Digital Self Sabotage

** Today's article was submitted by Julz (Julia Vitality) - we met last year in an online networking event & have since developed a budding friendship. Her article today speaks finding that balance in life, which is especially important when you are a small business owner or home-based entrepreneur.  

Julz is a very professional, organized, proactive personal growth advocate & a brand visibility / social media exposure mentor, serving conscious entrepreneurs. ...She has a free gift for our readers ! She invites you to "Grab your Free Visibility cheat sheet http://PRJulz.com & check out my show http://PositiveImpact.TV.

Digital Self - Sabotage

We may give ourselves a million reasons to keep our phones on at night. We may
check our messages just one last time before going to sleep. We may be tempted to watch something entertaining or relaxing to help us fall asleep. ...Sound familiar?

"As phone notifications discreetly stole my sleep, they caused a constant drip of anxiety for absolutely no reason, affecting my mood and ability to truly engage in the real world. I was out in paradise, surrounded by amazing people, constantly beckoned to thumb through the mundane posts of strangers."

 

~ Les Steed

If all this fails, one thing that can help you at least with mobile devices is turning off notification sounds. That way when the phone is out of sight, you can at least have a few minutes without distractions. I personally use DND (Do Not Disturb) as a habit these days. Yes I do miss some calls, but so what :)

Why not start small. Make it a personal challenge or a goal experiment. See what happens if you do turn off your phone for just one night. If you miss a 2 AM message, you respond to it when you wake up refreshed and ready for the day. 

Is it WORTH waking up in the middle of the night, 

disrupting your body clock 

and struggling to fall asleep afterward? 

 Try doing this on a certain day of the week, then pick another day, then another. Maybe try controlling your WIFI by programming your electrical outlets to cut off the power to your router at a certain time, like midnight. That really helped me back in the day when I was tempted to watch Netflix late at night. When the movie would
freeze at midnight, I had to respect my own decision.

“Turning off notifications on WhatsApp, deleting Facebook, silencing notifications for anything but phone calls and breaking news, and removing apps like Instagram and LinkedIn from my home screen dramatically reduced my FOMO (fear of missing out) and made me feel less worried about what I was doing with my amazing life.” 

~ Julia Vitality

One mindset obstacle I had to overcome is that I would inconvenience people, miss their messages, calls or emails. People know perfectly well that you have a life and that you're not by your phone 100% of the time - or, at least you shouldn't be. Let them leave a message  and you will get back to them, later.

Benefits of Setting Limits

1. It's empowering. You will respect yourself for sticking to your own decision. You will gain confidence that you have the self-discipline to do the right thing, because you already knew it was the right thing to do anyways.

2. Respect from Others. A bit contra-intuitive, but you'll see that people will actually respect your time MORE. Event if they initially complain, they will quickly learn that if they need you, an advanced notice would be much appreciated. All my friends know that about me!

3. More Time. This is an obvious one. Batching anything saves time. Checking all the messages during your breaks will take less time than checking them one by one sporadically. You'll also accomplish other tasks in less time without distractions hence buying out even more time.

~~~ 

 Discover the Brummet's Books on Amazon: 

https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0845RLK1X

 Find Them Online via : 

https://taplink.cc/brummet 

https://linktr.ee/LillianBrummet

~~~