The idea to disable all your social media push notifications can be daunting.
How would you know instantly what is happening in your account right?
Of course, we can debate about the importance of being constantly up to date, (and I do talk about this in many other videos), but let’s focus now on that feeling of FOMO.
Let’s acknowledge that for the avid social media user it is hard to simply disable all the push notifications.
In a perfect world when one disables push notifications, the apps are rarely opened.
Why opening the app if your phone ceases to inform you about some activity that just took place right!?
Well…from experience I can say disabling push notifications can result in opening the app a lot more (initially).
Because of that FOMO, you will constantly check the app to scan any activities you might have missed.
Now instead of the phone notifying you, you have to get active to find out.
So disabling notifications is unfortunately not the perfect solution that ends any form of social media or phone addiction abruptly.
To end these impulsive “I need to check my apps again!” actions, I also suggest setting alarms every 30 minutes in the evening for example.
So once the notifications are disabled, you set the alarm which allows you to check your apps when it goes off.
30 minutes will initially feel like 2 hours because of that FOMO but remain patient! That alarm will go off.
This strategy only applies to checking your missed notifications speedily.
If you stay on your device for the next 30 minutes, well…then setting the alarm for every 30 minutes will be pointless.
Just check what you have missed in your popular apps and lock your device again after a maximum of 5 minutes.
You can start with 1 social media app first before disabling the push notifications of all your installed social media apps.
From there on slowly increase 30 minutes to one hour or 2 hours for example.
Train the skill of patience.
Acknowledge that you really want to go for your phone.
That’s okay and understandable.
You have unwittingly programmed yourself to run for your phone.
After acknowledging that feeling, reshift by explaining to yourself that it won’t take long before that alarm goes off and why you have disabled those notifications in the first place:
Because you want to reduce your screen use.
Show your device who’s really in charge.