Shadowing Practice: The persistent struggle to undo screen addiction | 60 Minutes Australia - Learn English Speaking with Video
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Actually, you know what
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Jess, it just dawned on me.
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My phone just vibrated in my pocket.
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Oh no!
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You're gonna have to get rid of it.
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Is that bad?
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Yeah, it is bad.
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I can't have it in my pocket?
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Well, I mean, it's gonna...
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I mean, actually I have mine too.
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We'll both get rid of ours.
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Ah.
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Let's both get rid of ours.
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So why should we get rid of it?
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Why can't we just have it on silent in our pockets?
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Because you're gonna be thinking about it.
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Because it's gonna shorten our conversation.
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Your body, your brain knows it's there.
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And so even though we're talking, a little bit of you,
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a piece of you is going to always be wondering what's happening in that other world that lives in your pocket.
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Is it really that bad?
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Because I'm looking forward to chatting to you about all this stuff.
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But I would really be distracted even more the momentarily.
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Oh yeah, yeah.
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This takes up all the space in our room, in a room, in our brains.
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And we've been conditioned.
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We're kind of like Pavlov's dogs.
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Like even if it's not in our sight, we know it's there and there's, you know, kids, people, friends,
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work, always chomping at the bit in your phone waiting to get your attention.
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So it's much better if it's off your body
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and out of sight and then you can be really present with me and really focus and not feel that anxiety.
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Okay, perfect.
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Do you feel a little anxiety right now?
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I'm thinking about what's in my phone.
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Yeah, yeah. Of course.
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Is that just because I've drawn attention to it or is
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that just a sign that I might have a bit of an issue?
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I think it's a sign.
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I do.
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Yeah, you can start testing that after we talk.
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Well, let's rewind to the start before you found the light, so to speak.
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Yeah.
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What was personal and professional life like for you when you were, I guess, consumed by tech like most of us?
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Yeah, so I was a digital brand strategist just as all these companies
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and platforms were starting to get so big that brands and corporations could no longer ignore it.
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I was a traditional marketer.
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I sold billboard advertising, ads in newspapers.
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And so I was able to speak the language of the C -suite in a way
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that was very comfortable and traditional to them as this new media was coming onto the stage.
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And so when it could no longer be ignored, I started saying, hey, we have to set up this Facebook page
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or you have to set a budget to actually hire someone to help run these things.
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And it made it so that they were open to this conversation.
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I mean, you have to remember back then, it was like the Wild West.
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People thought that this was just like a flash in the pan or something that just college kids did.
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But very quickly, it was where all the eyeballs migrated to.
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So the brands and businesses had to go there, too.
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I didn't plan to have this career.
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I didn't want to have this career.
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It was kind of like the perfect timing, right?
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That I was the right age to understand this new media,
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and I had the skill set to talk to the C -suite about why they could no longer ignore it.
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So next thing you know, I was, you know, setting up these profiles for these businesses and then running it for them.
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Today, a Facebook page for one of your favorite brands is run by an agency, you know, with million dollar contracts with 20,
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30 people working on it to create content and answer customer service.
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Back then, it was me.
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And I was expected to do it 24 -7 because the internet was 24 -7.
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So a CEO or a CMO, knowing that I was the main point of contact for Twitter or,
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God, there was Vine or YouTube or the Facebook page, they wanted to make sure that it was always being monitored.
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And this was before the backlash of, you know, a little bit of American work -life balance.
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So it was at two in the morning, if my phone dinged, I was supposed to respond.
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How often were you on your phone?
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Genuinely 24 -7?
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24 -7.
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24 -7.
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And I hated it.
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But it was also, you know, my job.
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And I was good at my job.
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And I was proud of, you know, the accolades and the things that I was able to do for these companies.
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And it was also fun, too.
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Like, I don't want to lie about that.
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Most people would see what you've just described as life success.
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Were you happy and fulfilled?
