It’s (sometimes) ok to disconnect

It’s time to disconnect, recharge your mind and take a break from your devices.

Monday morning: the first thing you do is grab your smartphone from the nightstand and check your email, social media and even the weather.

As the day goes on, you find yourself interrupting whatever you are doing to check your Facebook account for the hundredth time.

Signs of cellphone addiction include considering your phone part of you.

If this describes you, maybe you should disconnect to help increase your efficiency.

The typical smartphone user checks his or her device an astonishing average of 2,617 times every day, according to a study by research firm Dscout.

But extreme cellphone users —meaning the top 10%— are a completely different story, checking their phones over 5,400 times a day.

The flip-side of the immediacy and availability brought about by smartphones is the lure of time-consuming apps, social media and the like.

It has become something of a taboo to disregard the constant stream of updates on your devices. But sometimes you need to embrace missing out.

Addiction to mobile, impossible to disconnect

The average American spends nearly half a day staring at a screen. A Nielsen Company audience study revealed that adults in the US devoted about 10 hours and 39 minutes each day to consuming digital content during the first quarter of 2016.

That includes time spent on tablets, smartphones, personal computers, multimedia devices, videogames, radios, DVDs and TVs. In 2015, that time was one hour less, according to Nielsen.

This situation could be explained to the rise in smartphone and tablet usage. The report concluded that out of 168 hours in a week, Americans spend more than 50 with devices, said Douglas Gentile, professor of psychology at Iowa State University.

“If people are spending over 50 hours a week with media for entertainment purposes, then there’s really no time left for any of the other things we value,” he said.

So, it’s time to disconnect, unplug, recharge your mind and take a break from your devices. Keeping your cellphone on constantly is bad for your health and your productivity.