E87: Brain Dead with Paul Robinson – The Phone Trap

Your phone is not just a device, it is a habit engine that follows you into lines, meals, conversations, and bed. We sit down with Leeds-based creative and author Paul Robinson to talk about his new book, Braindead, and the personal moments that made him realize how quickly smartphone use can become automatic. The conversation gets honest fast: the “queue without a phone” panic, the constant urge to check for something new, and how digital overload leaves us mentally tired even when we have not done anything “hard.”

We dig into the mechanics behind smartphone addiction and doomscrolling, including dopamine anticipation and the attention economy that rewards endless engagement. We also talk about what this does to kids and teens, from the challenge of “dumbing down” a smartphone to the way screen time rises the moment more apps appear, even if it is not social media. School phone policies, notifications, and the pressure to be reachable all come up, along with a bigger question: what happens to creativity, patience, and real human connection when every pause gets filled by a screen?

This is not a tech-hate rant. We share practical digital wellbeing moves that actually work in real life: turning off most notifications, reclaiming small in-between moments, reducing blue light at night, and building enough awareness to step out of the scroll before it steals your evening. We also touch on AI as a powerful tool that becomes risky when we start relying on it instead of thinking for ourselves. Subscribe for more conversations like this, share the episode with a friend who needs a reset, and leave a review with your best tip for using your phone more intentionally.

Transcript

Welcome And New Website

SPEAKER_02 0:02

Hello and welcome to the White Fox Talking Podcast. I'm Mark Charlie Valentine and at the controls is Seb. Hi Charlie. Hi Seb, how are you? I'm okay, thank you. Weather's nice. Weather's lovely. Although I think I've been to too near this uh too near not react good to pollen. Well, I do spend a lot of time cuddling trees and stuff, and now I think it's yeah, probably not been this close to as many trees. Actually going willingly to smell the trees. Do you know what I thought for the other day?

SPEAKER_01 0:28

No. Um we never actually introduced our new website to our listeners.

SPEAKER_02 0:31

Be my guest. Well, we've got a new website. We have got a new website. It's very well done, Seb. Thank you. It's looking great. Thank you. And we should thank Keith and that that came out on the Exactly. Um where was it? Edel Skyline, when we did the fundraiser. Beautiful walk. Yeah, so they've helped us uh fund that. So that's cool. So if anyone wants to go there, that is. www.whitefoxtalking.com. That's it. That's it. And then there's all the socials as well.

SPEAKER_01 0:59

And if anyone wants to get in touch with us, info at whitefoxtalking.com. And if anyone wants to buy us a coffee.

SPEAKER_02 1:05

Someone did buy us a coffee. Someone bought £100 worth of coffees the other day, which was really nice. Yeah. So thank you to that listener from North America, I think. Yeah, California. Wow.

SPEAKER_01 1:14

Cool. Right. Who's here today? I think it's quite an interesting topic. Well, I think you should introduce a guest today.

SPEAKER_02 1:20

I know nothing about it. You've you've you've given me a curveball. Well, in the studio today, we've got Paul Robinson. The White Fox Talking podcast is sponsored by Energy Impact. Hi, so hello. How are you doing?

SPEAKER_00 1:32

Hello.

SPEAKER_02 1:33

Welcome, Paul. So I have got your new really released book in my hand, Braindead. So we're going to be looking at that. Can you give the listeners a brief introduction to yourself? A bit about background and let's know where you're coming from, and then we'll get into it.

SPEAKER_00 1:47

Sure. Um I'm from Leeds, born and bred. I guess I've classed myself as a creative. I do a lot of creative work. I've done that all my life since going to Leeds College of Art and Design some 25 years ago. I only recently wrote this book, probably about a year ago. Always been interested in writing, and I've always done some sort of journalistic work before, but I've never got to grips with fully doing something as full length as this. Even though it is really only a short book, you might call it a long essay. And you could probably read it in an hour and a half. There was a personal involvement where where I could see this problem with phone use, and it just prompted me to write. So I guess sometimes you just need a good subject. How long did it take you? It took me about, I would say about eight months. To be fair, I actually started writing a different book to start off with. Started to write a book called The Narrowing, which was similar. It's about algorithms and how I kind of, you know, how we got this thought that algorithms are taking away creative thought, especially from young kids. If every time you go on to sort of social media, for example, you're being guided into what thinks you should like. And I started thinking about my own kids. Like I have um I have two kids, seven and twelve, two boys. The eldest, I obviously worry about him when he he doesn't have social media, but I worry about when he gets to that point. And I worry about how his creative mind will be when everything is guiding him into doing one thing. So I started writing a book called The Narrowing, and it was only short, but then I just kept going, writing other bits, and then it it it moved me into this.

Meeting Paul And The Book

SPEAKER_00 3:15

It was like an issue I had with myself where I realised I was using my phone too much. I'm sure you feel the same sometimes. Yeah, yeah, totally. What prompted it? I ended up being in the queue, uh, thing for a cafe and I'd forgotten my phone and I just looked and I everybody was just sort of on their phones, you know, in the queue. And it but it gave me this like self-awareness where I was like, oh wow, okay. If I had my phone on me now, I'd be I'd be on it to fill that gap, fill that space. And I and I started to think that like there's so many spaces in our days that we don't need to fill with a phone. And actually all that's happening is we're just getting all this overload happening, you know, digital overload from from everything.

SPEAKER_01 3:50

But you can't run away from when you're in the creative industry because you kind of need that connection anyway, don't you?