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Yeah, I mean,
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yes and no. You get older and you realize what matters and so I was proud that I was winning these awards.
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I was, you know, 40 under 40.
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My clients were winning Webby Awards and Edison Awards
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and we were going to all the best conferences in New York City
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and giving talks
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and I was able to then parlay this into a big consulting thing where I could go in
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and work with these people at a very high level
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and help them go viral on the internet and hire celebrities to do our, you know...
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really fun idea for this series on YouTube.
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And so it was fun.
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I had a lot of trust in me.
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I didn't have a lot of gatekeeping and the internet was just more fun back then, right?
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There wasn't the things that are happening today.
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At the same time, I was becoming really exhausted, burnt out, ignoring familial responsibilities.
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I would find myself, this one time, I went out with a bunch of girlfriends
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that were in town for this really special occasion who I hadn't seen in like 10 years.
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And I caught myself excusing myself to go to the bathroom several times to look at my phone
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because I still had the etiquette to know not to take my phone out.
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I didn't want them to know I was ignoring them, but I couldn't stop myself from thinking about this responsibility that I had.
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So I just kept going to the bathroom and they asked me
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if there was something that I needed to talk about if I had gotten a new habit, right?
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Like if there was a drug problem or a bathroom problem, which is so embarrassing.
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It was just a phone problem.
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Yeah.
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Did that dawn on you that
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that was sort of akin to an addiction at the time or is this something that you're realizing in retrospect?
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I realized it at a very specific point but no at
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that time it felt um
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it felt like very like self -assured like this is what
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i do this is my job like i'm very important right um a little bit to do with age um obviously
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to do with you know our own personal things right
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so i had something to prove right to certain people in my life
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and i did but that doesn't equate happiness and success i don't think now you know, I realized that.
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But no, for me, the moment I realized it was an addiction was
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when all of my devices were taken away from me against my will by my family very unexpectedly.
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And the response that my body had had to that and my brain had had to that was when I started to,
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after the fact, realize, oh, this is like an actual problem.
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That's fascinating because Because obviously this for a lot of people is insidious.
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People don't realize.
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But for you, what was that turning point?
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So I was going on vacation to Hawaii.
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I'm surprised to hear you were going on vacation.
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I was very excited.
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It was my first time going.
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I had my toddler with me.
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We were going for a wedding.
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And like I said, I started consulting.
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So I had 15 different clients.
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And of course, I told, hired someone to take care of things while I was gone, told everyone I was going on vacation,
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but that I would be available the whole time.
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Of course you did.
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Right?
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And I got on the plane and there was no
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Wi -Fi, which was horrifying for someone like myself.
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I'll tell that.
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You get it, right?
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You get so conditioned to these things.
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And so instead of texting my mother
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that I was going to be unavailable for the 12 -hour flight i texted 15 clients
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that i was going to be unavailable for the 12 -hour flight
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and just so you understand of like where i was at at
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that point in life
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and as soon as we got off the plane um my
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husband at the time had hired um paid for the lay
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when you get there right they come over they put the lay on you
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and it's like welcome to hawaii and they were attempting to do
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that and i was on my phone trying to connect to the Wi -Fi to let my clients know
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that I had landed.
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Oh, dude.
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And he turned around and he looked at me and he basically said in so many words, I'm not doing this with you.
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Like this costs a lot of money.
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People wait their whole lives to come to Hawaii.
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I will buy you a plane ticket and you can go back home or you'll give me all your devices.
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And like at the time, like there's no such thing as a digital detox or a, you know, tech intervention or anything.
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It was just I was being a bad family member, you know, a bad wife, a bad mother.
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Of course, in that moment, I was super angry.
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I don't know if you've ever done an intervention with an addict on anything, but there's a lot of emotions that come with that.
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I'm fascinated you called yourself an addict.
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Now, but I didn't know it, right?
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Even still today I am, you know.
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But so it was all these emotions.
