I feel like we've gotten to a point now where discussing the reality of what it means to
live today in 2024 in regards to technology has become cringey.
It's very cringey.
Okay.
To be like, social media is routing our brains.
Cringey, to be like, we're all overstimulated and addicted to our phones.
Cringey, I know.
I agree.
However, it is unfortunate that it's cringey because I am going to be talking about it
today again.
Have I talked about it before?
Yes.
Have I said everything there is to be said?
Yes.
Am I revisiting it today because it's still sort of an issue in my personal life and I'm
trying to work through it with all of you?
Yes.
It's unfortunate that it's cringey because it's not a conversation that should be over
necessarily.
I sound like, listen, I know I sound like your mom or your dad or your grandma or your
uncle coming to you at Thanksgiving being like, you need to get off that phone.
I know I sound like that.
I sound like that now.
I've sounded like that before and I'll sound like that again.
This is just the reality of who I am.
I've said this before also, but it's almost like I have a mom, like a built in mom in my
own brain.
I obviously have my mom, who I love and adore, but I also have like another mom slash grandma,
slash older, wiser voice in my head telling me what's right, what I should be doing.
And then on the other side of my brain, I have 22 year old Emma and those two sides of my
brain are constantly fighting.
But today I'm going to be talking from the mom in my brain, the grandma in my brain for
the most part.
And then 22 year old Emma will come into.
I'm going to warn you I'm about to say a cliche about the world that we live in today that
you've heard a billion times and you'll probably hear a billion more times in the future.
We live in a time where you don't have to be bored anymore.
Oh, you've never heard that before.
Yeah, you have.
I know.
I know.
I don't need to explain why this statement is true.
You know why?
There's endless entertainment readily available at all times and it's addictive.
Okay.
We know that.
But a little less discussed is also the fact that we live in a culture that sort of shames
boredom, not necessarily directly.
There aren't people saying like being bored is bad.
It means you're a failure and it means you suck.
But indirectly, I feel like we don't live in a culture that says, Hey, you should go
and be bored.
There's a lot of emphasis on working really hard grinding blah, blah, blah, which is sort
of in my opinion, indirectly saying, if you're bored, then you're not working hard enough
and there's something wrong with your life.
There's this emphasis around finding your dream job and working really hard at it.
And that whole narrative does not have boredom anywhere in it.
And I feel like if you were to go to someone who has this major grind mindset, like find
your dream job and work really hard at it every single day, if you were to say, I'm bored
to somebody like that.
They'd be like, Okay, why aren't you working?
And if you're like, I am working.
I'm bored and I'm at work.
They'd say, Okay, why are you still at that job?
If it's making you feel bored, do you see what I'm saying?
Like that whole narrative just does not support boredom on top of that.
Everyone's constantly comparing their lives on social media and everybody looks like
they're always doing something fun all the time, blah, blah, blah.
That's something we already all know.
That also makes us all feel like we should never be bored.
Because it's like, Oh, well, this person's on a trip to Hawaii and they look like they're
having so much fun and they're doing something.
Meanwhile, I'm not doing anything.
I'm sitting in my backyard looking at a bird and I'm bored.
I shouldn't be doing that.
I should be doing something else.
I should be entertained.
I should be doing something with my life.
Again, that does not support the idea that boredom maybe can be good.
Everything going on around us pushes us towards over stimulation in one way or another.
I came to the conclusion the other day that I need to allow myself to be bored more often.
This is not a conclusion that I'm coming to for the first time.
I've come to this conclusion 10 times before.
This is not a new conversation for us here on anything goes.
I have talked about this, but I've come to the conclusion again recently that you know
what?
I'm not bored enough.
And I know that being bored is important because just through life experience, not that
I have a lot, I'm 22, but through experience, I've noticed that times of boredom have
led me to do incredible things.
I can look back and see the value in times of boredom in my life.
And simply because of that, I'm inspired in moments where I'm not ever bored and I'm constantly
overstimulated that I need to create more space to be bored.
And I need to allow myself to be bored more often.
Now there's a few things I want to go into, but the first one is why I think boredom is
important.
In my personal experience, I found boredom forces me to reflect for one.
If you're not bored and you're constantly overstimulated, when are you going to find time to
sort of do the dirty work and reflect on yourself and your life and the people around you?