SPEAKER_00 3:57

Yeah, you do, but you need to I think being aware of when these matters, these moments arise and and and and whether they need to be. And I I think now a lot about patience and our patience, like the human race having patience and how phones have taken away a lot of that patience. You know, an example could be if you get a text message at 9 pm on a night, do you have to answer that text message right there and then? And if you step back from it, you go, hang on a minute, the world's not gonna end if I don't, right? So don't do it. And then you still answer it. Yeah, do it. Because then because then you're just thinking about it, like, God, I really need to answer that text. Yeah. But it's also like it's it's just having that awareness to go, wait on a minute, is this important enough to take my time away? And what's it doing, and what's the aftershocks of all this? Because essentially I just think that like we're there's too much overload going on. We're downloading all these images and text messages, we're switching between work emails, to a text with our friends, to social media, to anything that's on our phones, and we're not kind of powering down enough. So the book is really about that. It's about finding time, but it's also time that was given to us. If you think about 30 years ago, we didn't have phones, right? It's like like like we do now. If you were driving somewhere, you'd never just check a text at a traffic light. So, do you think we are rewiring our brains without reasoning? Yeah, completely. Yeah. I think that the phones have already rewired our brains. I mean, I was thinking this just this morning. So I'm trying this thing at the minute where you've probably heard when people say, Don't take your phone to bed. You know, you you've probably heard people mention it. And I thought, oh yeah, I'd like to do that. But I don't think I'm a creature of habit. So I did it for about three nights and then just forgot and then just went, you know. So now I'm actually just looking at it in a completely different way, and I'm going, right, I need to actually take a bit of self-control here and just tame myself a bit better, or tame the the whole process of using your phone and just be above it, you know. So last night, you know, went to bed, put my phone down, went to sleep. This morning, when I woke up, my brain was just like, check your phone, Paul, check your phone, right? And I'm trying not to, and I'm realising that's where the rewiring is. I would have never had that before. And I also think that's just addiction. I genuinely think that everybody that has a smartphone is addicted to a smartphone. It's just you're not aware of how bad the addiction is. You know it's hard to sometimes define that addiction. And people might be listening to this and going, Oh no, I'm not addicted to my my phone. But it's like if you reach for it without thinking, or if you just even just the way you think about having a phone, even if you're just taking it out to go on Saduka or whatever, like you know, these brain training things like that, you're still you've still got an addiction to that device. And I don't think it's a bad thing. I think we should just go, right, let's have some awareness on it. Let's just you just accept that it's a it's an addiction, whether it's a small one or a big one. Because some people, let's be honest, have huge addictions to phones. Probably a lot of young kids that have been brought up with a world that never didn't have a phone. No, it was always like to them. And for us, maybe you know, because we've grown up at a point without a phone, we're sort of aware of it more. But I just think that everyone has, whether it's a small or big, it's addiction. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:04

Yeah, I think this thing with um dung scrolling is just blatantly obvious, isn't it? With some people. Yeah. And we had when we spoke to Dave Gallagher, you remember? I can't remember because I was each time. Yeah, I tangent Dave Gallagher, our resident psychologist, um, and I went off on a tangent. As I do, but about dopamine addiction. Yeah. And these things we and I've seen it where, you know, working with young people and they've just got head in the phone and they get that. You know, we're talking about algorithms earlier, and it's it's dragging them, dragging them deeper in down the algorithm because there's a suggestion there, isn't it? And they're chasing that suggestion. And I suppose with the what you were talking about earlier, with creativity, we used to have to be creative ourselves. Whereas now that's taken away from us. The dopamine, uh if I get it, if I understand it right, is an anticipation that's what I have this morning.

SPEAKER_00 7:50

Yeah, and I didn't know what was on my phone, I just knew that something was on my phone. And also, like with the the end of the book, I I do go I I do mention that I'm not don't give the ending away. Don't worry, it's not fiction. I also just mentioned I don't reject technology, like I use technology and I like technology, and I want to be able to live in this world with technology. And I've thought really long about how there's some people and they literally want to go and live in a cabin and just shun it all away. Like I probably would if I could, but but we have to live in this world, don't we? So I think it's better to be just above the system, to know what the system is, know what the mechan mechanism is of social media and big tech, just be completely aware of it.

SPEAKER_01 8:28

I don't think enough people do, and obviously big tech doesn't want anyone to know they make money out of you staying on your screen and being glued to stuff.

SPEAKER_00 8:36

Yeah, and they don't want anyone really knowing that. But let's be honest, that attention economy is killing so many brain cells, so many avenues of thought. Yeah, it is just sucking people into their phones for long periods of time.

SPEAKER_02 8:47

You mentioned earlier about the um, you know, we're you know looking for work emails and things like that. And in I think it's in France, isn't it? It's illegal to send after hours. After hours, after working hours, you can't send emails, you can't send work correspondence. Yeah. And we don't have that here anyway. And I but I remember with some of the work I was doing. On the other hand, it's expected from you sometimes. Yeah. And it's a di I think it's a difficult one because whenever you know, I do this work with young people in education intervention. And so your phone would be pinging at eight, nine at night because there's been a change to the plan for the next morning, and you're like, well, actually that's in my own time. So I've I've got two phones. It's not that I'm double addicted, it's just that I have one for work and I just turn it on at five, six o'clock, it's turned off. Yeah. But then it's me that's not they're unable able to reach me. And then it's seen as a failure,

The Queue Moment And Overload

SPEAKER_02 9:35

isn't it? Rather than me looking after my own welfare, really.