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First anger and then shame and then crying.
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And eventually one by one, I handed them over.
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He did give me permission to say, to send out that I'm no longer available for this vacation.
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And if you need to get a hold of me, you can contact my husband.
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What was that like to send?
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It was weird, but like it was one of those moments in your personal life where you know
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you just have to like do what you're supposed to do.
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You have to do the right thing.
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And so this was like that was it.
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And I can remember walking out from the airport and getting to where we were staying and looking at everything.
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And I was looking at it and thinking how beautiful this is
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but I was so nervous and so anxious
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and just telling myself like just be present just be with your family
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it's going to be okay it's like you're going off at cold turkey oh yeah no I totally was
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and I had no idea that I was going to do
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that um but the reason this is so important is because
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eight days later and I don't even think I've really told you yet
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but like prior to this I I was feeling
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so unwell in my brain that I had been going to see all these different doctors.
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Cognitively, I couldn't grasp words anymore.
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I was having this brain fog that wouldn't lift.
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There was this general sense of malaise and disassociation that I couldn't put my finger on.
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This had been going on for about a year, and no one could tell me what it was.
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And so when I went on this vacation and my husband made me turn over all of my devices,
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eight days later it was as if somebody had turned a switch back on in my brain, like reboot.
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Fully the brain that I had loved and known my whole life was back.
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And it was astonishing because I knew, yes, I was on a vacation and that's lovely and you get rest and relaxation.
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But what it was was that I didn't have the constant pings and dings happening and communication through screens.
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Even as we're sitting here talking, I can see one of our phones lighting up over there.
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What have we done?
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It's like now taking my attention.
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That's interesting.
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Oh dear.
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So you were forgetting words.
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I mean, how old were you at this point?
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31, 32 years old.
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So just into your 30s.
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Yeah, there was no reason.
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No reason for my brain to have operated like that.
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And whatever they had said, like, maybe you're not getting enough vitamin D.
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Maybe you're not getting enough nutrients, right?
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You're not getting enough sleep.
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I had my hormones tested.
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I did anything that they requested, and nothing made it better.
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So, no, like, I think of this one very specific moment.
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My job was to present to a huge corporation.
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We flew out there.
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The room was filled with, like, you know, 15, 20 people
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and I'm up there with the big board explaining why they
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have to spend millions upon millions of dollars on this campaign that we had crafted.
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And I had to say the word hanger, and I could not find the word.
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And I'm talking for like a good 15, 20 seconds, which is very long when you're supposed to be giving a presentation.
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So I said, the sticks you put clothes on, the sticks you hang clothes on.
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And that was when I was like, this is not normal.
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And it happened all the time and more progressively as time went on.
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The challenge you've got with that or anyone has with this is it's not a diagnosis, is it?
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So I'm sure doctors weren't telling you you had digital dementia.
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No. It couldn't have been attributed to something else.
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They, you know, maybe it could have been baby brain, right?
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But that would have happened, you know, a year or two prior.
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That's why we checked the hormones.
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It could be just classic burnout, right, of running 24 -7.
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But for me, this felt really different than any other time in my life that I had been exhausted.
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At 32 years old, you've stayed up late.
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You've burned the candle at both ends.
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I've done all of that.
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I know what that feels like.
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This was entirely different.
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This was cognition.
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This was my brain.
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And it was operating in a way that I had never experienced before
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and to feel like you're losing your mind a little bit is terrifying.
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So take me back to the contrast then when you've been experiencing that.
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Yeah.
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I mean, how long were you experiencing that?
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About a year, year and a half that I was trying to find answers to what was going on.
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And doctors weren't telling you much at all?
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No, I mean, just the things that I had said.
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So then you're on vacation.
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Eight days it takes you.
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Yeah.
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What was that point, that light bulb moment where you've gone, oh dear.
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I woke up like that one morning.
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So eight days to me is significant, at least as Americans.
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The average vacation is always less than seven days.