You don't really have to do that if you're constantly distracting yourself with other
things.
I tend to reflect most often when I'm driving or I'm in the shower.
Even in moments of over stimulation, I can't usually distract myself very well when I'm
driving or when I'm in the shower because what else am I going to do?
I mean, yes, sometimes I can listen to a podcast or play a YouTube video or call someone
on the phone.
And I've been known to do that.
Sometimes no one's available.
Sometimes everyone's working.
Sometimes everyone's busy.
And guess what?
Emma's left to be alone and a YouTube video or a podcast is not cutting it.
And that's not a distraction enough.
And you know what?
It gets to a point where it's like maybe silence is the best option.
And then I find myself briefly for just a moment bored.
And guess what I do?
Without a doubt, I reflect.
And I always find it miraculous when I do give myself a moment of boredom in a phase
of over stimulation.
How quickly that moment of reflection makes me feel better.
Like we always have things going on in our head.
Okay, here we go.
Here I go with a metaphor.
But I feel like we have this backpack that we're carrying all the time.
And there's certain things that put weight into the backpack and then there are certain
things that take weight out of the backpack.
Daily challenges and dilemmas and questions that we have unanswered, unsolved weight
in the backpack.
And then anytime we take a bit to think and reflect and answer some of those questions
and address some of those uncomfortable things, we're able to take weight out of the backpack.
In the moment, it's annoying because there's a lot of heavy shit in the backpack and it's
annoying and you just sift around and find the things that you need to take out.
And it's harder to lift something up from the front than it is to be carrying it around
on your back.
So it's really heavy and it's annoying and then you get it out and you throw it and then
you're done.
And it was annoying to go into your backpack and get it all out and like whatever.
But then now that it's gone, you're so stoked that it is.
That's sort of what it feels like to be in a phase when you aren't reflecting.
I feel like when you're in a phase where you're really overstimulated and you're distracting
yourself a lot, that almost acts as like these pads on the straps of your backpack.
These like soft fuzzy pads that may get hurt a little less when you're carrying around
all this heavy stuff.
You don't feel as inspired to look into that backpack because you're like, well, my shoulders
don't hurt as bad because I have these pads that are protecting the straps from digging
into my shoulders.
I'm not thinking about it as much.
I don't have to think about it.
But eventually you'll add enough heavy stuff to that backpack that now you have really
bad back pain and maybe your sciatica is acting up and now you have to look into that goddamn
backpack.
But you don't want to get to that point where your backpack is so heavy that you have so
much stuff that you need to reflect on that it's like overwhelming and daunting.
It's better to have more moments of boredom throughout your day and in your life so that
you just naturally end up addressing those things more often.
At least this is my experience.
I also think boredom is crucial for creativity in always.
I'm not just talking about like a creative project like, oh, I'm making my magnum opus.
I'm painting a self portrait that hopefully will be in the Louvre one day.
It's not like that.
It could be good for that as well.
Don't get me wrong.
But I'm just talking about using the creative side of your brain in general.
I'll use an example for when I'm trying to come up with things to talk about for my
podcast.
I sometimes get really stumped because I've had a podcast for a long time and I'm like,
fuck, what did I never talked about before?
And by the way, this is not me complaining.
This is just genuinely an example for my life.
I'll be like, okay, I want to think about something that I haven't talked about before.
Something that feels fresh and exciting maybe or maybe I have a different take on something
that I have already talked about before.
But sometimes I get stumped and I can't really figure out what I want to talk about.
And I have to sort of get creative and try to figure out, okay, what could be a full
episode?
And you know what the best solution for that is forcing myself to be bored.
I have days sometimes where I lay in bed all day bored as fuck with my computer open,
trying to figure out what I could talk about for the podcast.
That's part of the deal.
If you are trying to create something new in some way, no matter what it is, a lot of
times you're going to end up really bored staring at the wall, not sure what to do.
And that's sort of a part of it.
And I wish in a way that I set out more time in my life to be bored because I think that
if I did that, then in those moments of boredom, I would end up coming up with ideas instead
of coming down to the wire and then having to force myself to be bored on days when I'm
like, oh, I want to record today.
And it's like, oh, I said, I don't have an idea.
And then I end up needing to stare at the ceiling for six hours to eventually figure something
out.
Then I have to shove all this boredom into one day out of necessity instead of, I don't
know, being bored some other time and spreading it out in a better way.
