Am I an addict?

AM I AN ADDICT?

It was in elementary I heard the word ‘addiction’ for the first time. Particularly, this related to  people who were alcoholic. I could then relate to people who were very violent at home in the neighborhood. Then got to understand even cigarette and tobacco addicts were also around. And its dangerous impact.

When I was in college, got to hear about the drug addiction.

Never thought dozens of more addictions will arise, and I will also be a victim!

These are not so serious to health and won’t impact family members the way alcoholism or tobacco addictions were. And it will not disturb our life. Our careers will not impact. I was more than confident of these facts.

Well, those were a bunch of assumptions.

You might think what addiction is this about? Will you be able to guess?

I just hope that you’re not a victim. However, if you're one of them, no surprise honestly.

Yes, these are the new age addictions, the Digital Addictions. You're not able to be away from the 'digital distractions' for long. Now think, are you also a victim? Pause for a moment and think. 

What comes to your mind when I say Digital Addictions? Again, take a moment to think!

In simple terms, there are three addictions in the Digital arena; not to forget, there could be multiple other addictions which could be relevant. I am writing only about three of them as a major category.

• Internet Addiction: Excessive time spent on the internet; in fact, excessive time wasted surfing the internet; impacting personal & professional life. Sometimes the real social life also gets impacted. About 20 years back I started using internet, and I was proud that I was one of the first in my college circle to use the internet. Never knew it will affect my life.

• Social Media Addiction: Though this is yet to be recognized fully in medical terms, research has been on in the last decade at least. Any of us who extensively use Facebook, Instagram, twitter, Tumblr, WhatsApp and similar ones - knowingly or unknowingly are in the addiction circle! We are friends in Social media circle and now in the addiction circle in the media!

• Phone Addiction: Mobile phone now has become an additional organ in our body. We cannot think of a life without it. Mobile is the medium to use internet and Social Media. Maybe except some portion of office work, rest all are carried on the mobile. On one hand it makes life so simple yet we get addicted and make it so complicated!

We started living in the real world; I mean, the real Virtual World! The virtual world has become the new reality for us.

On a holiday, I used to spend over 6-7 hours on my mobile; though it is less on a working day. After working hours, as soon as reaching home, I take out the mobile and check—as if the entire world is depending on me and I must check it to save the world! 

It’s not that I am not aware of this like many of you. If I want, I can just stop using it; the way you also think. However did we stop? How many of us did? And for how long?

Is our usage less than 30 minutes daily? Or less than 1 hour at least? I am just talking about people like me. I am not so rigid. These are over & above the calls! Not possible right? Isn’t it quite insane? And some of us are more worried about the Games. And the new age games are so engaging that we start living in the games! Some of us feel, every other minute we need to check who has shared what on FB. In fact, so much importance on others’ life than ours! Some of us are curious to check how many friends have seen our posts or liked it or commented on it or shared it! Practically, what do we get out of it? We just get old with lots of needed work still pending on the checklist; mostly the personal ones—sometimes professional.

What’s the breaking news? What’s happening in the city? State? Or country? Or even world? I mean, there’s no end to it.

Trust me, we are not as busy as we showcase. Isn’t it? However, it has become a fancy thing to showcase that we are busy. Just a question. Who is at loss?

There were a series of attempts to kill this addiction and yet again we fall in the trap. Few months back while talking to Neehar, we discussed this and he was mentioning how his wife is being away from the Digital life – her usage was less than 15 mins apart from calls. We committed to reduce the usage. We did. Then someone shared about an interesting series 😉. That’s it! You know what would have happened! Thanks to Covid19! We needed to raise funds to buy groceries for the students’ families near our school because of the outbreak.

And again, like any addiction, it started off.

Are we any better than those alcoholic addicts? We are not, right? Looks harsh. But that’s the reality. In most families, the kids are also addicting exactly like us. Why so, they follow and reflect what we do. Kids are our mirror. Remember this before you be harsh on the kids next time.

Don't relax! I shared nothing about TV - doesn't mean they are out of this circle!

When I started a planned conversation with my friend Mohit, got to know that we both were in the same boat. We are not so busy, still no time for the venture we have been planning for more than a decade now. We were notionally busy with the Digital Addiction. And we have a special love towards all the gadgets which supports internet.

Finally, we concluded that; we do something about this addiction.

We were more living a virtual life and streaming series were our oxygen. We had various apps on our mobiles which were helping us kill our time more and more every day. While in the conversation, we decided to kill it. We uninstalled Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hotstar, MX Player, Airtel Xtream, Zee5, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & Tumblr. 

What's with WhatsApp? Unfortunately, we have an excuse to keep it. Many of our professional updates are on WhatsApp. Now we plan to reduce the habit of downloading all the content in the friends’ group or a family group and sometimes even the office WhatsApp groups.

A ‘Good Enough’ start? What you feel?

We began engaging ourselves in the learning and building right habits; and build on to existing hobbies which are to help our venture. Putting this experience on paper was the first task like we get tasks in the new age games. Let’s see how the Power of the Mind is and how we can live in the real life.

Below, I summarize what we started doing:

•          Uninstalling the Killer apps – Streaming & Social Media
•          Changing the Notification of WhatsApp to silent.
•          Checking the mobile in planned intervals only – that too when we are waiting for a communication.
•          No botheration to the internet packages – now we know, how Jio made us not to Jio!

-    Commitment to put this experience on the paper – if you’re reading this, it means we lived up to our commitment. This writing makes our subconscious help us consciously.

We killed the addiction to skill-up!

That’s all for now. More to follow as we progress. So, what’s your task now? You want to suggest something? You’re welcome!

Happy Day!