SPEAKER_00 9:38

Yeah, and I do think that's something that a lot of people struggle with, that they're like scared that they uh if they're not if they're not contactable, then they might, you know, not be you know the best worker or something like that. And it's like, or they they might have a fear of um not being available means that I'm gonna get fired or something like that. Or letting someone down. And letting someone down, yeah. But no, I mean I don't have any notifications on my phone anymore. And um that's helped a lot. Like and I mentioned a bit of that in the book, and it's you know, if you work a lot with your phone, it's quite a big leap. I just found that like it was just taking me away from anything that I was trying to do. I've done a very similar thing.

SPEAKER_01 10:13

I've gone through all my notifications and be like, right, what do I actually want? Automatically, every single app that you download, everything that you sign up, notifications are turned on. And unless you know where that function is in the settings, notification, no one ever turns them off. Yeah. And they distract you constantly. So I only have certain notifications, like for my personal emails, they come through, and I don't get many personal emails, you know. My work emails are sure off. Yeah. Um, you know, I've got the cameras on because you know you're always a bit paranoid. That sends you notification and and you know, just text messages and that's it. But yeah, you need to be self-aware about how to turn these things off and actually make a decision and think, do I actually need this?

SPEAKER_00 10:49

Yeah, and I think that as well, like these companies that make the phones should be more aware that not everyone's tech savvy. That not like, you know, not everyone's we think so. Recently uh I got well, probably about a year ago now, just less than a year ago, my eldest son started high school, so I we got him uh an iPhone. The reason we got him an iPhone was because he was walking to school and we wanted him to keep in contact with us and he had friends that were on WhatsApp. So there was this whole moral thing of like, well, we don't want him being the one left out, you know, the one without a phone, or the one and and I mean I I actually first tried to give him a burner phone and um he just he was like, Why does it take so long to text, you know? And I was like, Okay, right, fair enough. Obviously, like there's all this nostalgia of a burner phone, you know. And I was like, Yes, you're gonna love this. It's great, it's got a snake on it. And then he was like, This is the slowest thing in the world. I was like, Right, okay. So anyway, I I got him an iPhone. I found um there was this problem with how he could have this, what he could have on it and stuff like that, and social media and all that kind of stuff. He doesn't have social media, but um I'm gonna ask you there.

SPEAKER_02 11:51

I mean, you don't have to tell us if you don't want but have you noticed any changes in behaviour observing your son from having an from having an iPhone?

SPEAKER_00 11:58

Yeah, I'll I'll I'll come back to you on that because that's important. Yeah. I was I was basically saying that um I had to dumb the phone down completely. And why there isn't just a button that says, you know, let's dumb this phone completely so he can't do anything. So it's the the easiest thing possible that's just not there. You know, you have to follow certain guides and go in. And it's like, wow, you're a big tech company, you just really don't care that so many parents are gonna struggle to actually dumb their phone down. So in the end, they're probably just gonna give up and they're just gonna be like, right, okay, you know, whatever. So anyway, I did figure it out. It took me a while and I figured it out, and then so I could take control of his phone in a way, and then he didn't have so he couldn't he can't download any any app. So he's essentially he has WhatsApp and he has maps. The thing is, he gets lost from away from school to like two roads, but and then I think he's got like an animation app or something, because he likes doing little animation things. So going back to what you were saying there, like that he's only got that amount of stuff. So for for a good amount of time, he he really didn't use his phone. Like he'd do things like he'd text and then he'd put it down and he completely forget about it, forget about it for a weekend, just didn't know where it was. He'd there was no addiction there, you could tell. And then recently he asked for a couple of games to be put on it, and they're like brain training games, like moving blocks around. And um, we were like, Okay, yeah, yeah, you know you can have that. And his phone use has gone up now. And so it's not social media, it's not any of that stuff, it's just he's using it more. So we'd be driving and he's in it, and I'm like, Can you get off your phone? You know, look out of the window kind of thing. So it's just like the little things like that, it's scary because he's 12 and it's like I can see how if he had an unlimited phone, like some of his friends do at school, I can't he would just be in it all the time and I would have to then physically confiscate it. So now we've got a good agreement. He's like he'll still leave his phone down and won't care about as much. But just from getting those two brain training apps, the usage of the screen usage rose.

SPEAKER_01 13:54

Do you think he understands why you're restricting him?

SPEAKER_00 13:57

Yes, he does, because I drill it into him, like and I I really do, and I talk to him, I've completely told him about the attention economy, about big tech, and I've told him really that I've drilled it into him and explained about capitalism. Because that's what it is at the end of the day, you know? To to a point as well where he's he likes watching YouTube videos, and I've said, Well, this is again capitalism, it's people making money. And he looks at it in a different view, and so yeah, I've I think I've I think I made my point a few times to a point where he's like rolled his eyes and gone, Oh God, are you gonna put this even once when God are you gonna put this in your book?

SPEAKER_02 14:36

Yeah, I think there was something in the news today that I I sort of uh that's saying they are actually gonna take steps for under sixteen. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:43

So they've just done that in the iOS, new iOS update. So when you update your phone, you actually have to verify your age. Yeah. If you don't verify your age, if you um I haven't updated yet. Is it a photo? So I can use it.

