Photo by Josiah Weaver on Unsplash

I’ve seen many people devote themselves completely to work. They stay late, constantly check messages, and let their jobs define their lives. Even outside working hours, their conversations and relationships often revolve around what they do for a living.

Unfortunately, society tends to praise this behavior. We call such people “always available” or say things like “You can always count on him — no matter if it’s 5 a.m. or 11 p.m., he’ll reply right away.”

But the truth is, we don’t live to work — we work to live. Work is a means to build a life, not the other way around. We work to earn enough to live well, to spend time with loved ones, to rest, to explore, and to grow beyond our professions.

So next time you find yourself answering messages late at night, pause for a moment and ask yourself: Am I living to work, or working to live?

If you open YouTube, Instagram, or any other social network, you’ll notice countless posts comparing things — trying to decide which one is “the best.” You’ll see titles like “AirPods Killer,” “Garmin vs. Apple Watch,” or “The Best Gaming Laptop.”

But here’s the truth: none of these really matter, because your life is probably very different from the person who created those posts.

People have different expectations and needs. For one person, a simple non-smart watch might be perfect. For another — say, an ultra runner — a smartwatch with long battery life and advanced tracking might be essential.

The sad part is that many of these videos are not created to help you. Their real goal is to keep you watching — because that’s how their creators get paid.

So, instead of asking “Which one is the best?”, maybe we should ask: “Which one works best for me?”

The best one is always the one that fits your life — not someone else’s.

Image by Dmitriy from Pixabay

Last week I wrote about the fact that people were more productive when we moved from wired connections to wireless.

Besides the distraction that wireless devices can create, being wired has other implications:

• When you’re wired, you have a specific location for doing something.
• When you’re wired, there’s no sitting on the sofa with your laptop while watching TV.
• When you’re wired, you can’t take your phone or tablet to bed — which ultimately leads to better sleep.
• When you’re wired, you need to move more throughout the day to get your day-to-day stuff done, which helps you burn more calories and stay more active.

When you read productivity books, they all emphasize that to be productive, one should focus on a few key things:

• Focus on one thing at a time -> from “Deep Work” by Cal Newport
• Avoid distractions -> from “Indistractable” by Nir Eyal
• Get a good amount of sleep -> from “Why We Sleep” by Matthew Walker
• Be more active throughout the day -> from “Atomic Habits” by James Clear

You see, just by being wired, one can naturally live a better, more productive life.

I was talking with my wife the other day and told her I was way more productive when I had a desktop PC. When I think about it, my current laptop is far more powerful than my old PC, but simply because I was wired, I was able to achieve more when I used it.

Looking back, I was probably among the last software engineers to buy a laptop. I stayed loyal to my desktop PC for a very long time. Before turning 23, I had a PC and a phone that could only call or text people. The phone barely had a camera. I often feel I was far more productive back then. When I talk about it with others, they say it’s because I was younger and had more energy.

That might be true, but I believe there was also a connection between simplicity and productivity. I think we had a much better life when electronic devices were wired. There was a LAN cable — an RJ45 — that connected the home’s PC to the internet. Anyone who wanted to go online had to enter a separate room, sit behind a specific desk, and use that one computer.

Back then, everything had its place. Nowadays, everything is mobile. You can use your computer while sitting at the dining table, in a coffee shop, or on a train. You can access YouTube directly from your TV and spend endless hours watching videos designed to keep you watching. Instead of visiting a bookstore, you can buy any book with just a few clicks. Instead of going to the cinema with friends or loved ones, movies and shows are only a few buttons away — I’ve even seen people watching entire series while exercising at the gym. Instead of spending time with friends and family, everyone is on their phone, even when they’re sitting next to each other.

Some might argue that these are actually good things — that life has become easier and more convenient. And yes, that’s true. But while technology has made our lives easier, it has also made us less human.

You can already see how robotic we’ve become. Walk through any city centre around 6 p.m., when people are heading home from work. It doesn’t matter which city you’re in — many people wear noise-cancelling headphones, eyes glued to their phones. They barely speak to anyone. They prefer to stay in their own little worlds.

Photo by Hugh Han on Unsplash

The side effects of such behaviour are now surfacing. In his book The Anxious Generation, Jonathan Haidt shows how social media has had a devastating effect on young people, especially teenagers. According to studies cited in the book, phone-based childhoods have led to significantly higher suicide rates. Among girls, the rate has increased by 167%, and among boys by 91% between 2010 and 2021.

The main reasons, as Haidt explains, are:

• Rise of smartphones and social media
• Decline in real-world social interaction
• Overprotection in the physical world, underprotection online
• Sleep issues and constant stimulation

To break this dangerous cycle, many scientists and productivity advocates suggest practical ways to control our device use.

For example, one idea is to plug your phone into its charger as soon as you get home — in a specific place, ideally far from where you usually sit with your family. That way, when you need to check something or answer a call, you have to walk there and back. As a result, you won’t have your phone with you at the dinner table or during family time.

Another useful approach is to remove social media apps from your phone and check them only on your computer. Ideally, we should return to the time when we met people in person and socialised face to face.

Conclusion and Some Recommendations

Of course, we can’t return to those earlier times, but we can adjust our lives to take advantage of both the wired and wireless worlds. Here are a few recommendations:

Use your phone only for:

• Calls
• Texts (such as WhatsApp or Telegram)
• Two-factor authentication and mobile banking
• Taking photos and notes

Avoid using your phone for:

• Social media of any kind (including WhatsApp or Telegram channels you follow)

Practical tips:

• Set a timer to limit phone use to one hour a day (excluding calls).
• Go to a cinema instead of watching Netflix or other streaming services.
• Try not to listen to music while commuting — listen to the sounds of life instead.
• Listen to music when you actually want to listen to music.
• Don’t combine things. When focusing on a task, focus only on that — even if it means turning off the music.
• Connect with people physically whenever possible, not just virtually.

A lot of people reflect on what they’ve done, either daily or weekly. I’m one of them. Every morning, I write down three things I want to accomplish that day—sometimes on paper, sometimes in a text file—and try to check them off throughout the day. Most days, I manage to complete them, but there are also days when I don’t, which is absolutely normal.

A few weeks ago, I realized that I hadn’t completed most of the tasks I had written down for the day. When I looked back at the entire week, I noticed the same pattern! I was confused because, by the evening, I was so exhausted that I couldn’t do anything else. My energy had to be going somewhere else. So, I decided to track how I was spending my time each day, writing down everything I did for a few days. That’s when I noticed something interesting:

For the past three weeks, I had been spending a significant amount of time following a political figure. My interest in Future Studies had led me to discover this person, whose job is in that field. I started watching almost all their videos on YouTube and scrolling through their content on social media platforms like Instagram and X. Thanks to social media personalization and recommendation algorithms, I was introduced to even more figures in the same space, and I began watching their videos as well. After a week, I realized that most of my time was being consumed by this, which explained why I was so drained by the end of the day.

Sometimes, instead of writing a to-do list, we should write a “not-to-do” list. Here’s an example:

• Don’t check social media today.
• Don’t follow the news today.
• Don’t eat sugar today.
• Don’t drink today.

Achievement isn’t always about doing more—it can also be about avoiding the things that drain your time and energy. If you don’t check social media, you’ll have more time for things that actually matter.