Switched to a Flip Phone

[Snowman99]

I was spending waaay too much time on the "smart" phone around the house and recently switched to a "dumb" phone.  I still keep the android down in the basement to dust off and take to business trips so I can work remotely when needed.  My day-to-day phone now is the flip phone.  Here are a few things I noticed:

1.  There was definitely a "withdrawal" period for about a week, where I found my self reaching to google something, check email, etc.  I literally felt anxious that I could not do that, and felt somewhat out of control.  This went away after about a week.
2.  Stepping out of the house was much easier, because I had no trouble fitting the compact dumb phone into my pocket as opposed to my huge smart phone.
3. I was reading books a lot more often, and noticed that I would get the "urge" to check something on the phone in the middle of reading.  When unable to do that, I stuck to the book.  This leads me to question whether these smart phones are causing us all to have adult-onset ADD.
4. I was more "present" with my family.  Played with my kids more often.  Talked with my wife more often.
5. Got a lot of stares/laughs from friends and family.  Nobody is yet to agree that this is a good idea.
6. Had a work "emergency" the other day, which made me need my smart phone.  All it took was simply switching the sim card and no problem.
7. Using waay less electricity.  This flip phone battery will keep a charge for about a week.  The smart phone battery drains in about a day.
8.  It takes me about 30 minutes to send a text message.  So I don't really text as often, which in turn lowers the monthly bill (Ting).

All in all, I think life is better with the flip phone.  However, the smart phone still has its uses and should not be jettisoned entirely.  The smart phone has gotten me out of a lot of jams when working remotely.  Hence, I only take it out when doing that and try to keep the work emails generally out of my home domain.  What I seriously question is that there are a lot of people who literally do not benefit at all from a smart phone (people who don't need email for work).  Yet they still carry them around. 

[Linea_Norway]

My DH and I also use too much time on our smartphones and iPads. Recently we went on vacation for a week to the south and there we we phone/iPad free for most of the time. I felt we were more present there than as usually are.

When that is said, I think the smartphone is brilliant in many uses: access to a photo camera, TomTom, online telling you your position, googling stuff, reading emails, buying public transport tickets. I wouldn't want to do without. But when being home, reading a book, I am probably as much distant as when being on the internet somewhere.

[Slee_stack]

So many are indeed addicted.

I'm an outlier though as I don't feel the need to reach for my smartphone often at all.  (I might text all of once per day)

However, when I do reach for it, its nice to get what I want easier than with a flip phone.

Honestly though...GPS, maybe a sports score, a news article read, and maybe a price comp or action follow up is my typical daily use.  All-in...maybe..MAYBE 15min of actual screen time per day.

Oh yeah...I do use it for BT music streaming on my commute.

Thankfully I pay peanuts for my data plan.

I'd never have interest to use a flip phone for anything unless it were just to get reactions out of people or my phone broke and i couldn't find another dirt cheap smart one to replace it with. 

[GuitarStv]

I feel that life is better without a cell phone at all, but I congratulate you on your first steps to freedom from the portable monster.