SPEAKER_03 14:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:59

Um it depends when you've got your iTunes account or iCloud account, and then it kind of verifies your age from that, too. If you had it for like twenty years and knows that you're old enough. But if you if you if it's quite a recent account and you need to kind of verify that you're old enough and then it unlocks things if you're older and restricts you otherwise. So they are doing things dramatic.

SPEAKER_00 15:19

Yeah, there's been a lot of pressure, hasn't there, recently as well. Like smartphone free groups and things like that. I think Lord Nash and stuff just just putting pressure on the government. But I think yeah, they've finally agreed to to do something anyway. I think they'll what the details are, I'm not sure. But not allowing for phones in schools and stuff. And I've had a I've had a meeting actually with school just to try and get this well, get some movement going there. But it is difficult. There is I have to look at it from both sides. You know, a lot of parents want their want to to contact their kids. And I'm kind of like, well, if they're in school, they're in school, I don't need to contact them. You know, I I was never contactable to my parents at school, so I don't know what what the difference is. And I do see it as a problem. I I know that there's been studies done of you know distraction techniques and things where like one group of kids have have have tried to do a test with their phone on the table in front of them, and then one set have done that test with their phones in their bags in another room, and they did better on the test because they weren't distracted by the phone.

Addiction Signals And Dopamine Loops

SPEAKER_00 16:20

They didn't even go on the phone, they were just distracted by it. So, what's that gonna do? My kid's school, he is a allowed to just have his phone in his pocket, you know, he's not allowed to bring it out and go on it, and if the teacher sees it, I'm like, that's not I just No, because it vibrates, it's yeah, it's just a distraction anyway. And like I said, I'm happy that he doesn't have these apps on his phone that he's distracted about. But some kids, I know they're they have TikTok and all sorts of things on uh you know, at 11, 12 years old.

SPEAKER_02 16:48

That in itself is Well you see it with you see it with adults, though. I've done it myself where you're just doing something and then you've got these like you said, you stood in a queue. I'll pick my phone, I'll look at my phone, rather than having these moments of yeah when I were a kid laid there having a tantrum because I was bored, because there was nothing at all to do, which I wish I could go back there now and be bored. I know, right, yeah. I mean it's it's a bit of a gift, isn't it, to be bored, really.

SPEAKER_00 17:13

Yeah, it is. And I think we yeah, I get it sometimes, like where we've come to, but I think that we're too quick to to give like kids phones as a distraction if they're bored. I think you you can you can do other things first, you know, you can give them some paper pens and stuff.

SPEAKER_02 17:30

You see it in restaurants, don't you, where babies crying in the high chair and they give it the die pad or something like that. Yeah. And you're like, well, any sort of studies of that, it's it should be coming out now, really, shouldn't it? I think we'll probably all know about it, but it's massive or suppressed, I suppose.

SPEAKER_01 17:44

I don't think it's all kids though. You know, I I just remember my mum and me buying her an iPhone and be like, Look, Mum, there's an iPhone, you know, you can phone WhatsApp and you can text me. Now I just feel like she's more addicted than I am. Because I actually use my phone to do work stuff or stuff that I need to do, and I I've got a lot of things going on, so I always use my phone. But like my mum just uses it for brain deaf things. You know, she just scrolls and she does a doom scroll and she looks for AI generated videos and then shares them with everyone in the contract list. Why? Like, Mum, you've got a problem. And she doesn't realise she's got a problem and she won't admit. She's like, No, no, because I'm just looking at this. I'm like, yeah, but this is all fake. Yeah. And like I can't get through to her that you know, it's not good for her. Yeah. Yeah. She just doesn't understand.

SPEAKER_02 18:26

And I suppose this is a thing, innit? You you're not giving your brain time to rest. Yeah. As in when we're before phones and before other electronics and you know, these things that are so convenient and so designed to make us interested and sort of saying that's a subconscious level, innit? Oh, where's that going? I need that. I need that now. Well, you do need it. I'll be honest, as I'm getting older, I'm using my phone less mainly because I can't find it or I can't find my glasses, but I can't see it. I can't see it. That's a good thing, I think. I ran nature therapy session recently for a group, and we do an exercise called conscious observation. Yeah. And it's you've just been you're conscious that you're observing something. That is good, yeah. Um, and it's things like it's just uh, you know, people are like thing that we did in the woods with you. Please be more because you know Yeah, it was legal. Um yeah, and then there's there's exercises like we do where I'm giving people magnifying glasses or you know, jewelers glasses, and walk around and just observe something, but consciously make an effort to observe it, and I've like and one lady said afterwards, she went, you know what, she's she texts a dog for a walk and she went, There's some woods near me. And I walk through them woods, and I can't remember a single plant or a single thing. I just walk through because I'm on my phone, like dogs running around. But she was, you know, just from going back to that.