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I'm so sorry.
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I know, I know.
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We're so jealous of you all.
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But it was eight days, and it was that eighth day I woke up.
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I woke up without an alarm, like just...
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Very calm, very aware.
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It was like all of my senses had been turned up to 100.
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When I talk about it, I say like I can still feel the sheets.
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Like I just became hyper aware of how the sheets felt.
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And then there was a rooster crowing and I noticed the rooster.
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And then I could smell the salts from the ocean that I hadn't really taken notice of.
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And all of that was really interesting.
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I was like, oh God, I feel great.
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What is this? maybe it's just vacation right?
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I was going to say that.
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Are you just rested or are you just not distracted in a very general sense or is that strange addiction?
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It could have been just that except for I picked up I had brought a journal with me.
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I'm a writer at heart right
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that's what I always wanted to do is kind of how I ended up in
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that career and I started to journal
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and the words once I started to use my brain just started coming out with no issues whatsoever
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and I wrote a note to myself in there
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and I still have it
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and it says you know basically like what is different besides the view
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and you and I wrote you already know the answer it's your lack of technology use
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and so I played with this for the rest of the vacation
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because I was still there for like another I was there for 14 days
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and I started to notice how my words were coming to me the memories
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that I was making the memories I could recall all these things that I was struggling with with,
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being able to recount exactly what we had done the day before.
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Because honestly, if you had asked me what I had done for lunch yesterday, I would not have been able to tell you at the time.
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It was that severe.
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So I joked that my brains were scrambled eggs, right?
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I couldn't tell you what I had for breakfast.
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I had to make fun of it because I was so scared I had to make a joke about it.
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But the interesting thing is when I came back to New York and I started to look for research on this,
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there was nothing, like nothing existed.
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And I did find a couple studies on people that were starting to look into this.
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So I was like, okay, if this is really what it is, then I need to protect myself until science catches up, until researchers catch up.
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And I started to put my computer to the side
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and return to pen and paper and make these changes
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that I thought would be like how I used to operate and how my brain used to operate.
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But my clients weren't having it.
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Exactly.
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Is that realistic?
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It's not.
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No, no. This world is all about tech.
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It is all about tech and that's when I quit all my clients and made the shift to,
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you know, telling this story to the general population and advocating for change around technology.
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Was that immediate?
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What?
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Was that immediate for you?
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How long since the vacation did you go, I'm out, I'm done?
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I went back and I took a couple meetings with a few different clients that all said the same thing.
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I said, I'm just, you know, I'm going to close my computer.
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I'm going to take notes by hand.
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One said, you're a digital strategist.
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Can you please to open up the Twitter feed.
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It's almost a fair point.
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I understand. And so I quit.
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It was about three weeks later.
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Wow, that quickly?
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Yeah.
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You just had enough.
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Well, I also was terrified of my brain going back to what it was, right?
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I finally felt well.
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And so was I going to feel unwell to continue receiving accolades and making this money, or could I do something else?
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And the biggest thing for me was I didn't have a computer growing up.
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I didn't get my first cell phone until I was 20.
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I'm from the Adirondacks here, so I'm like a super hippie offline girl, right?
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Like Fridays we'd get out of school and we'd go hiking.
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Like that was my life.
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And I became this addicted this quickly.
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And like I don't even like technology.
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So what's going to happen to my two -year -old, right?
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And once I thought about that, I was like, no, I don't want this for him.
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And maybe I can use all of these skills
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and my sort of like insider's knowledge and my own lived experience to say, hey, this doesn't have to happen to these kids.
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And so, yeah, it was pretty instantaneous.
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I'm also a little, I'm not risk averse.
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So, you know, I kind of like to put my life through a cheese grater every once in a while.
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So I made the jump and I'm really glad for that.
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But back to your question about how do I know it was the tech?
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Because now, that was 2013, my brain changes based off of usage.
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I can literally almost document it.