Does that make sense?
I think that nothing inspires creativity better than boredom.
And I think that you're able to be creative in all areas of your life, so much easier
when you have the space in your brain to do it.
I feel like creative endeavors, whether it's a creative problem or it's a creative project.
It requires almost an empty brain.
You almost need to have an empty brain.
And when is your brain empty?
When you're bored.
So it's similar to that problem solving.
I mean, I kind of already addressed that with reflection and creativity because both
of those involve problem solving.
But I feel like problem solving, similar to creativity, it requires so much focus in such
a blank slate in the brain that without boredom, it's very hard to solve a problem properly.
And then last but not least, recharging.
I think a lot of times we look at boredom as something that is not recharging because
being bored is not the most comfortable feeling, especially now.
It can make a lot of us sort of antsy because we're like, God, I should be doing something,
I should be doing something.
But being bored is, in my opinion, crucial for recharging and preventing burnout in all
areas of life.
Having the freedom to do whatever you want with your brain, whether it's uncomfortable
because that's actually not always a comfortable feeling or it's comfortable because maybe
you're someone who, I don't know, understands the value of boredom and appreciates it.
I think it's the only way to recharge in a way.
With all that being said, it's clear that boredom, at least for me, is very important because
it allows me to do all of these critical things in my life.
And I was thinking about it the other day, it's not hard to find boredom.
It's actually really easy.
In fact, it's easier than ever because I do think that it takes much more to stimulate
us now than it used to in the past.
Like people in the 1920s didn't know what they were missing.
They didn't have an iPad.
They didn't have Instagram.
They didn't have TikTok.
They did not have Netflix and they did not have Max, formerly known as HBO Max.
And they definitely didn't have Hulu either.
Like they were probably properly entertained by, I don't know, going on a walk through
a flower garden.
They were probably properly entertained reading a book.
I would argue it's much less entertaining now for the majority of human beings alive today
than it was for human beings in 1920 when there was just a whole lot less going on.
Our barrier for what's entertaining and stimulating, it's just different.
But with that being said, it's kind of cool in a way because boredom is all around,
like we can find boredom in way more places because we're so much less entertained by
mundane things.
Like let's say it's a Saturday and you have two options.
You could over simulate yourself as we all do, okay?
By spending all day going on TikTok and then maybe watching a really addictive TV show
and then ordering dinner on a food delivery app and then, you know, just all these things
that are very addictive and very just prevent you from being bored because you don't ever
have to be bored during those things.
All of those things gather all of your attention.
Now, before I even go any further, I want to say that I don't want to demonize a day like
that because I also think that there can be something recharging at times about having
a day like that, just letting yourself do all the things and indulging all these things.
I don't think that that's always inherently wrong and I don't want to demonize it because
I think there is some value maybe there too.
I'm not sure if there's value there.
That might be pushing it too far, but I think that we shouldn't feel like we can't ever
do that.
I think that's so unhealthy as well because whatever.
But I think we should keep that to a minimum, you know what I mean?
I think that there should be a limit.
Like I don't think we should do that anytime we have a day off, anytime we have an hour
off, you know, I think that there should be a balance where sometimes our time spent
off is like that because that's fun and that feels good sometimes, but it should also
be spent being bored sometimes too.
And we should just create more boredom in our life in general.
Anyway, and it's easy to do like replace a day like that watching TV going on TikTok,
boring food delivery, with going for a hike for a lot of us going for a hike is fucking
boring.
Some people love it.
Some people are vividly entertained by that and that's beautiful.
Some people are not.
Many people are not.
I do enjoy going for a hike and I find it to be fun in someone entertaining, but I also
do think that there is a little bit of it that's boring for sure, you know, maybe in good
company, it's less boring, but actually definitely in good company, it's less boring.
But if I were to go on a hike by myself, enforce myself to just walk and not listen to anything,
maybe listen to music, but I might get a little bored.
I'm going to be honest like in our end, I may be like, all right, I'm fucking bored sitting
in your backyard with no form of entertainment, no music, no podcast, no YouTube video,
not even a book and just sitting there.
Oh, that's uncomfortable.
That's boring.
Being in bed with the TV off, thinking time, that is boring.
Who'd want to do that?
It's not hard to find boredom.
Like you can make yourself bored very easily.