SPEAKER_00 19:43

It is completely different, and like I so some woods near me, and I do sometimes walk through there just to get to the shops or something, and it's different. I've gone through there just without a phone, might purposely left my phone at home, and it is a different walk. Like I can't explain it, it's just a different walk. Even if I'm walking through with my phone in my pocket, it's different. My brain feels like I should check it. Oh, what if this has happened? It's it's like it's it's like my brain's connected to my phone somehow, or the possibilities of what's in there. As soon as you leave it behind, you're just like, oh wow, you s you do, you start seeing things, you become observant more. And like that, yeah. So and a lot of that is in the book, it's about those moments, like why should we leave them behind and fill them with looking at a screen when they're there for a reason. I mean, like if you think about most, like say most people, we probably wake up and check our phone, and then we have breakfast, and you might eat breakfast while looking on your phone, waiting for the kettle to boil, scrolling. And then you drive to work, again, you might be checking your text message at a traffic light. And you get to work, you work, and a lot of people working on the phones, off the phones, and then your lunchtime, you're having it again, phone in your hand. Then you get home, you do the same thing, you come back in a car, you have dinner, probably on your phone, and then I don't know what most people do. Let's say you go watch Netflix, and then some people are again they're on their phone. No What what what's he been in? No, and then you're checking your phone, and then you're just checking Wikipedia to see what actors what films that actor been in. And before you know it, you've swiped to Instagram, and then you're just like trapped in your phone. And then you're going to sleep, and that's a whole nother story. You're literally on your phone again. Blue light, it's just like, you know, you're not getting a good night's sleep. Yeah. And then what's happening is doing it all over again. Take those moments where they're not when you're not supposed to be on a phone, like lunch and walking and getting a bus and just trying not to be on it. You know, and I think it's it'll help massively.

SPEAKER_01 21:33

Do you know what I just remembered? About maybe six, seven, eight months ago, we were having a chat over point, weren't we? And you were telling me that you've kind of turned your phone red on an evening. Yeah. So is that all part of the book? Is that something you become conscious of?

SPEAKER_00 21:48

How do you do that? Oh, yeah, again, it's not easy. You can you can make your phone red, which is really good because obviously that blue light is yeah, it's terrible for Yeah. Yeah, you do it a thing, you set it up and then you can triple click or something.

SPEAKER_01 22:04

Yeah, it's w with the shortcuts you can activate it.

SPEAKER_00 22:07

Yeah, you can triple click it so it goes turns red. Problem I had was I kept um going to put it on and opening my banking account. And then the obvious the the other side of it was I'd go to pay and it'd go red. It's like, yeah, it wasn't it wasn't that good. But no, I've just used I'm I don't do that now anymore. I just try and not use my phone at night or at least two hours before I go to sleep.

SPEAKER_02 22:28

And have you noticed anything in yourself with that?

SPEAKER_00 22:30

Yeah, I sleep better. I transition into sleep a lot better. I'm learning all the time, and I'm not trying to have this attitude where I'm just throwing my phone in the sea. Because as much as I would love to just not have a phone, I think there's a lot of benefits to it as well. Communication and work and it is great to just be able to get a taxi like that and have it turn up and see where it's coming from. I'm trying best to be not b not be killed by it, if you get what I mean. Like and be a bit more aware of just my usage on it.

SPEAKER_01 23:01

So it's more like having a bit of discipline. A bit of curveball, is it actually addiction or are we all lacking a bit of discipline?

SPEAKER_00 23:10

I think it's addiction. I know what you mean. I guess discipline and addiction go hand in hand sometimes. You know, whether you can overcome your addiction. Again, I keep mentioning awareness. I think that awareness is key. Like if you go in it's it's like saying, Yes, I've got a problem here. Sort of like, do you have a drinking problem? No, I don't have a drinking problem. I have like what, six bottles of wine a week, I'm fine, you know? It's like, yeah, maybe that's not that good, you know, but you don't see it. All right, maybe I have three bottles of wine a week. Maybe you're drinking too much. No, I don't I only drink socially. Well I'm out every day. Yeah, yeah. And it's sort of like I think people

Kids’ Phones And The Attention Economy

SPEAKER_00 23:45

are scared to say I'm addicted to my phone because it seems stupid. I mean you were just saying before about your mum. I think a lot of boomers are addicted to their phones. They're probably not going on social media as much. It's probably Facebook and these brain training games and you know, I don't know what else.

SPEAKER_01 24:02

There are essentially generated videos.

SPEAKER_00 24:04

Yeah, I generate videos, yeah, you know, and sharing them. But yeah, I think there is a problem there and they're just not sort of admitting it.

SPEAKER_02 24:12

Yeah, I suppose they like if you say to someone you're addicted to your phone, it's it's that thing, do they see that there's so I believe definition of addiction is repeatedly doing something that's doing you harm rather than a habit is when you're repeatedly doing something but it's not doing you harm. So if it's if it if they don't see that it's not doing them harm, but how do they know that? Because they're not comparing it to what they'd be doing that downtime.

SPEAKER_00 24:34

Yeah, and also what you say there about repeatedly doing harm, like there's not enough at the minute, like information about the harm. You know, when smoking was first a thing, it wasn't like this isn't harmful, and then it turned out it was, but by that time everyone was already hooked. It's the same with phones, you're already hooked, you've already invested actually more than anything, because you've you know social media's free, you've built up a following, and you so you're invested in it. Now it's like, oh, this is harmful to you. So that's why I think it's like instead of just going cold turkey and getting rid of it all. I mean I think I do think that social media is really bad, like in so many levels, and you shouldn't have it. But I also think same you guys like me, I have like a business and that might be it's it's it's free advertising and whatever, that kind of thing. So many reasons why I hate social media, but I have always asked this why can't you just have an option where you don't see the feed? Because it's the attention economy and they want they that that would kill them completely. But it would also solve a lot of problem. Because I can just go on then, update a picture, oh that's some comments, great, and then leave it. But you don't, you go on it and then suddenly you start scrolling through suggested content and all this sort of stuff. You can't win sometimes, so you kind of want to throw it in the sea.