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So the more that I'm on, so let's say I had a book come out a few years ago.
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I obviously had to be on my computer more in the promotion of it.
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I had to be accessible to answer emails with publicists and things like that.
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I could literally feel my brain changing back to forgetting things, being...
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not of this space is kind of how I describe it.
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It's like you're here, but you're not here.
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And I had to tell my editor
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that I was going to step back from responding to all of these and if their team could just do it,
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which is a place of privilege at this point.
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I understand that, that not everybody has gotten this far in their career to be able to have someone support them to step away, right?
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That's going to be the new luxury in the future is those that can afford to not use their phones.
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Absolutely.
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This is why it's really important to speak to you because we haven't diagnosed this.
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There's so many terms, brain fog, brain rot, screen addiction, distraction, all these things.
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Can you explain more in detail as you're documenting it what you're feeling, what you're seeing, what's happening in your brain?
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Yeah, yeah.
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Yeah, I would say the most noticeable thing for me is the inability to find the appropriate words.
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And that one usually comes after you've experienced all the other things, right?
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That fog, that where hours disappear or days disappear where this sort of, I call it like malaise,
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where you feel not sick, but not well.
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There's just this like, ugh, that happens.
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And then this inability to stay present or focus your attention on any one thing.
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You know, back when I kind of fell face first into this career, being able to multitask was like the biggest badge of honor.
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The more you could multitask, the better you were.
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But that's actually really, really bad for our brains and really bad for remembering things and not making mistakes.
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And so, yeah, like even right now as I'm talking, I can feel myself like, you know, trying to you lose your place, right?
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So I would say for me it followed that path of fog,
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malaise, a little bit of depression kind of starts in there and then it was really the memory.
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The memory loss and the word recall.
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So it still happens from time to time?
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Oh yeah, yeah.
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It's much better but again it follows my usage.
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Was it a work addiction or a screen addiction?
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Work.
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Definitely work for me.
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So when I give talks, I'll tell people, you know, digital detox is not the answer, but it's a way into understanding your triggers.
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So if you take everything away for a set period of time, when you return to it,
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you kind of see what's the thing that you miss the most?
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What's the thing you keep going to look for or to touch?
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For me, it's always been email, which shows you that that's how I became in contact with these.
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And even today as I've, you know, left all of that behind
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and recreated this other world where I'm an activist and an artist and trying to help future generations,
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I recreated the same problem at one point with, I had a media brand called Folk Rebellion.
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It was a very early days digital wellness movement.
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And this is why I left and I started this using
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that branding to get people to have this conversation because you have to remember back in 2013 -14, everybody wanted to be Mark Zuckerberg.
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Everybody wanted their kids to be Mark Zuckerberg.
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To question this was crazy.
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So I had to create this sort of counterculture cool lifestyle around
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it to get people to even think about challenging the idea of technology.
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and it took off like gangbusters and I was flying all over the world
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and giving these talks and people were buying my newspapers
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and I had these t -shirts that say wonder where the wi -fi is weak
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and things like that but I recreated the same problem
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which was I became addicted just now this time with this altruistic mission
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I've learned my lesson how difficult was it doing that at
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that time though let's remember this was during the onset of social media
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and technology really did anyone really believe you at all i would say i don't want to be vindicated but
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this was like one of those times where i get emails all the time
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and messages and letters in the mail saying you were right i didn't want to be right um
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but no at the time most people kind of chalked
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it up as like a tinfoil hat wearing you know hippy dippy movement and You know,
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I would have people, like when I would give these talks that they would, at the end, during the Q &A,
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really hardcore challenge me, almost to the point of being rude.
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And it would take a couple years, but I'd get like a letter in the mail or an email and saying, I saw you talk.
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I was the one who asked this question.
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I wasn't ready to hear it yet.
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Because again, you're talking about something that is so personal and likely addicting that people just couldn't.
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They didn't want to.
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And I was really early and not because I wanted to be.
