Like it or not, the vast majority of us spend a fair old portion of our lives staring into a screen. Whether you work in an office, a school or live the freelance life, the brilliant white light from an array of different screens comes bouncing off your retinas on an almost hourly basis.
Even when we’re not at work, screen time is beginning to outweigh our non-screen time. One way you could reduce your own personal screen time significantly is by letting social10x.com help you with your social media.
It’s estimated that many people spend more time looking at a screen than they do sleeping in a 24 hour period. But if looking at a screen pays the bills, what are you supposed to do? Well, in addition to working with Social10x, there are a few things you can do in fact.
A Start
You can start by, well, not looking at a screen.
It’s easier than it sounds, and the benefits outweigh the initial struggle. Giving yourself regular breaks is the best way to achieve a reduction, as abstinence and amnesty just don’t work when your livelihood depends on tablets and Macs. One way to ensure you meet your target time away from the blinding light is to set an alarm to remind you to get up and go and seek some natural light. Turn the screen off if you must, there’s a button for that.
Invest
Updating your monitor is another way to reduce the effects, as many modern bezel monitors now feature technology that will help save your eyes from any potential damage. Whilst this is a feature that has been designed with marathon gamers in mind, the benefits are there for all, if you (or your boss) can justify the investment.
On a Budget
If you’re on a budget, you could try playing around with the brightness settings of your screen. This isn’t ideal for some uses, but for lengthy admin jobs and some writing activities you might want to see which settings work best for you. Don’t dim the shade too much though, or you’ll end up straining your eyes instead.
For the Kids
For kids, the effects of screen time aren’t just limited to potential damage to the eyes. Whilst studies are pretty primitive, conversationally most parents will tell a similar story. Going on the iPad can cause kids to get tetchy, affecting their moods in the most bizarre ways. Now, no one is suggesting that screens be banned from children, because that’s plainly ridiculous, as the modern world is theirs to inherit and their capabilities with contemporary technology are incredible to say the least, but moderation is key. Moderation is hard to preach when you don’t practice it yourself though, so make sure you’re prepared to forego coinmaster and Facebook in the evening times, if you want your children to give the Xbox a rest.
So that’s taking regular breaks, investing in new eye saving technology and using screens in moderation. All three are really good bits of advice for reducing the effects of screen time, but they’re a lot harder to implement than they sound. Not wanting to overwhelm anyone, let’s look at the typical day of a typical working man or woman and then compare that with the day of a typical child.
So the first thing most people do in the morning, is check their phone. They could be looking for the time, the weather or checking that they haven’t missed any breaking news overnight. It’s good to keep your finger on the pulse after all.
On the way to work it’s traffic and travel updates sandwiched in between a few rounds of Candy Crush.
At work, well, it’s 8 solid hours of screen time and then the reverse commute is spent staring into the abyss of social media and showbiz news. An evening of TV or games is followed by setting an alarm, on a smartphone screen obviously.
For a child, it’s only a few tweaks to the tale, as cartoons and YouTube might replace the weather and the FTSE100, but the bulk of the day is spent learning on iPads or computer monitors.
Yikes. It all adds up.
Now there’s no need to panic, but if you can make a few minor adjustments to limit the effects of the dreaded ‘screen time’, then you should go ahead and do it. Social10x can certainly reduce your screen time by getting you the hits, the likes and the followers that you’d have to spend hours on end searching for on your own.
Screens are the present and the future, there’s no denying that, but much like the old wives’ tale about getting square eyes from watching too much TV, there’s wisdom in leaving the screen alone every now and then. Turn it off. Go outside. It’ll be right where you left it when you need it.