Finding boredom is not the hard part.
It's motivating ourselves to create boredom and then not succumbing to the addiction to
all these things when we are in a moment of boredom.
Not just being like, fuck this, I'm just going to, like, what's so wrong about playing
a podcast right now?
I'm on this hike and I want to listen to a podcast like, what's wrong with that?
It's like there is nothing wrong with that necessarily, but I don't know.
I think that there's a balance that we're not striking.
It's almost like for a lot of us, we have to almost manufacture boredom nowadays, which
feels so unusual because I feel like in the past, it was always like, you know, people
would tell their kids, oh, go make yourself busy.
You know, go figure something out.
Go figure out how to entertain yourself.
And kids would have to go get creative to entertain themselves.
Whereas now it's like, we all have to manufacture that boredom again because we don't have enough
of it.
And we need a little bit of it at least.
I don't know, just feel so backwards and unnatural.
It feels weird and forced to do that.
And it feels kind of silly, but for me personally, I feel like I need to do this.
Like I know I need to do this more because I am constantly over stimulating myself because
it's just the easier route in life.
And I know that it's not good for me in any way.
Like it's not good for my creativity.
It's not good for my growth in life.
It's not good for reflecting on things.
It's just not good for my overall soul in a way.
But it's so much easier.
It's so much easier to just let myself indulge in all of it.
It takes a lot of discipline.
And I go through phases, you know, like you've heard me talk about this topic before, maybe
in a slightly different way.
But I've talked about being addicted to social media and then I've talked about how, you
know why?
I think I kicked it.
I think I figured it out.
I, you know, maybe I picked up this hobby or I started doing this and this really helped.
I've only ever found temporary solutions for this problem.
I've never found a permanent solution for this problem.
And maybe there is none.
But I would say right now in this current moment, I'm back in a period where I am just
constantly listening to YouTube videos or podcasts, you know, I go on Instagram reels all
the time.
I go on YouTube shorts all the time.
I waste so much fucking time on those because I don't have TikTok.
So I'm not addicted to TikTok per se.
But I might as well be because I'm addicted to all the weirder forms of TikTok, aka Instagram
reels and aka YouTube shorts.
I would say actually Instagram reels are not weird, but YouTube shorts are obviously
weird and everybody talks about how weird they are.
However, I've found that their algorithm is actually very addicting once they understand
what you like.
And it's just as potent as like, if not even more potent sometimes than Instagram reels.
Like I'm so addicted to YouTube shorts and they have me down so good right now.
And I get actually positive content.
I get a lot of like food reviews and stuff, which is fun because I'm always like, oh,
maybe I'll go try that restaurant.
Of course, I won't.
I don't know the next time I'm going to be visiting Singapore and remember to go to this
one restaurant that this person visited.
The likelihood is very low.
You know what I'm saying?
Or I don't know the next time I'm going to be in Mexico City and no, and remember this
exact bakery that this person went to.
However, it's very entertaining.
And I'd like to think that I would go there one day.
I also get a lot of videos of people on van life doing van life, okay, living in a van.
And I know I'm 10 years late to that sort of trend watching content about that doesn't
matter.
I'm just as fun to watch now as it was 10 years ago, okay?
I'm very addicted to YouTube shorts.
I'm also very addicted to Instagram rails, whatever.
I get very funny stuff on Instagram rails.
I'm laughing up a storm over here.
I'm sending Instagram rails to everybody and they're like, I'm not, this is so annoying.
This would be less weird if you just had TikTok and it's, it's all good.
I've resorted to just sending reels to people who appreciate them and also don't have
TikToks such as my parents because they love it and they get it.
This is all a pointless tangent.
I'm in a phase again where I'm very addicted to all of these things, food delivery, social
media and the internet as a whole constantly having noise going on, you know, constantly
having a podcast or a YouTube video playing.
I'm just, there's constant noise.
I'm back in that place.
And I think the reason why it happened was because in phases where I'm maybe working
harder or working more, that tends to give me an excuse.
I'm like, well, I've been so busy doing all working on all these things that when I
have like, you know, in hour off, I just want to fucking rot my brain.
Like that just feels good.
And it's like, yeah, but when is the time?
When do I get, then I'm never going to get that moment of silence, that moment of boredom,
that I'm like, I'm not getting that at all.