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It just was all by chance.
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And therefore, I became like the canary in the coal mine for biologically what happens to us.
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So, I mean, I say that it was really hard for me to be one of the only ones having the conversation.
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There was a handful of other people at the same time doing the same thing.
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There was one podcast.
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I mean, we're all still friends and we're all in the same community and it's wild to see what's happened.
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But there was also a large group of people
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that were feeling the same way I was and they started to find me.
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And so we built this community of like, you know, 150 ,000 rebels is what I called it.
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These were people that signed up for newsletters and things like that,
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that wanted alternative stories and content and information that what they were feeling was likely a little bit true.
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So it did become popular.
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And then you had Apple and Google launching their own digital wellness initiatives.
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And everyone's calling me saying, you see this?
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And I'm like, they don't mean it.
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They don't mean it.
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It's all fake.
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But yes, it feels good that at least we're talking about this.
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I'm glad you brought that up.
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Why have you called yourself a bullshit artist?
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Ah, yes.
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That's a great question.
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I learned really early on through work how to influence people.
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And have you ever read the book, my brain, see?
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There you go.
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Yeah, there you go.
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Brain fog, brain rock.
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Hopefully fog, not rock.
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Exactly.
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Brain fog, I would say on that one.
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Oh my God, I can't even think of it.
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You know the book I'm talking about.
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I actually don't.
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How to Win Friends and Influence People.
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Ah, I've heard of that one.
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Okay.
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Very popular book.
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I read this at a job that I had when I was 17, 18 years old.
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And at another job that I had at 19, it was a personality.
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We learned about different personalities and we were able to slot people into four different groups.
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So if you were to walk into the room, I could kind of size you up almost instantly within a couple conversations,
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very short, and understand you were this type, this type, this type, or this type.
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And based off of that, I knew how to make you feel comfortable so
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that I could then sell you what it was I was trying to sell you.
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Now, this is a bad thing.
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I wrote my book about how I feel bad about knowing these things and doing these things,
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but I actually think that there is an important skill set in all of this,
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of being able to have conversations and influence people in a positive way.
453
And so that's kind of what I look to do now with my work.
454
But when the internet became a thing, I realized that what I did, you know, person to person in,
455
say, a sales room, I was able to do online.
456
And I was able to influence people and pull these mechanisms mostly through story.
457
But I understood how data worked and I understood how the internet worked.
458
I was not one of these engineers, but I know about the thousand engineers and what they're doing
459
and what they're studying to be able to get you to click on this or to buy this or to watch this.
460
So that's kind of why I called myself a bullshit artist because, you know, it is all bullshit.
461
And, you know, I regret some of the things that I did,
462
especially helping usher in this wave of marketing, creating online communities, right?
463
Online communities that care about you it's just a place to sell.
464
Social media, is that one?
465
Yeah, exactly.
466
But if I didn't have that experience,
467
I wouldn't have the knowledge nor the skill set to be able to do the work that I do today.
468
And I think that for anyone out there who also feels a little bit of that, whether, you know, whatever they do in work,
469
like what can you take from it and how can you pivot to something better?
470
And I think we're all experiencing that in our world now.
471
Are you making amends?
472
Yes, I am.
473
Oh, I say my book was an apology letter right up front.
474
Yes.
475
Well look, I'm glad we threw my phone away because I would dread the thought of looking at my screen time.
476
Honestly, I think sometimes it's around about eight hours.
477
It's atrocious, isn't it?
478
Yeah, yeah.
479
But that's life.
480
That is the world we still live in.
481
Currently.
482
So I'm very curious, what does a day in the life of Jess Elefante look like now?
483
So for me, I'm an addict and I have to set buckets of time away from this stuff.
484
I have to set up every control I can.
485
Controls, they don't work.
486
They just kind of make you feel worse.
487
The things that really work for me is a return to physical anything.
488
That means I try not to take Zooms.
