Not long after I began taking my mental health more seriously, my therapist advised me to shift towards a mindset of metaphorically living “in the gray.”
Many of us live in a world polarized by black-and-white thinking — amplified by social media’s echo chambers — where you’re right and I’m wrong, or I’m either the world’s most terrible human being or a saint.
Much of my inner work this past year has been trying to accept more nuanced, uncomfortable worldviews where I’m neither a hero nor a villain. In other words: living in the in-between or “gray zone.”
So I found Oliver Burkeman’s latest advice hilariously funny when he said I should start literally living in gray mode. Well, at least put my phone in gray mode.
(For those who are new to this Substack, I’m following the ten recommended guidelines for productivity in Oliver Burkeman’s brilliant book, Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals. Each week, I’ll publish a new post focusing on one of the time management principles and how well it worked (or didn’t work) for me along with any life lessons leaned).
Productivity Tip #6 - Embrace boring and single-purpose technology
Burkeman writes: “Digital distractions are so seductive because they offer the chance of escape to a realm where painful human limitations don’t apply: you never need to feel bored or constrained…”
In our age of distraction, boredom is becoming almost an endangered species. When was the last time you took a walk and didn’t listen to a podcast or worked out without music or simply…stared at a wall and let your thoughts percolate?
The thing is — we need to be bored sometimes to do the work that really matters to us. Whether that’s starting a business, writing a novel, solving a complex coding problem, or even patiently listening to your boss drone on at the holiday party so you can eventually get a coveted promotion.
But our modern age of smartphones means it’s near impossible to be bored — unless you’re intentional about it. So Burkeman suggests going into the settings on your smartphone and turning on grayscale mode. (For iPhones: you can find this feature in “Color Filters” under the “Accessibility/Display” section in your Settings.).
I was skeptical, but I immediately noticed an impact. When the once colorful apps on my screen turned to various humdrum shades of gray, suddenly, my phone lost its marvelous appeal.
Watching YouTube videos — my major social media addiction these days — in gray mode had the biggest impact in reducing my screentime and desire to compulsively check my phone. Watching picturesque videos of influencers frolicking under autumn leaves turning red — no gray — made me sad, not joyous. It became easier to stick to my Instagram limit of one hour per day when everything was gray, gray, and more gray. I even spent less time compulsively checking my email on my phone than I once used to do.
There were some downsides. I still found it enjoyable enough to watch YouTube videos that were essentially podcast episodes on grayscale because the visual content wasn’t that important. Watching episodes of the Apple TV+ show Pachinko almost felt more enjoyable because it felt like watching a black-and-white television series, especially since the episode was set during World War II.
And it made it harder to take photos on my phone. Taking pictures of nature on my daily walks wasn’t quite as fun if I couldn’t observe the shades of green-red in the autumn leaves that had started falling on my block. I also spent a lot of time with family this past week, so I had to awkwardly explain the grayscale mode to people using my phone to take group photos and assure them the photo would still appear in color on their devices.
But, on the whole, I found myself reaching less and less for my phone, and, when I did, I spent less time on it. My phone had quite literally lost its luster. As far as productivity hacks go, I’d give this one a solid 8/10.
Burkeman’s other piece of advice in this tip was to use single-purpose devices like Kindle e-readers, which means you have to focus on one task without getting distracted. Unfortunately, my 2014 Kindle has been having some tech issues, so I wasn’t able to try it out, but I have noticed that I’ve gotten more distracted while reading ever since switching to reading ebooks on my smartphone (not to mention pronounced finger pain).
So I guess the major life lesson here: make your smart device a “tool rather than a toy” in the words of tech journalist Nellie Bowles. Your phone is just supposed to make your life easier. Not drench you with dopamine every second of the day. Remember that.
Choose to live in the gray. Embrace boredom.
I’ll see you next week.