I can't tell you the last time I was bored because anytime I would be bored, I just
drown it out.
I'm very much in that phase again.
I'm frustrated.
I'm fucking frustrated because it's like, I can't tell you how many times I've cycled
through like, okay, I get to a point where I'm so overstimulated that it's like actually
starting to make me, it make me lose connection with myself.
I don't feel connected with myself.
I don't feel connected with my life.
I don't feel connected with the world around me.
I'm not looking inward enough.
I don't feel connected.
And it starts to make me feel like shit slowly, but surely it leads me to a solution
to sort of a dark place.
Like, it can make my anxiety worse.
It can make my depression worse.
Like, it can make these things.
I think particularly in this phase of my life, my anxiety worse because I'm not in a depressive
phase necessarily.
But yeah, it can make me start to feel like shit and it can make various mental health
challenges even worse.
And I'm reaching that point now again, where I'm just feeling down in the dumps a little
bit.
And I'm like, I can't keep coming back here.
I don't want to keep ending up here.
You know, I want to get into a routine that's so solid that I don't end up back here.
It takes so much discipline though that it's so fucking tough.
And I honestly think the best way to kickstart it in past experiences is doing somewhat of
a dopamine detox.
Okay.
About a year ago, actually, I tried my first dopamine detox, which is basically when you
abstain from addictive things such as social media, gaming, food delivery, alcohol, shopping,
watching TV, listening to podcasts like you basically anything that would over simulate
you, anything that makes your life too easy.
Uh-huh.
Not happening.
So I did the dopamine detox and I actually, from what I can remember, found a lot of value
in it.
I think it was really challenging because it was uncomfortable a lot and I was bored a
lot.
And I realized how much time I waste entertaining myself with pointless shit.
And it was sort of an uncomfortable realization I remember.
Like I felt a lot of shame.
I think about how much time I was wasting doing all this pointless shit when I could have
been doing something else.
But I remember it being pretty profound.
And I think I did it for a week or two.
I don't remember.
And I remember feeling really good during it.
I remember feeling much clearer in the head.
And I actually, if I close my eyes now can remember the calmness that I felt towards the
end of the detox.
Like I felt amazing.
And in the past, the dopamine detox was a very trendy sort of movement.
Like everyone was doing it.
It was like, we're all, you know, so overstimulated.
We need to do a dopamine detox.
And it was very trendy and a lot of people were trying it.
And I think that that was great.
The problem is it fell out of favor because the name of it is scientifically inaccurate.
Like you technically can't detox your body from the chemical dopamine that your body
releases.
Like you can't cleanse your body of dopamine.
You're always releasing dopamine.
So it's scientifically inaccurate.
And I also think too, there are some people saying that it doesn't technically work the
way that people explain that it does.
Like people say, okay, a dopamine detox is you remove all of these things that produce
the chemical of dopamine so that you can start releasing more dopamine when you do less
exciting things.
Like that's sort of the idea.
Like we get all these easy hits of dopamine all the time from social media and food delivery
and shopping and video gaming.
And we get too much dopamine all the time from all these things.
So to strip it all away forces us to find little hits of dopamine and things that are more
impactful in our daily lives.
And then soon we'll be able to release more dopamine from those things.
Basically there's a whole lot of like science debate on how it actually works inside of
the brain and body.
And it was sort of proven that the name of it was kind of bullshit and the whole concept
and what people were selling when it came to the dopamine detox that it was sort of bullshit.
It turned it into somewhat of a fad and made it disappear out of the zeitgeist.
Like you don't really see people talking about the dopamine detox anymore as much as they
once were.
Which I actually think is a shame because I don't think that there should be something
that's a fat.
I understand that the science is kind of spotty.
I'm not a fan of that either.
But I think it should be repackaged into something new where the science is backed up that
people can revisit whenever they feel like they need it because I think in theory it's
actually a really beneficial thing.
That just reminded me of there was another flaw with the dopamine detox where it was
at times considered to be too extreme.
The rules vary depending on what website you went on or whatever.
But with some it was like no reading books, no listening to music.
Certain things that are arguably not that big of a distraction.
You know what I mean?
Music I guess is sort of that's maybe a more controversial one with this.
Some would argue like music is distracting like it's better to have complete silence if
you're doing a full detox.
I could see value in that because music can sometimes prevent you from reflecting and
stuff and being fully bored.