489
I try to have in -person meetings, even though I loved work from home when it first became a thing.
490
But now it's becoming detrimental to my health and to my connections and relationships.
491
I try not to read on my phone.
492
I don't read articles.
493
I don't read books.
494
I subscribe to as many paper publications, physical publications as I can.
495
I love media.
496
I'm a media girl.
497
I don't love what's happening to media.
498
I don't love what's considered media in our new social media world, so I'm actually spending money in places where I think it's important too.
499
I have physical music.
500
I have returned to cameras instead of my phone,
501
and all of these things like together is allowing me space away from this thing
502
that is a necessary evil in my life.
503
I have tried every dumb phone known to man.
504
Yeah, Nokia flip phone?
505
Oh, I've tried them all.
506
I have quit my iPhone six times.
507
This is an ongoing joke with my oldest son who's 14 now and he says, oh she can't stick with anything.
508
And I say it's all an experiment so I'm gonna get it right at some point.
509
But But there's, I mean, I'm just as guilty as anybody else.
510
I mean, you know, the other day, my little guy, he's four, you know, we talk about these things and,
511
you know, the manners or the values or how we operate in our house when it comes to technology and the screens.
512
And he whacked my phone right out of my hand in my bed before eight o 'clock in the morning,
513
breaking three of my own rules, right?
514
Of like, no phones in bed, like no phones before a certain hour, no phones in front of my kid.
515
But like, I still do it we all still do it.
516
So even someone as passionate as you are about this is your entire life.
517
Yes.
518
Yeah.
519
You're not giving it up entirely.
520
I'd like to.
521
That's the goal.
522
That's kind of where my next project's going.
523
I have found that protecting and educating my children and their peers has been really great.
524
And a lot of this has been about individual self or you as an individual and how technology impacts us.
525
And when you do good and you feel good
526
and you've protected yourself and you have this like code of ethics of how you operate with technology in our modern world,
527
it becomes difficult to keep those when the community and the environment of which you exist is still in this other world.
528
So I actually want to put more of a focus on our physical infrastructure and environments.
529
So for example, the subways, okay?
530
This was a place where I had spontaneous meetings, where I would make a random friend, where I would learn something new.
531
Of course, it's New York.
532
You see things you don't want to see, right?
533
All of that.
534
But lots of history and stories there because of the just, yeah, the spontaneity that happens in shared spaces with strangers.
535
Well, today, you go.
536
The people are all still there, but they're not there.
537
They are literally not there.
538
And I've taught my two kids that you need to be present.
539
You need to look people in the eye.
540
You need to be courteous.
541
You need to strike up conversation and be a part of the world.
542
But when they do it now, it is actually really dystopian and sad,
543
especially this past year, I would say it's like somebody just turned that dial up.
544
There's no one for them to make eye contact with.
545
Really?
546
No, like literally no one.
547
I mean, even the people that were like holding out and like reading books, you'll see a few of them.
548
But I would say almost all people are fully on their phones
549
and to the point of not even caring what they're showing.
550
So where maybe you're looking at something salacious
551
or a bad text message you're private nobody cares because nobody's looking
552
because everyone's in their own virtual worlds and so that's my next battle is more of this environment,
553
infrastructure, community, because it does no good for me to protect myself or my kids or,
554
you know, focus on individual if the world of which we exist is non -existent.
555
Are we too far gone?
556
If you'd asked me that a couple years ago, I would have said yes.
557
Today, there is more people than ever in this conversation.
558
We are changing laws slower than I would like in the United States.
559
I'm a member of a grassroots organization called Mothers Against Media Addiction that started about two years ago.
560
We were key in getting phones out of schools, which would have been unheard of, right?
561
And my oldest will say, mom, it's not the 90s.
562
You can't change the whole world.
563
This is just how it is.
564
And I look at him and I go, do you have phones in school?
565
Your mom did that.
566
I did that.
567
I did that.
