Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
IT’S WEEK TWO of our Live A Better Life series, and it’s all about challenging yourself.
To start off the week, we’re going to see if removing an app can have an effect on your behaviour on your phone.
Of course, there are reasons why deleting an app – especially a messaging or social media app – can be difficult.
FOMO
Dr Larry Rosen, professor emeritus at California State University author of The Distracted Mind: Ancient Minds in a High-Tech World, told TheJournal.ie that it’s normal to feel anxiety if you feel you’re missing out on something – like the content on an app – on your phone.
“If you are using the phone to gain pleasure then that causes your brain to produce pleasure chemicals including dopamine and serotonin which make you feel good,” he said. Just think of those ‘likes’ and ‘reactions’ that you get which make you feel temporarily good.
“If, however, you are using your phone because you feel you need to keep up with your virtual worlds then you are already producing chemicals that make you feel anxious (cortisol, adrenaline, etc) and you need to check in to remove those chemicals that make you feel anxiety.”
There’s also a phenomenon called ‘app fatigue’, which some tech writers have been examining. One journalist detailed how he deleted 165 apps from his iPhone (he’s a tech reviewer, hence the numbers):
But the point is to think hard about what you really need and use, especially if the app is lousy or outdated
Now, app fatigue isn’t quite a legitimate thing, but there’s no doubt having too many apps and too many ways of distracting yourself on your phone can be tiring.
That’s why today’s challenge is to delete one app you don’t want to use.
What sort of app could you delete?
I deleted the Facebook app on New Year’s Day after realising I was spending some of a holiday with friends scrolling mindlessly through it. I had already deleted Snapchat after starting to dislike how much time I wasted on it.
How has it changed things? Well, I do sometimes look at Facebook on the web on my phone, but I can go days without using it – rather than multiple times a day. I do check in on desktop (I don’t have Facebook Messenger). Do I feel like I’m missing out on anything? No.
However, the one issue I still have is that I still use Twitter a lot. Partly, that is because of work – so I can’t get rid of it – but my challenge is to use it less.
I asked some of my colleagues if they had deleted apps, and they told me:
I deleted Snapchat – it’s such a timesuck and it’s not content I miss. Easily can lose the guts of an hour staring into the minutiae of someone else’s life when I’m putting off doing something I need to do.
Deleted Facebook a while ago. It’s been great. Deleted Snapchat yesterday, too. It’s been great.
Facebook Messenger. I just read messages on desktop.
Most of my news apps – I find it way easier/better to stick to the couple that I use regularly, and leave the rest.
Tell us in the comments how you get on.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Is that sarcasm..?
The *drab* colours of the old punt??
I’m fond of the euro, but the punt was lovely – fabulous old Irish art on it.
Am I on glue? Am I remembering it incorrectly?
I agree the art on them was very good but I do think the colours were fairly drab.
I like glue
Fairly drab, good, great, fantastic, who cares unless you can buy more for it,
You gotta love the nun on the old fiver.
Or not.
With the old punt you actually felt like you had real money that was worth something in your pocket. A 50 euro note now goes nowhere. Monopoly money.
@Karol Aww, all the pretty colours. Should we have put Barney the dinosaur, Elmo and Zig and Zag on the old punt? Would that have been colourful enough?
Len,
No, colours would have sufficed.
Miss getting a few horse monies off the oul mother.
Nice picture of Bertie on the 20
You are right. The old Irish tender was fantastic…I remember asking my grandfather about the people on the notes and him telling me stories about ‘old’ Ireland. Unfortunately that’s now lost forever with the Euro
I thought the Euro would have nudey pictures by now lol.
Drab colours of the punt? The punt had so much more character. And so much more value. Wish we had never adopted the euro!
I don’t know about not adopting the euro, but the old notes were far better. Surely the EU can agree on some universally admired people like Einstein and Beethoven to put on the euro notes.
There was nothing wrong with adopting the Euro. It was been driven off a cliff by Fianna Fail that was the problem.
A common currency was, in theory, not a bad idea. But the euro was badly run from the get go. Too much political grandstanding and not enough fiscal, economic and social considerations. It wasn’t entirely Fianna Fail’s fault. Sure, they were the biggest culprit when it came down to the local Irish economy. But they can’t be blamed for failed ECB policies in relation to Portugal, Greece, Italy, Spain, etc. So, as I said, we should never have joined the euro. A better conceived common currency, yes. But not the euro.
Greatest financial con job in history adopting the euro.
Faces on notes look better than bridges.
Ah yes our old £50 that used to last for weeks not like the new €50 which seems to vanish in minutes, fond memories……….
So that’s what a £50 looked like – don’t think I ever had one of those in my pocket. And I didn’t even know the £100 existed!!
I remember once seeing an old £50 when I was little and I remember being profoundly mesmerised. Nowadays €50 are as common as the old fivers!!
Preferred the old notes.
More character.
More of a cultural icon / connection. When you held them in your hand you knew you had money, real money, worth something.
These new ones are insipid. Bland.
Could be from any old place in Europe.
I miss the old money , heading into town on a night out with 20 quid in your pocket . happy days ..
Ah yes the old money. For 5p you could get a steak and kidney pie, a cup of coffee, a slice of cheesecake and a newsreel, with enough change left over to ride the trolley from Battery Park to the Polo Grounds.
Everything was better back then for sure.
Monopoly money soon.
“I prefer old money….money was better in them days”
as if i give a fook as long as i have any of the stuff
I remember well the one and only time I saw a £100 note as a child. To my young eyes it looked like a bed sheet. Even a £50 note was an event to break down the local.Would the bar man have change or the worry of it being fake….
Worth abut 10$ Next Year.
Send me a few dozen to examine
IMO, the nicest set of notes we ever had was the Lady Lavery collection.
That nun had a fiver on her head.
If money talks then €20 has little to say.
Wasn’t there an auld fella’ on the back too in a coat? Called “Scrotum” I think he was.
Should send every1 a new €20 note. Way better way to circulate them…
Jesus who gives a flying f*ck about the colour of the money as long as you have loads of it! It could be covered in sh*te and you would still spend it!
Any plans next year for a 1916 commemorative €5/€10/€20 note?
I was listening to a 1980s recording of Fr. John O’Connor O.P. talking about a saint in the 1800s predicting that Europe would be united under Germany and that Europe would share the same currency until 22 countries had it and then Germany would cause its break up of its Empire when 22 countries shared the same currency.
19 share it now just 3 more if you believe in Saints…??? Love the weird but take most with a pinch of salt…
You can’t fold any of the Euro notes a certain way to make a picture of Reg Holdsworth from Corrie like you could with the old £10 note
Will they still be as hard to get?
have your say