But I don't know that one's kind of debatable or like saying that you know you're not allowed
to eat any sugar.
You're not allowed to eat out at any restaurants.
It's like okay if you want to do a dopamine detox, quote unquote for three weeks.
The rules need to be a bit more realistic.
What if you want to go out and eat with friends and what if they order cake and like yeah,
you can have a fucking you can have some of the cake.
It just feels too extreme to be realistic I think for some people which I think is also
a flaw with it.
So there's scientific flaws and then there's also like flaws with how extreme the rules can
be.
I think I don't know.
I think it's something that should be revisited though because I think that there is value
to it regardless of the incorrect science and regardless of the optional extreme rules.
According to Harvard's website, they describe the concept of the dopamine detox as something
that helps you to instead of automatically responding to these reward inducing cues
like text messages or Instagram notifications or TikTok notification blah blah, which provide
us within immediate but short lived charge.
We ought to allow our brains to take breaks and reset from this potentially addictive
bombardment.
The idea is that by allowing ourselves to feel lonely or bored or define pleasure in doing
simpler and more natural activities, we will regain control of our lives and be better
able to address compulsive behaviors that may be interfering with our happiness based
on my experience with doing it a year ago.
That was kind of true.
That was genuinely what happened to me.
So here's the thing.
Like the dopamine detox, I wish that it had a different name because that name has absolutely
no respect on it.
But I want to do it again.
And I think I'm going to.
But I think I want to do it for longer.
I'm thinking and I think I want to change the rules to fit my life better.
But I think I'm going to do it again.
And the reason for that is because I know that I need it.
And I think by doing a longer but less strict version of it, I'll learn more about what's
sustainable for my life so that maybe some of these habits will stick.
Because I think that was the problem last time.
The rules were maybe a little too strict.
So I couldn't continue the detox, if you will, for as long as maybe I needed to to build
some new habits and on top of that, I didn't really have a plan for what I was going to
do after the detox, if you will, ended.
So then it just all kind of went to shit after that.
I'm not quite solid on what my detox sort of plan is because I'm also kind of confused.
I'm like, should I try to just make new rules for my life period?
Now that feels when I look at it like so extreme.
I'm like, to have rules in my life, is that realistic?
Is that something I'm actually going to stick to?
Is that even fair to myself?
I'm making excuses about it.
I'm like, maybe like do I need to have rules?
Or should I just do a detox for a longer period of time?
And then I don't know.
Am I going to, am I setting myself up for failure by setting up indefinite rules?
Maybe, maybe not.
But then again, it's also like saying, am I setting myself up for failure?
It's like, it's up to me how I handle the failure.
You know what I'm saying?
Like, let's say I create a set of rules for myself.
Like, oh, I only order food delivery on weekends.
And I only go on social media when I'm posting something on social media.
Like if I'm posting something on Instagram, then you know, I can scroll around for a
little bit and then I'm done.
And then I will not be on Instagram again until the next time I have something to post.
Or in the car or when I'm walking around the house, I'm not allowed to listen to anyone
talking.
So I can't listen to podcasts.
I can't listen to YouTube video.
I only can listen to music.
Like are those rules too strict?
And are those also preventing me from possibly benefiting from YouTube in a way?
Like I love watching YouTube videos listening to podcasts.
Like I love, and sometimes it's educational.
Sometimes it's not.
Depends.
I'd say it's like 60% of what I listen to and watch is educational, which is not bad.
But then the other 40% is not.
So it's like, okay, I've learned a lot from things that I've been listening to on YouTube
and on podcasts.
Do I simply remove and not allow myself to watch the things that are not educational and
are simply just entertainment?
Do I save those for another time?
Do I only let myself consume that stuff on the weekends?
I'm still trying to figure out sort of the rules.
And I'm also trying to figure out if it's a detox or if it's just a lifestyle.
And as I'm talking about it now, I'm starting to feel like I think it needs to just be a lifestyle.
Let's try to figure out what the rules are together.
Okay.
This might be boring for you, but I don't, this is useful for me.
So let's indulge in this together.
I love eating out at restaurants so much and I find that experience to be so magical.
And I also find it to be very present.
Like I love being present at a restaurant.
You know, I get to interact with the servers and like I just, I love that experience and
I love, I never, I rarely go and eat at a restaurant alone.
