I watched a video yesterday about an experiment involving five children who were heavily addicted to smartphones, averaging around 10 hours of screen time per day. They were asked to give up their phones for 10 days. While the reported improvements in attention, memory, and creativity were interesting, that wasn’t what stood out to me most.
What struck me was that they seemed more human.
Our natural desire to connect with other people, create things, and contribute to the world is often suppressed by smartphones, social media, and endless doomscrolling. We spend so much time consuming that we leave little room for creating, thinking, or simply being present.
If we want to become better human beings, we need to reduce mindless screen time. When we stop feeding our brains a constant stream of digital stimulation, we naturally begin looking elsewhere for fulfillment. We are forced to sit with boredom, which can feel uncomfortable at first. But boredom often becomes the starting point for something meaningful.
It pushes us back into the real world. We start having conversations, pursuing hobbies, learning skills, building things, and working toward goals that matter. And as we engage more deeply with meaningful activities, we develop discipline. Over time, that discipline shapes our character and helps us become more intentional, capable, and fulfilled people.