Welcome to the thirteenth day of the 30 days writing challenge of this year. You can find a list of all the articles I wrote at the end of each article. Please have a look at the end of it to understand how can you participate in this one.

A What? With Who?

Yes, I actually wrote "a healthy relationship with your mobile phone" and that's exactly what I meant. It's hard to believe that something invented just 10 years ago - and I'm talking about the smartphone - could enhance and damage at the same time our lives to such a deep extent. And yet, that's the reality of our times: the speed at which our days are unfolding is unprecedented, and the impact of stuff on us is amplified more and more. Also, if you really think about it, smartphone wasn't the only invention from the last decade that turned our existence upside down, so was crypto.

I confess I'm guilty of overusing my iPhone and not only for social media. I realized I spend way, way too much time interacting with my phone, sometimes more than interacting with any other human being during an entire day. So, what follows is a short list of best practices for taming down our addiction to this tool, to the point it becomes rather healthy, than toxic. Or so I hope.

1 Limit The Number Of Apps You Carry Around

"There's an app for that" used to be the mantra of the golden days of AppStore. Alas, those golden days are gone, but the number of - most of the time, useless - apps we're carrying around is more or less the same. Truth is, there might be an app for every thing in the world, but you don't really have to actually do every thing in the world. There's only so much stuff you can engage with, and just pretending more apps will make your life better is simply not gonna work. It will eventually make it more and more complicated.

2 Group Your Apps In Folders (Use At Most Two Screens)

If you really found the right balance between the number of things you want to do on your phone and the number of apps required for that, it would be a very good idea to group those apps in folders, based on a specific domain. iOS already has this included and you can also do it quite easily on Android as well. Having more than 3 screens (all filled with folders, well, that would mean you're up to about 100 apps) is beginning to be a drag: the mere time required only to get to a specific app will be relevant (and, obviously, lost).

3 Sync It With The Cloud (Unload Processing To Your Desktop)

Most of the tasks that you can do on your phone can be done on your desktop. The difference between the "desktop time" and the "mobile time", is that at the desktop you're required to work, whereas on the move you're not. It may be downright dangerous to interact with your smartphone while on the move. For instance, when you're driving. So, make sure you have some sort of cloud integration for all the apps you're using, so you can pick up on your desktop, from where you've left on mobile.

4 Log The Time Spent (And Actually Check The Logs)

I only recently started to do this, after iOS introduced the "Screen Time" reports in version 12. I never realized I was spending more than an hour a day on Facebook. For what is worth, that time is way lower now, with days in which it gloriously sits to zero. So, having some sort of a log of all the time you spend on mobile will be a great wake up call. You'll realize very soon what exactly are you doing when "checking your phone" and how healthy or useful all those things are. Of course, logging the time is not enough, you'll have to actually look over those logs every once in while.

So, this was my (very short) list of best practices for having a healthy relationship with your phone (and I meant that).

How Do I Participate In This Challenge?

The criteria for @challenge30days account to vote your post are:

• post must be at least 300 words long
• post must be original
• post must be on best practices
• post must use the #challenge30days tag

Previous Posts In The Challenge

• January 2019 Challenge 30 Days - Best Practices For Keeping A Successful 30 Days Challenge
• January 2019 Challenge 30 Days - Best Practices For Selecting Relevant Crypto Projects (Day Two)
• January 2019 Challenge 30 Days - Best Practices For Surviving In The STEEM Universe (Day Three)
• January 2019 Challenge 30 Days - Best Practices For Working Remote (Day Four)
• January 2019 Challenge 30 Days - Best Practices For Working From Coffee Shops (Day Five)
• January 2019 Challenge 30 Days - Best Practices For Learning A New Language (Day Six)
• January 2019 Challenge 30 Days - Best Practices For Choosing A Crypto Exchange (Day Seven)
• January 2019 Challenge 30 Days - Best Practices For Running (Day Eight)
• January 2019 Challenge 30 Days - Best Practices For Getting A Good, Relaxing Sleep (Day Nine)
• January 2019 Challenge 30 Days - Best Practices For Incorporating Yoga Into Your Daily Routine (Day Ten)
• January 2019 Challenge 30 Days - Best Practices For Choosing (And Working From) A CoWorking Space (Day Eleven)
• January 2019 Challenge 30 Days - Best Practices For Integrating Meditation Into Your Life (Day Twelve)

Steem on!

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I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me @dragosroua.

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