So it's usually a time that I get to bond with friends or family.
I love eating at a restaurant so much that I'm not going to give myself any rules or restrictions
on that.
However, I also don't do it as often.
It's usually something I do on the weekends anyway.
So it's like a special occasion thing.
However, food delivery, I think needs rules.
I think I'm going to make the rule.
This might seem a bit extreme, but I think that it's something I can do.
I'm going to say no food delivery went alone.
So like if I'm with friends or my parents are visiting and we're hanging out and we're
like doing a puzzle or something in my living room, I'm not going to be like, hey, you guys,
let's pick up and let's go to a restaurant now.
Because it's fun to hang out with people and order food in because we're all already
together in my house and we're doing another activity.
You know what I'm saying?
So I'm going to make the rule.
No food delivery went alone.
So when I'm alone, I have to either cook or go and eat at a restaurant by myself, which
I actually love doing.
I did that recently when I was on a trip in New York.
I like fully went to a sit down restaurant by myself and I was like, is this going to
be kind of weird?
I haven't done this in a really long time.
It was fucking phenomenal.
I loved it.
I just sat there, eavesdropping on other people's conversations on accident.
I wasn't trying to.
It just was inevitable.
I couldn't help it.
I forced myself to not go on my phone too much.
I did go on my phone a little bit, but not that much.
And I really enjoyed it.
So that's a rule that I think I can stick to.
The next one is YouTube.
What am I going to do with YouTube?
Okay.
I think with YouTube, the rule should be as follows.
Okay, I think I know what the rule is.
No YouTube at all before my work for the day is done.
Even when I'm eating lunch and I want to watch something, even when I'm doing a little
chore in the middle of the day, like putting my dishes away in the dishwasher or something,
like whatever, or folding my laundry, like, it doesn't matter.
Even when I'm doing chores, no YouTube, no podcast, no talking, music only.
And then limit myself to only consuming educational content after that during the week.
Maybe it's just all the time.
No, because sometimes you got to watch fun shit on YouTube.
Come on.
Like maybe I save it for the weekends.
Okay.
So here's my YouTube rule.
Okay.
During the week, no YouTube before work is done.
And then once work is done, only educational content.
On the weekends only allowed to watch YouTube.
I can watch any YouTube I want, but I'm only going to allow myself to watch it once the
sun is down so that during the day, I'm forced to go and do something else.
Like I'm not going to allow myself to just rot inside all day and watch YouTube like
I enjoy to do a lot of times.
This is a personal rule.
For some of you, this might be too strict.
However, I think I need this rule because I think it'll be good for me.
Okay.
Now we have social media.
This is like Instagram.
This is like Reels.
This is like YouTube Shorts, which is weirdly more like social media.
This one's been the toughest one to have boundaries with.
And I'm starting to think I just need to have really rigid boundaries because I get so
addicted to social media more than most people, I think.
Like more than a lot of people I know, I really get sucked in where I just am like doom
scrolling on my explorer page on Instagram.
For like, I just have a horrible relationship with it.
And I think it's something I need to fix, something I need to work on.
I love Instagram as a platform.
In fact, I find a lot of inspiring things on there.
I find a lot of amazing things on there.
However, I have yet to build a healthy relationship with it.
So I think I need to go a more extreme route for now.
And I think that my extreme route is honestly, I think I only am going to post on it.
I think I'm going to post on it.
And I think when I post things, I can, you know, go and read comments and interact and
like, you know, enjoy that experience and maybe go and check in on people like some friends
on those days when I post and in those moments that I post, like maybe I give myself, you
know what it is?
Here's the rule.
Okay.
This sounds like I'm literally like a fucking mom, like giving rules for my toddler, but
here it is.
And I'm the top not only am I the mom, but I'm also the toddler.
Here's the rule.
I'm only going to allow myself to go on social media when I post.
And when I post, I said a 30 minute timer, a whole 30 minutes to do whatever I want.
I can go stock whoever the fuck I want.
Like it, it doesn't matter.
I can do whatever I want for that 30 minute period after I post.
But then once that 30 minute timer is up, I'm not going on it again.
And I think I have to be this extreme because I've been more lenient in the past and I just
find myself slipping into these routines where it's just like any down moment I have, I'm
on Instagram, I'm looking, I'm scrolling, I'm whatever.
And I just, it does not make me feel good.