SPEAKER_02 25:44

Well up for people not using phones so much, but then I'm trying to push news about the podcast through social media. So it is double-edged sword on that on that line. It's I think it's when you go down that, you know, and I've seen it and I've seen it with young people before, like I say, when I've been driving to driving to work, you've got a couple of young people in car and they're just like like just with the phone just there, and then it's right, guys, we need to put us helmets on, maybe because climbing and paddles paddle sports are really good with young people to get them off the phones. Because if you drop it, it's gone. Yes, yeah, but then you you know you you get tantrums and you're thinking there's something wrong here. If someone's been asked to put the work put the phone away, and that's when I think it's a massive issue with young people that that can't lift their heads up from the from the phone.

SPEAKER_00 26:27

Yeah, I found that I found myself being irritated when I'm using my phone and then and I hate this, but like sometimes I'm using my phone and my kids are wanting my attention. I get irritated. Just give me a minute, you know? And it's like, what am I doing? The phone is making me irritated because I'm trying to do this task inside it, and then the child just wants my attention. Again, going back to what I think, instead of just throwing your phone in the sea, just learn, you know, learn about how to just be to to just be above the system somehow, you know, so you're not inside it, you're not because I think when people are just like this, like you said, they're just completely doom-scrolling head and a phone that's so far inside the system that they can't even see the edge. If you can live just outside the edge, dip into it when you need to dip into it, get what you need out of it and get out of it to be you'd live a better life.

SPEAKER_02 27:14

I suppose when young people see the parents on phones, it's setting a standard there as well, and it's you know, I wanted to go to go to a club when my dad went into a club when I was you know walking in with my dad, like yeah, yeah, I mean club now. And now it's like, oh my dad's on his phone, I want to be on a phone.

SPEAKER_00 27:26

So exactly, and and parents think of themselves as guides, so they don't like you know, they don't think of themselves in any other way. It's like we're setting the standards, but really as soon as you're locked into that phone. It happened once where it was a bit of a knock on the head for me when Rowan, uh my son, he t took a photo of me with his and I was just sat on the chair and I was just on my phone. Oh really? And I'd never seen it from that perspective. Yeah, and he and he but we actually sent me it on WhatsApp, which was and I was like, Oh my god, that's what I love like, you know, just hunched over and like and I'm not giving him the attention. Yeah, I know, yeah. So God, that's what it looks like. And the more you see it, yeah, such a complicated subject, I think.

SPEAKER_01 28:10

Listen, I think it's quite ironic that we've created as humanity, we've created a tool to improve communication, but it actually stopped us communicating as human beings. It's so weird.

SPEAKER_00 28:20

Yeah, social media that's made us less social.

SPEAKER_02 28:22

Yeah, I think for myself, I think the the biggest worry with it is the effects that it has on young people as they're growing up. Yeah. Should they be exposed to this? You know, I mean it's bad enough just the light off it, isn't it? Yeah, yeah. So um, you know, the two hours before bed. And I think it was Huberman, if you ever listen to him, yeah, I do, yeah. Andrew Huberman. They come out with like routines. Don't touch your phone on a morning, get up, yeah, get some. I mean, they'd say don't don't have coffee for an hour and a half and all this lot, and get all them chemicals, sleep chemicals through you. And the amount of kids is it melatonin that the kids are all on? Like these kids because they can't sleep and they're having melatonin, and then with the sort of obviously HD sort of side of it, and then you're basically stripping the dopamine because they get up and they're looking and they're straight look straight on the phone and they're on a dopamine deficit. So how can they feel they're ch chasing satisfaction? But dopamine's not the satisfying drug anyway, the hormone, sorry.

SPEAKER_00 29:16

Yeah, yeah, like when you said Seb about, you know, has our brains been rewired. And I think that the rewiring that's happening in kids' brains is phenomenal. Like and uh, you know, I think that it's that I you know, I'm not saying that as adults it's not being rewired, but I think kids' brains, just the amount of time they spend on phones, it's like they they inhabit their phones rather than I like to think that I do like to think that now I'm at a point where I'm I'm like above my phone, I'm not totally in it. But it's taken a long time to get to that point, and I hate being on it, but at the same time I'm like I just I'm just aware of the of what it's doing to me. Maybe it's an age thing as well. I want to spend more time having actual conversations. Like I write in the book a little bit about rooms, how they're not really the the attention in rooms now is is like seeping out of it. Because one time you'd go into a room and you would sit down and you would talk to people and now everyone is on a phone. You know, you must see it in around here, and if there's a three or four people in a room, two of them might just drift into their phone. And at one point I think that was rude. And now I don't think it is anymore. I think it's just normal, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 30:24

It's been normalized. On that account, then some people may retreat into the phone either because they don't want to be in a conversation or because they can't handle this thing about I'm not actually doing anything.

SPEAKER_00 30:35

There's there's that the sort of fear of boredom.

SPEAKER_02 30:37

Yeah, I think there's a massive fear of uh yeah, of of just like what am I gonna do now? Yeah, how about don't do anything?

SPEAKER_00 30:44

Yeah, exactly. So I was like going back to what I said at the beginning about being in a like I said about being in a queue, you know, and forgetting my phone. Um what I felt at that point was different to now. So what I felt at that point was like I felt like I needed to be on my phone. I felt like uh impatience building up inside me. I was like, God, I don't like being in this queue, you know. Um because I didn't have you know something to look at. Withdrawal something. Yeah.

