I’ve only recently learned about the term “doomscrolling.” I could give an official definition of it and fill up some space here, but let’s reflect on some scenarios that speak more to what it is than any denotative description could do:

1. You’re sitting on a toilet enjoying a moment’s reflection, and reading helps you, you know . . . have a more complete experience for whatever reason. Used to, before smartphones, you might try to practice your phonics skills by pronouncing all those chemicals at the end of the list of ingredients on the shampoo bottle, or if your household was a little more upscale, you might grab the latest copy of People from your trusty magazine holder. But now? All you have to do is open your favorite social media app and plop, plop: you can move on with your day, no pun intended. Except you don’t because the next thing on your feed is a funny cat video, or a recipe for tamales, or the latest drama on your What’s Happening in Hometown USA group. Go enough days of sitting after you should have been long finished and wiped and on your way, and you just might develop a raging case of hemorrhoids. Now there’s some real doom and gloom.

2. It is 3:26 am, and you have been trying to fall back asleep after your 2:56 pee break. No happy place imagining is getting you anywhere good. The beach scenes aren’t cutting it, because your mind keeps drifting back to your work list, or your kid’s bad attitude, or the doctor’s appointment later in the week. So you reach for your phone and open your favorite travel app, and you are sure you will soon be back to sleep, carried away with better thoughts of a Caribbean cruise or a ski holiday in Vail. But those ads for mastectomy bras and cancer treatments keep popping up, and you are soon obsessing over worst case scenarios, Googling tests and symptoms and options. Before you know it, the sun is rising. Despite being sleep-deprived, you feel quite alert and on edge, so you reach for the bottle of diazepam to get you through the day.

3.  You’ve just gotten home from a hard day’s work. The dog needs to be walked. Supper is waiting for you to lay hands on it. But you’re needing a little break first, some unwinding after a long day of talking to people and making the world a better place by solving one problem at a time. Your chosen distraction? Ahh, you guessed it — it’s a short walk! With your phone in hand! Isn’t it better than sitting on the couch? After all, you might see something amazing that would warrant a photo to show your significant other later, and so you justify your decision. But you don’t make it past the porch. You sit in your rocking chair, birds at the feeder twittering away, but you’re not noticing them. Instead your attention is drawn to the gaming notification that just came through, and now you’re off on a quest to remain the champion. Tonight you will cook a frozen pizza, but you will remain on top of the leaderboard.

Oh, please don’t let me take you on a guilt trip! I truly don’t intend to manipulate you with words. If your phone is your distraction and the only thing that’s keeping you from going off the deep end at times, by all means, carry on. 

But we’re addicted, a lot of us, to the dopamine hits we get from the scrolling. It’s the same as pulling the lever on a slot machine at a casino. You’re gonna win sometimes. Programmers and developers of social media have studied reinforcement schedules, and they are doing everything they can to keep you scrolling, because it’s making them money. There are lots of articles and books out there to explain the chemical processes happening in our brains, but as I am not a scientist or a psychologist, I’ll go no deeper than this.

I’ll put it this way. I don’t like feeling used. I imagine you don’t either.

And so, in a fit of Lenten devotion, I deleted my TikTok and Facebook apps from my phone on Ash Wednesday. 

I’m not Catholic or Methodist. I don’t belong to any of the other Christian groups that adhere to a liturgical calendar. I celebrate Easter and Christmas and the Fourth of July.

Deleting these apps just seemed like a good idea.

I’d rather live in the real world than be drawn into virtual ones that, while they can be used for so much good, often only increase anxiety, pride, doubt, fear, anger, and depression.

Birds make me feel none of those things. Except when they sit on the string lights and poop on the newly washed porch. My blood pressure might go up 2 ticks.

I remember what the world used to be like before we were introduced to these little 3” x 6” or so sized devices.

We went outside and looked at the birds.

We talked to each other at the dinner table.

We didn’t have nearly as many turkey neck wrinkles or tech neck pain.

We read more printed material.

We slept better.

So take that, social media companies. I’m going to delete you, again, and try to develop a little more self control.

Yep, it’s spring break, so I put TikTok back on, but did I really need to watch for an hour and nineteen minutes on Sunday?

Screen Time does not lie, so thanks, Apple. You did something good.

I think I’ll go hang my hummingbird feeders. 

Facebook says they are on the way.