I'm not strong enough to have a healthy relationship with it.
So I'm going to really give that a try.
I don't feel like I have any issues with like I don't have any issues with video games.
I feel like my alcohol consumption is pretty, it's pretty rare.
It's not rare necessarily what it's, it's once a week, once every two weeks, maybe on
a day on the weekend.
So I don't, I don't think I need to touch that.
So I think I'm good there.
I don't think there's anything else I need to like refrain from doing.
But rather, I think I need a few more rules for things that I need to do.
Like for example, I do think I need to read 10 pages of a book every day, minimum,
minimum.
And you know, I decided when I was writing this outline last night, I was like, you know,
I'm just going to stop going on social media now until I post, you know, like in less
I post.
So for the last 12 hours, I've been fighting, I've been like wanting to go on social
media so bad, like when I'm on the toilet, I just want to go on Instagram, I just want
to start looking at Reels.
But you know what I've been doing instead?
Going on the app, the book app on my phone in reading.
Now I'm not reading a full chapter, but I'm reading a book that I already had started
from like literally eight months ago.
And thank God I remember the plot.
I know what's happening.
So I just could jump back in.
But it kind of replaces it to like just read the book on the phone.
And I've tried that method before, but I fell off of it, of course.
But I don't think it's going to be hard for me to read 10 pages a day.
If I have nothing better to do when I'm on the toilet or I'm waiting in line at the dentist
office or I'm bored and bed and don't know what to do and have thought enough, you know,
like I think that that is realistic.
But I think it's a good goal too.
10 pages of a book a day.
I also think I need to start going outside more.
I think I need to be outside for 30 minutes a day.
I could work out there.
I could read a book out there.
I could go for a 30 minute walk.
It doesn't matter.
I do not go outside enough.
All of my work is indoors.
I'm on my computer.
I'm doing all the shit.
I'm not.
Now, even when I work out, like my exercise routines are all indoors.
I do indoor classes and things that sort.
So it's like, I just need to get my self outside for at least 30 minutes a day.
I think that would be really good for me.
OK.
So I think that that's sort of the rules.
And as I've been sort of talking this through with you, I'm realizing, I think that this
isn't a cleanse.
I think this is just, it starts today and I need to just fucking do it.
And I need to stop making excuses and I need to stop giving an end date and I need to stop
doing all these things because I really do think that this will benefit my life in so
many ways.
And I'm taking control of my internet addiction and here we are trying to better ourselves.
And I know I sound like a broken record because I've talked about this a lot of times before.
But I think that this is one of the hardest things to kick.
I really do.
And I hope that there are some of you out there who are like, oh my god, I'm dealing with
the same thing.
Maybe I'll do this too.
And I'll create my own set of rules and really get a handle on this shit.
So that's where I'm at.
I'll let you all know how it goes.
I sort of started yesterday and I did sort of fuck up this morning because I did watch.
It was at least educational, but I did watch something educational.
I was eating my breakfast.
But I want to stop doing that because I guess what?
I wasn't done with my work for the day yet.
And I started to get sucked down the YouTube rabbit hole where I was like, oh my god, I'm
watching this interesting stuff.
I want to watch more of this and that gets in the way of me getting my work started.
See what I'm saying?
So anyhow, I'll let you all know how it goes.
And this is something that we all are battling, I think.
And to stop the conversation is the less cringy option.
It's more cringy to continue to have this conversation because it feels so played out
and old and just done.
But I think it is an important conversation to have and here I am still having it.
So that's all I have for this week.
I hope that you all enjoyed working through that with me and discussing that with me.
If you did, new episodes of Anything Goes every Thursday and Sunday, you can follow
Anything Goes on Instagram at Anything Goes.
We're also on TikTok now.
If you want to find us, I'm not on TikTok, but Anything Goes is so you can find Anything
Goes on there.
You can follow me on Instagram at Emma Chamberlain or me on YouTube at Emma Chamberlain.
You can check out my coffee company, Chamberlain Coffee.
We might be in a store near you.
But if not, you can order us straight to your door.
And that's all I have for today.
Thank you all for listening.
I love you all.
I appreciate you all and I can't wait to talk to you in a few days.
I just adore all of you and I'm so grateful that you listen and hang out.
It's so much fun.
And that's all.
Okay, talk to you soon.
Love you, bye.
