankful to have found more of “My People”. On my iPhone I have set my Lock Screen to black then the clock text to black as well. That way when I I am like oh what time is it I literally have to unlock my phone to see it. Doing this forces me to look at my actual analog watch. This has done two things. 1 it has dramatically reduced the number of times I even grab for my phone and 2 have given me a new found love for watches. Which I’m finding out is a REALLY expensive hobby 😅. But nevertheless I’m thankful for having discovered this little hack.

Things I really despise are the annoying sound effects of smartphones. I don't need or want to hear bird chirps for notifications (and I want notifications switched off anyway) or watery bubble sounds when messaging or any other irritating sounds that I often overhear during a train commute or from family members using those phones.

When you start all the tips you have mentioned and you are finally able to leave the phone at home, you realize that literally everyone has a phone stuck in their hand which is sad to see. You go to restaurants where you see families where mom and dad are glued to the phone and the son is given a tablet not knowing the tremendous damage they are doing to themselves. Honestly they are quite depressing those scenes, very similar to a famous Steve Cutts animation. In the end, the phone is a tool, not a dependency.

Another banger from Spencer. Crucial video. Thanks

Companies want us addicted to our devices because when we're not on them we can't impulse buy/be inundated with ads for things that the algorithm says we want

i have committed to finding records and music on youtube vs depending on algorithm. looking forward to getting off spotify

People are breaking away with AI.

This is where I always go wrong. I always have to have the full tv series, the full discography of an artist, all the sequels of a movie, all the sequels of a game, etc. lol. But what you said makes absolute sense. I definitely need to start curating and getting rid of stuff.

Brother Spencer. It‘s me! I wrote a comment about getting a radio. Yeah, classic shortwave radio or DAB+/HD radio. I will make a new video on that! I bought an MP3 player and saw your channel! Same with radio man. Like in the old days. No subscription, no internet, just push the button and you get music and talk radio. How fine is that? Just ordered a mic and tripod to get back making KZbin videos. Just wanted to say, that I love your channel and your kind character! Of course I rock DVD and Blurays too, despite the digital people laughing about me. But wait until the internet breaks down. Our entire infrastructure is build on the internet. So it is key to have alternatives. Thanks again!

I've got the complete series of the original Star Trek and Twilight Zone, WKRP and Fawlty Towers. Also have most of the Looney Tunes DVD and Blu-Ray collections. And about 400+ movies. Most got used or at deep discounts.