Boredom, Nature, And Real Presence

SPEAKER_00 31:10

And now, after sort of being like writing the book and sort of coming to terms with a few things in life, I'm so much better like at being in a queue. And I thought before it was me personally, I thought it was my patience level. Thought that I had problems with my patients, but I think it was all down to phone use and how everything's quick in a phone, everything's short, and now I I can stand in the queue and just like look around and look at people and look at things, and sounds sounds like kind of embarrassing in a way. I'm able to just sit there and use my own thoughts and maybe have a chit-out with the person standing next to you. Yeah, maybe, yeah. For a dilk, for a dunk of them. Yeah, exactly. Not either. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:50

So how long has that sort of taken for you to realise this and then put things into practice? Uh probably about a year or something.

SPEAKER_00 31:57

Another story, like sounds embarrassing, but it's the other day I c I I flew in from Madeira to Manchester Airport, and when I got off the plane, my phone wasn't working properly, like the data wasn't working, and I didn't have time to sort it out, got in my car. And as I was driving out of the car park, I needed to go pick up my kids, which were my parents. That was in Bradford. And I just didn't know the way off the top of my head. So I went to put it on the sat nav and my phone wasn't working. And then I was like, oh, okay. Find my own way. Find my own way. And then I was like, right, well hang on a minute, we've got these things called street signs, so let's follow the street signs. And I'm like, okay, Leeds is that way and Bradford's up there, so I'll just do it. And and then my brain was working. And it was like my brain wasn't following a system, it was actually working things out, and and I did it, and I again that sounds totally embarrassing, like, oh wow, I drove somewhere without the aid of uh found found your own way. Yeah. Yeah. Um but but it then made me think, well, why am I always I was getting and put the satin ev on all? Like it goes back to this idea of Because you want to know where the speed cameras are. That's fine. It was good for that. I'll give it that. Yeah, and I've had a lot of speed and tickets, so um, yeah. Yeah. Tech is is it likes to guide you and palm you into things like and and and you know, like sort of hold your hand and say this is how it's done and do it for you. And that's I think that's as what AI is doing as well. I mean, I think AI can be really good, really good. But if you're gonna rely on it for like advice or therapy or stuff like that, I think that is you walk in in in pretty dodgy territory there because it's always gonna give you what you want, it's always gonna tell you what Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 33:31

I think we're at a very dangerous place in humanity where a lot of people are starting to use AI not just as a tool, but they're relying on it completely to the point where you know they're relying to do the job with it. If they were to be ever been asked, let's say then the internet cuts off, they wouldn't be able to do that. Yeah, like full they don't use it as a tool and they're just like fully reliable on that tool to do everything they like.

SPEAKER_00 33:55

Like I want it to do my taxes, but yeah, I you know, I don't want to have to always rely on it for advice or something like that. I think if I got to that point, yeah, I just fear about us we have to use our brains. We've got these beautiful things inside our skulls, so let's use them as much as we can.

SPEAKER_01 34:11

And we have the um uh have you seen Wally, the Disney film? Yes. You know, to the end where they're all on that spaceship and no one does anything. It's like and it I feel like we're we're heading towards a full tilt.

SPEAKER_00 34:21

Yeah. And I think there's some people that think that that's a reality as well, which is even more disturbing. Like you could just be like that. Yeah. Yeah, it's a weird one now.

SPEAKER_01 34:29

So what do you do now to switch off?

SPEAKER_00 34:31

Like I said, I I tried to balance it all out. So I it's not that I'm like I've tried to go cold turkey before with the phone, I've tried to do the things the reason I had a burner phone for my um for Rowan was because I originally bought it for myself and I thought uh what I'll do is on a weekend on a Friday I'll completely switch off and I'll switch to the burner phone in case anyone needs to contact me. Then I realized I quite like taking photos on my phone.

SPEAKER_02 34:55

This is a thing, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 34:56

It's convenient.

SPEAKER_02 34:58

Then you get dragged off down another path. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 35:01

All I did all these things to try to make my life better and make it so I wasn't so I was being more interactive with my kids and doing all these things. And then I just realized that no, I just need to be above it, like I said. I need to tame this. And now I'm I'm so much better. My partner Joanna will say like because she she's noticed it in me. You are on your phone less, it's less and less and less. But what's interesting was I couldn't form a habit before. I couldn't, you know, form this habit of leaving my phone down on a Friday and then switching to this. I couldn't I couldn't form the habit of just stopping putting my phone in a different room. But now I've formed a habit of just not using my phone as much. And that's just these moments of stood in a queue or when the kale kettle's boiling and all those type of things of just not using it and looking out the window or something. And that's what's helping me better. Like it's actually that habit forming naturally, which is good.

SPEAKER_02 35:52

So if somebody was listening to this and thought, and it's something just gone ping, yeah, maybe I'm using my phone quite a lot and I'm using it not in just for information or just for communication, what sort of advice would you give if they think if they think we've got an issue really?

SPEAKER_00 36:05

I mean, yeah, well, um first of all, like awareness is great. So awareness creates that distance between you and the problem. I think that you can see it a lot better. And I think that like you just have to start really small. So take identifying those moments that are moments in between moments you know, or in between things. And if you really need your phone right there and then. And then I think once you can once that awareness hits, then you bring out your phone and you go, oh god, like you know there's no point in you being on your phone right then. And you s then then moments start um escalating and start getting bigger and bigger, and that's when I think you can start doing it. But it's not everyone's different, so yeah, it's not gonna be that easy. You have to identify the problem, I think, don't you? You have to say, you know, am I using my phone at dinner time, am I using it in a restaurant when I'm

Small Habits, AI Risks, And Wrap

SPEAKER_00 36:55

with my partner or with my family? Maybe everyone just needs their kids to take a photo of the phone to show what it looks like, you know.

