That’s the average and it’s too much. 

The phone has become our life and not a tool for a better life.

Any excuses for not taking action today will only make it worse.  Distracted parents, unhappy children, a lack of innovation. 

IBM was the leader in working from home and has now reversed its policy requiring employees to show up at the office.  Not because they didn’t work, but because the quality of the absentee interaction was so low. 

It’s not like we can’t make a dent in 150 distractions a day. 

• Stop looking at the phone in the car. 
• And during commercials or in waiting rooms where we could be interacting with others live and in real time. 
• Seriously restrict notifications (The Wall Street Journal may want to tell you the worst and best wines at Costco, which it sent to me, but it can wait). 
• Separate from the phone several times a day.  It doesn’t need to be in your hand all the times.  We can learn to rely on it less. 
• Avoid the black hole of social media.  Facebook, Instagram and others are just begging you to go deeper, spy and chew up your precious time. 
• Put apps that get you information quickly (like weather, news, traffic, etc.) on page one of your phone’s screen.  Put black hole apps in a folder on the last screen.

Anyone who believes that in this digital age we have little control over how distracted we are could start with the above. 

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