The Year of Getting Off Your Phone

Some principles, some practices, and a bit of inspiration for the digitally exhausted.

We pick up our phones 150 times per day on average.

Three out of four Australians check social media as soon as they wake up. Four out of five check it before they go to bed.

These ‘micromoments’ add up – the ways we choose (consciously or not) to spend our time shape us. Many of us find ourselves dissatisfied in the ‘relationship’ we have with our phones, and wanting to make a change. But breaking up is hard!

In this first episode of Life & Faith for 2026, we consider the forces at work when it comes to our digital habits, why we might choose to reduce our phone use, and how.

Simon, Justine, and Natasha confess and compare their daily average screen time. Felicia Wu Song, author of Restless Devices: Recovering Personhood, Presence, and Place in the Digital Age, describes the ‘digital ecology’ we inhabit and the ‘liturgies’ we participate in – and proposes some practices, or ‘counterliturgies’, that might help us move in a different direction. Plus, a bunch of people who’ve taken various steps to get off their phones tell a remarkably consistent story about why they did it, and how it’s changed their lives.

More and more of us are joining the ranks of the ‘digitally exhausted’, and looking for a better way forward. If you want it to be, this is the year of getting off your phone.

Explore:

Felicia Song’s book Restless Devices: Recovering Personhood, Presence, and Place in the Digital Age