As my 30-day digital declutter comes to an end I've been thinking a lot about how I want to bring back certain digital technologies into my life in a way that supports my values.

As silly and harmless as it may sound, podcasts are my Achilles heel.

I can listen to interesting and smart people talk for hours. Before this challenge I would listen to 2-3 hours of podcast every day while doing other activites, most of which I would find through a YouTube algorithm.

While podcasts are relatively harmless when compared to something like doomscrolling, I still felt hesitation bringing them back into my life after seeing the results of the declutter.

During the declutter I didn't have the easy option of consuming podcasts and videos when I got bored so I had to find other ways to spend my time. I had already built a solid habit of reading for an hour a day so reading more become the new default. As the days went on, my hunger for reading increasingly grew.

In fact, towards the end of the month my appetite for books had grown to close to four hours a day. By the end of the declutter I had finished reading seven and a half books, three plays of Shakespeare, and filled three pocket-sized notebooks with excerpts, quotes, and summaries of my readings.

The total was over 2000 pages of reading.

What's more is that because I wasn't listening to podcasts inbetween readings or while doing tedious tasks, my mind would often think about what I had just read allowing me to explore the ideas deeper before jumping over to the next piece of content. I felt like I could remember more of what I was reading and like I could connect the dots better because there was space in my head that would normally have been filled with the voices of conversation.

That being said, podcasts can and have added value to my life in the past. For one, they often lead me to new ideas and authors. I also use podcasts for research purposes and to deepen my understanding of ideas. One of my favorite things to do is to listen to a podcast of an author I just read to hear them speak with some more nuance about the topics. It helps round out my understanding.

So I wanted to bring them back into my life in a way that didn't interrupt my newfound appreciation for solitude time. Some rules had to be written:

I will only listen to podcasts while driving or cleaning.

This rule builds in some natural limits to my desire to consume podcasts all day.

Driving time is limited enough that I can't over consume podcasts while also keeping in tact the valuable head space that I've found to be so beneficial during walks, cooking meals, and exercise. Cleaning is a tedious chore that I want to be more consistently doing so I think using podcasts as an incentive to clean more might help balance the scales.

I'll monitor it and see how it goes.

All podcasts must be chosen ahead of time from a curated list.

Like I mentioned earlier, most of the podcasts I used to listen to were recommended to me by an algorithm on YouTube. The problem is the algorithm knows me too well and is really good at surfacing me content that can derail my plans but I also want to benefit from that surfacing.

The solution I'm going to try is to create a buffer between discovery and consumption by creating a podcast list much like you might create a movie watch list or something of the sort.

If I come across something that looks interesting I'll add it to my running list and allow for some time to pass for listening to it.

The key for me is to only listen to podcasts that were previously added to the list and avoid anything that I just discovered. That way I can avoid the dopamine-driven impulse to chase novelty and be more intentional about which podcasts I listen to which is more important now than ever now because of the natural built in limits of how much I can consume.

I'll probably keep this list in my bullet journal because you know I like a good handwritten list.

No more YouTube on my phone.

Before this declutter I had YouTube premium on my phone, mostly just to listen to podcasts. But like I said, that algortihm is too damn good. So I've decided to keep the YouTube app off of my phone to avoid any urge to check in and see what's out there.

I will still browse YouTube on my desktop to discover new podcasts to add to me list.

Otherwise, I will only listen to podcast on the Podcast app to avoid any derailing situations caused by a properly enticing video.

A system for intentional consumption.

So what we have here are clear rules structuring my use of a technology that used to be midly problematic for me in a way that supports my current values.

There are specific times of use in place, a method for choosing that avoids my tendency towards novelty, and a hard barrier on the algorithm's ability to capture my attention.

That, for me, was the whole point of the declutter: to see what life could look like without digital technologies that had a tendency to consume my attention and to reintegrate those digital technologies back into my life in a way that is good for me and my values.

You could adapt a system like this to most media sources such as movies, television shows, and even books if you feel like your consumption patterns have become imbalanced. It's probably is less effective for the forms of media that involve scrolling through an infinite feed. Those require much stronger guardrails.

I will eventually write a full recap of the declutter but for now, I've got some cleaning and podcasts to catch up on.

Prompt:

What's your digital Achilles' heel? What do you think you are missing out on because of it? What do you gain by using it?