Phone-free Fridays

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By Scott Shepherd

On my way to work this morning I peered around in a quasi-somnolent state at my fellow commuters, probably over a hundred of them, all crammed into a carriage of the Seoul Subway, and I pondered. How did people cope with long commutes before we all had mobile phones? With the exception of a fair few sleeping passengers, almost everyone on the carriage, including me, was engaging in some way with a phone.

I usually listen to podcasts and try to snooze on my way to work, but looking around me today I could see that some of my travel companions were playing games or watching videos, while others were scrolling through webtoons or reading the news; of course, the most erudite and intellectual among them were probably reading The Korea Times in order to keep up with all the best English-language opinion and news articles in the country.

But do we use our phones too much? Don't get me wrong: I'm not one of those tin-foil-hatted doom-mongers who thinks that phones are a sign of The End of Days or a precursor to the collapse of civilization. As a rule this train-bound phone use works well to soothe the crowded passengers. After all, how stifling it must be to be tightly jammed into a giant Pringles tube hurtling under tons of rock and dirt without the comforting sight of little aliens shooting each other on your screen or the soothing sound of people arguing in radio studios.

I mean, imagine if we didn't have phones and we just had to stand around and avoid eye contact for an hour or more. I have no proof, but I reckon the use of phones must have led to a reduction in violence on public transportation. Why fight with those around you when you could watch Ma Dong-seok or Tom Cruise beating up bad guys on Netflix?

But I am a little concerned about how much I use my phone ―- because it's not just on the train that I find myself gazing into my personal little rectangle of internet; it's all the time. I wake up in the morning to the dreaded sound of my phone alarm and, as long as I'm not running too late for work, I'll usually check the news to see what new disasters have occurred overnight. Before I even sit up, I often check my emails and read messages from friends and family in other times zones.

Then throughout the day any time I have a few seconds of idleness, whether it's in a lift or walking down the street, I immediately plug myself into my phone. After a long day of professoring I habitually relax in the evening by watching whatever videos YouTube recommends to me, and recently at night I've listen to someone reading essays by C. S. Lewis to speed my descent into the sweet bliss of sleep (sorry C. S. Lewis).

I just worry about the impact my phone has on my ability to feel bored, to wonder and imagine and dream. I've become such a passive receptacle instead of an active participant in my own life. Maybe this makes me sound old, but I remember as a teenager walking down the road and actually using my own brain to think as I walked: I thought about philosophical questions or imagined stories or recounted music in my head or simply wondered about the day. I used to read so much.

Weirdly, almost paradoxically, I now have access to so much more, to all the bright and glittering attractions of the world. I have knowledge and culture from all of humanity at my very fingertips. The galleries and theatres of history, the vast libraries of ancient kings and emperors pale in comparison to the information encompassed in my little phone. And with all of this power in my hand, I lie in bed and watch videos of people falling over or cats doing weird things.

This is, perhaps, what it means to be human. But whenever I'm away from my phone long enough to actually think about it, I realize that listlessly scrolling on my phone is not a fruitful use of the time I have on this Earth.

It's not that using my phone is wrong in and of itself, but I certainly do it too much. And I can't be the only one. The problem is that it's so much easier to gawp at my phone than it is to do pretty much anything else. And while it's not realistic or even desirable to go back to the old phoneless days, I need a better balance.

All of which is why I'm going to try implementing Phone-Free Fridays. Of course I'll still use my phone on the rare occasions that I need to actually, you know, speak to people; but on Fridays I'm going to try to avoid using my phone for entertainment or even for emailing and messaging. If I'm disciplined enough to follow through with this, I hope that I can rekindle the lost art of being bored. Maybe I'll read more books. Maybe I'll wander around my neighborhood or take up a new hobby. Whatever happens, I hope that I can use my time better and live more consciously, instead of existing only vicariously through my screen.

I chose Friday because it has a double advantage: first, an alliterative title is always an obvious boon when you're trying to come up with a scheme like this. Friday is also the best choice for me because I don't teach any classes on campus so I don't have to worry about my commute. And I'd like to invite you, the (erudite and intellectual) readers of this article, to consider taking up your own phone-free day. There's a great big world out there ready to be explored. I want to put down my phone and live.

Dr. Scott Shepherd is a British-American academic. He has taught in universities in the U.K. and Korea, and is currently an assistant professor of English at Chongshin University in Seoul. The views expressed in the article are the author's own and do not reflect the editorial direction of The Korea Times.