The chaos is all-consuming. Notifications that vie for our attention morning, noon, and night. Ever-present background music that now seems to flood every public space. The uninvited blare of a stranger’s phone serving you videos and advertisements for products you wish you didn’t even know existed.
Where is the calm? In hiding, waiting for you to unearth it and protect it like a timid fallen sparrow.
A year or so ago, I reached my limit for what felt like everything. Too many texts. Too many emails. Too much noise. Not enough space for myself to think, uninfluenced. So I introduced more quiet into my daily life, and the effects have been blissful. This is what I did:
Live without constant background music
It is everywhere these days. The library, I think, is the only establishment left that doesn’t pipe music into the ether every minute of the day.
I play the piano, the guitar, and the flute. I carefully transported my record player (a prized treasure since high school) across the Atlantic to settle into my Parisian apartment. It needn’t be affirmed that music is a balm for the soul and an important daily companion for many of us. But I’ve learned it should be a companion we seek out, not an overbearing busybody who won’t give us a moment alone.
Now when I’m walking to work, grocery shopping, or just unwinding at home, I don’t default to music. Instead of seeing silence as some frightening void I must rush to clog up, I savor it. More than that, I savor the daydreams and reflections to which only silence can send me.
Read more than you watch
The temptation to sit and empty our minds and live vicariously is hard to fight, especially when fatigue or boredom come calling. At the end of the day, I, too, appreciate giving my mind a rest with a big bowl of popcorn and the antics of my favorite characters.
But I realized I was leaning on these supports too often, even when my mind wasn’t tired and didn’t need a rest. Maybe I was procrastinating or trying to quiet anxious thoughts or simply bored. In any case, ending a binging or scrolling session rarely made me feel better. Instead, it introduced comparison, self-critique, anger about the state of the world, or the desire to buy something I before didn’t think I needed.
Reading doesn’t torment me in the same way. It quiets the anxious swirl in my mind, forces me to slow down, and gives my eyes and soul a break from the frantic energy of the screen.
I’ve never closed a book thinking I’m not pretty enough or smart enough or really need to run off and buy something.
Sleep with your phone in airplane mode (and turn off as many notifications as possible)
I once read, “My phone is supposed to be a convenience for me, not for others.” Those are now the words I live by. No more do I wake up to a deluge of notifications that immediately spikes my cortisol and sets my mind reeling with my first morning breath. Instead, I check my phone in the morning when I’m ready to, after having exercised, showered, dressed, and stepped into the sunlight to begin the day.
Nothing bad has happened, and no message has proven so dire it couldn’t wait for me. My phone is a tool I use to make my life easier; it dictates my daily rhythm no more.
During the day, meanwhile, I’ve significantly limited the number of notifications that make it to my screen. While I cherish the contact I maintain with long-term friends and faraway family, I do not believe I need to drop everything, physically and mentally, because someone somewhere had a thought. It can wait until I’m ready.
So away with notifications that break my attention from the present and the physical to the faroff and the digital. Away with alerts that tell me about upcoming sales. Away with everything that steals my focus and tricks me into thinking what happens on the screen is more important than what happens in front of me.
Take a break offline
Unfortunately, the Internet has become a hardened reflex for many of us. When there is a free moment or we have to wait in line for more than three minutes, the screen is the default. There is always some reason to justify it. We’re just “checking in.” It’s for work. We’re catching up on the news.
The only thing that’s catching is the sorry habit of running away from ever sitting in the quiet of your own thoughts. Stop running from yourself.
When you need to take a short break from a work task or you’re waiting in line for coffee, train yourself to stop reaching for the phone. I keep a pack of cards at my desk and play a few games of Solitaire when I need to clear my mind between tasks. I stand up and stretch for five minutes. I play a couple songs on the guitar. If I’m at the office, I’ll set a timer for ten minutes and doodle or go and sit outside. If I’m in line somewhere, I challenge myself to just be. There needn’t be an activity for me to pursue every minute of the day.
Sometimes, I mess up. In my stress, I reach for the phone. I look at things I don’t need. I scroll with no point. And I always put down the phone more harried and wired than before, now with guilt and self-disgust layered on top.
Solitaire and doodling, on the other hand, have never done me dirty.
Stop constantly stimulating and distracting yourself. Learn to just be with yourself.
Being alone is, for some reason, quiet unsettling for a lot of people. We feel we must be busy. We must be talking to someone. We must never be bored. I believe this is slowly killing us.
Being plugged in all the time keeps our bodies on high alert, depriving us of any prolonged calm and relaxation. It makes us constantly weigh our lives, our successes, our have-nots against someone else’s, or, more likely, the illusion of someone else’s life that we’re certain is easier and more fulfilling than our own.
Worse still, when we never allow quiet into our days, we deny ourselves access to the one thing truly responsible for our own happiness: ourselves.
Friends, family, pets, travel — the list of external pleasures is endless. But they can only do so much to really fill us up if they’re not founded on an already solid ground of inner contentment. Running from the quiet of sitting with ourselves makes that contentment ever harder to find.
Learn why spending intentional, undistracted time alone with yourself is good for your mind and your relationships. If that seems difficult, see four ways to help you learn to enjoy your own company.
Appreciating intentional solitude is easier when the entire world isn’t trying to distract you. See 34+ ideas of what to do instead of social media, whether you’re eating, commuting, waiting in line, or simply bored. If you’d like to work towards quitting social media altogether, here’s what worked for me.