SPEAKER_02 37:02

I suppose things like find myself setting an alarm on a night. Right, set me alarm, put my phone down. Well, set me alarm. Yeah. Uh oh, now I'm on uh in now I'm on Instagram. Yeah, exactly. How was that? You don't even know what happened, did you? Why am I why am I now checking the number the listening figures for podcast? It doesn't make any odds because I'm going to sleep anyway.

unknown 37:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 37:20

You know what I mean? I'm not going to get up and go do something to make someone listen. Yeah. Make them get on the phone to listen up. So yeah, I suppose things like that are side, aren't they, really?

SPEAKER_00 37:29

Yeah, I think you do n naturally without knowing, just drift into something else. That's also another bit of advice I would say is if you can turn off notifications, just do it if you can. Because that's what happens if you're reading a book or something and your phone pings, then I think they did some studies somewhere and it was something like it takes you takes your brain like twenty-one minutes to get back on track.

SPEAKER_02 37:51

Oh really. Well, they need notifications when we've got a new podcast coming out. Yeah, it's hard, isn't it? It's because there's so much so much view useful. So much sort of distracting. And I suppose that w when I 'cause I've you know I've got my viewers on the phone with with young people and uh this you know I've seen them have tantrums, but it's only in it that's just a small section and then will we ever find out if these bigger studies Yeah because you can imagine the people that are doing the studies it won't be good for the phone companies, would it?

SPEAKER_00 38:22

No, exactly, and that's that's part of the problem and like but I'm I'm sort of sick of waiting. Big tech is not gonna happen. No. It's it's so massive, it's so powerful. It's like what, forty percent of the SP five hundred, it's like that it's it's it's huge. It's never good they're ne they're never gonna go down without a fight. So I think that trying to look at your own behaviour really carefully and just know that like you are in this system and this this mechanism will try and hold your attention for as long as possible.

SPEAKER_01 38:53

I think just being more pro-awareness, really, yeah, and not anti-phone, just pro-awareness. Yeah, completely, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:59

Yeah, I think um it must have been last year or year, but even year before that the said government knew they had evidence about the s social media companies, so not the phone, not the tech, the social media companies creating addictive algorithms, and that's why it's uh you know, a reel is a certain time. And you know, we're gonna make this, we're gonna go into the companies and force them, and not happen. Yeah. It's always on the user, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 39:19

It is always on the user, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:21

I do love the YouTube music algorithms, though. They're really good.

SPEAKER_00 39:25

Really good.

SPEAKER_01 39:26

What you mean where it takes your next next tunes? But yeah, what you like. Oh, okay. It find stuff for you that if you're into music. The music algorithms on YouTube Unreal. It's so much better than all the people. Oh sad, are you? I'm the techy guy.

SPEAKER_00 39:38

Yeah, I know, and and that and that's also I think that's good. And like I said, I'm I think that tech adds a lot of value to our lives, it really does. But you know, you have to use it responsibly, don't you? You have to like know when it's used. And that's the thing it's only self-awareness will will will be able to solve because you just got to go, and I'm just using this for too much. I'm dragged into this, I'm dragged into that. I mean, yeah, like I love iTunes music, and I'd put like the you know, the way it sort of sends you down and take it just plays what music it thinks you like. I really like that. But I also just don't like being told what to do. I'm all right with that. So I mean short form content I think is really bad, you know, and it's already been proved in studies that it doesn't help develop empathy in kids, you know, because you kids just can't they need a character, they need a long long form content to develop emotion for that character. So short form content I think is really bad, like really bad for kids.

SPEAKER_01 40:33

So where do people go on their phone to buy your book?

SPEAKER_00 40:37

Well, I uh well it's in it's in um colours may vary in Leeds Bookshop, it's in Books Peckham, London, it's in um Good Press in Glasgow. These are all independents. There's a few more independents as well. Uh it is also on Amazon.

SPEAKER_02 40:50

I've got my own wall against Amazon at the minute. Well, they keep parking the trucks up now on main road near us and throwing bottles of um truckers tango out of the window, dirty anyway. It's a whole nother podcast. Yeah, trucker's tango. Funny enough, that's a nice colour. Cool. Well, thank you for coming in. No problem. That's pretty great, mate. It's one of the topics that it's so topical.

SPEAKER_00 41:11

It's never going away, is it? But I think as well, like the book is, like I said, it's not at it's not all against tech, it's not all doom. It's based on personal experiences. Also, it's it's fair to say, like, you know, I'm not an academic, it's not written from an academic standpoint, it's not all data, it is just personal experience, and um it comes from a place of just saying, like, identify these moments because these moments are really important. Because if you get sucked into your phone, then you're just not seeing the world, you're not seeing all this sort of stuff that's happening, and you're not using your brain creatively. And if that gets worse, then we will be like that film, Wally. Yeah, so yeah, it's important.

SPEAKER_01 41:49

But yeah, thanks, Paul.

SPEAKER_00 41:51

Yeah, thanks for having us. Appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02 41:53

And if you would like to support us and help us keep the podcast going, then you can go to buy us a coffee or you can click that on our website, whitefox talking.com, and look for the little cup. Thank you.