WHEN SCREEN TIME BECOMES A SILENT THIEF

As a self-aware iPad kid, seeing my screen time is my wake-up call—I literally have to wake up and get this autopilot routine out of my system.

- By JEWYZ ANN BUNYI

Ever woken up from much-needed sleep only to use the alarm—aka our phones—to scroll on the internet? We fall into a rabbit hole, which eventually turns into a morning ritual that subtly consumes us. Then, little do we know hours have already passed.

Being chronically online means becoming insatiable. Our phones serve as the bookends of our days, from our alarm clock to bedtime story—our beds are digital docking stations rather than a place of rest. We let our algorithms feed us with content that makes us stay, be it a new, controversial Twitter thread or a random Chinese micro-drama we did not ask for.

Undoubtedly, our lives are tethered to social media. It is a lifeline for our jobs and relationships, but also a leash when used excessively and unhealthily.

The hard truth is that detoxing fully from social media is almost impossible, especially when our entire lives are attached to it. However, this shall not deter us from reclaiming small acts of rest and resistance amid bed rotting, excessive screen time, and social media spirals.

LATE MORNINGS
Clinical psychologist Dr. Marc Eric Reyes explains why we're constantly tempted to reach for our phones first thing in the morning. "When we wake up, it's like the brain has been conditioned by the world that there's a sense of urgency in everything. That you have to urgently know what's happening in the world." It becomes a norm that can derail us from doing daily activities and responsibilities.

This looks very similar to bed rot, a popular self-care trend particularly among young adults. This involves staying in bed for extended periods, doing passive activities like scrolling through social media. According to Dr. Reyes, this proliferated during the COVID-19 pandemic, where everything, from alarms to news, was linked to our phones.