The power of the cell phone! 10 years ago, who would have thought a mobile device would perhaps control our lives and have such a huge impact on pretty much all that we do. My cell phone (#TeamiPhone) is a great addition to my life. It helps me communicate, remember meetings, keep up with friends, family, share special moments in my life, listen to music, takes notes and a variety of other wonderful things. But… there is a huge downside to having a cell phone. I am always on and never off. What I mean is, I am so attached to my phone, I feel sometimes I am missing out on what’s in front of me. Please do not tell me I am the only one.In fact, I know I am not.
Seriously, think about how much time you spend on your phone throughout the day. Think about how much time you are on your social networks. I am pretty sure it’s well over a hour. I would even say some of us are over two hours a day being on our phones. My question is: where do we begin to create boundaries between ourselves and our mobile devices?
I am beginning on a journey to create some phone boundaries in my life. For one hour each day I wake up I will not be on my cellular device. In fact, I am going to take full advantage of the do not disturb option. At night, I am going to use another one of my hours before I go to bed to step away from my cell phone. I am a night owl and I realize a lot of why I stay up late is because I’m watching basketball, trying to do homework, catching up with my wife and on different social networks.
Here is my theory. If I can step away from my phone at a certain time each night, I believe this will allow me to be more effective in my time with my wife, my thoughts and with my education. Mobile devices are wonderful but I am disturbed having something influence my life so much to where it has control over me. There are some things I need to shut down in my life, there are some bad habits I need to break and there are some things I need to get better at; having control of my time on my mobile device is one of them.
Maybe you are reading this and you are saying to yourself, “I don’t have phone and boundary issues.” Well, this blog post isn’t for you. 🙂 Kidding, sort of. What you could do, since you don’t have phone boundary issues is tell us some of your tricks to the trade. How do you manage your time with your phone? How do you manage your time on social media? What time do you shut down your mobile device each day? Help us people who struggle with our mobile devices out! We want to step away and be more present but we need some help!
Share this blog post with your friends and let’s get some conversation going about how to best set better boundaries in our life. Let’s start with the use of our cell phone.
Josh Samarco 
I used to have the same issue once upon a time. It was brought up while I was at a restaurant having dinner that I was always on my phone.
My boundaries (before I deleted all of my social media accounts two years ago) I stopped taking my phone out of my purse at a restaurant. It’s too easy to look at your phone while waiting on your order.
Second, I gave myself a phone curfew of 8am-10pm. There was nothing that had to be said at 10:01 PM that couldn’t wait until 8:01 am.
Third, I couldn’t get on my phone (email, social media, etc) at all until I’d read and studied my bible.
Wow, love the boundaries you created for yourself. I can only imagine how present you with God and with others. Thanks for sharing!
I love reading your blog, Scotty. You truly put the little things in life into perspective. Keep up the good work!
Thank you Lisa. I appreciate you taking the time out to read my blog and also share kind words!