568
I mean, with the help of many, many people, there was a coalition of us.
569
So there's an increase in the amount of physical books being sold.
570
There is an increase in the outcries from people.
571
They don't want this.
572
They don't want AI.
573
I think AI is going to be the thing that even though I just got goosebumps, it's awful and terrifying and scary.
574
And there's a call for no regulation on it because we must be first and we must be the best.
575
You have an equal outcry of people just being like, no. So I am hopeful.
576
It's going to be hard and it's going to take everybody from every different angle,
577
figuring out what is the thing that you care about the most and going, you know, top down, bottom them up, right, in our own homes,
578
then in our communities, legislation, government, and sort of meeting in the middle.
579
But for me, I'm really hopeful because unfortunately, the atrocities are getting worse and more often.
580
And so the tech companies, as they continue to not do anything to correct this,
581
are giving us no choice than to band together and opt out.
582
So yeah, that's my answer.
583
I'm hopeful.
584
That's good.
585
Good positivity.
586
The thing about you and I, Jess, is we remember a time where we didn't have phones, we didn't have social media.
587
For your two boys, they don't.
588
For them, is this an impossible dream?
589
I feel a huge obligation for our generation to pass down this sort of institutional knowledge, right?
590
And maybe that's not the right word, but we have this memory, we have this experience of what it means to truly be human, right?
591
I don't know that we're ever going to have that again, right?
592
But we can make sure that they understand what that is.
593
And And unfortunately, we're getting older and we are the last generation.
594
So what I really want to do is document these stories,
595
almost like folklore, so that younger generations can know what they might attempt to return to or try and preserve.
596
You know, there's things that they should have a right to, but if they don't even know about it.
597
You know, some people will say, well, you know, kids want, you know, they want this.
598
My kid wants marshmallows for breakfast.
599
Like, why are we asking the kids what they want?
600
I'm sorry, but like, you need to do what's best for them.
601
So yeah, so I think it's our moral duty
602
and obligation to try and fix things as much as we possibly can right now to capture what it was like before.
603
and arm them with this information.
604
What do you tell your boys to try to convince them and more importantly, do they listen?
605
Well, I've been having this conversation with my 14 -year -old since he was two.
606
I will tell you, he is over it.
607
It's never been easy.
608
Like, people will say, oh, it must be easy.
609
Like, he must just be okay with it.
610
We have been through every trend known to man and every time I have said no in so many words.
611
One of the things I talk about is it's more important to have the conversations with the younger generation
612
or your kids and explain why you're doing this or as opposed to just banning it.
613
I do both, right?
614
Because you're hoping to instill a set of values in them so that when they're out in the world,
615
experiencing this at a friend's house or when they're old enough to get it on their own or
616
what a lot of them do is they get the extra ipad from you know
617
so -and -so's cousin and hide it under their pillow
618
that they're still going to have your values your family values those thoughts
619
that understanding um in their brain
620
it's not perfect by any means um my 14 year old will tell you he doesn't like it
621
but he knows I'm right.
622
We have been through, he came home, this was in middle school before the phone bans, and he started saying, oh I lost another friend today.
623
And I was like, what do you mean?
624
He's like, oh we don't play anymore.
625
I was like, okay.
626
And then he came home, he's like, I lost another friend today.
627
And I was like, what do you mean?
628
I was like, did they move?
629
He's like, no, they got an iPhone for their birthday.
630
And I was like, okay, well what does that mean you lost them?" He's like, well, they don't play anymore at recess.
631
They sit on the floor at the wall.
632
And I was like, okay, so do you ask them to play?
633
And he's like, yeah, they're not going to.
634
So they're not going to be my friend anymore.
635
And it was as if he was talking about someone as if they had died, right?
636
So he was able to see and feel that, but we had been having conversations beforehand to understand really what that was.
637
And honestly, there was a bit of judgment on his end.
638
He was angry and young and like had all these feelings.
639
And I was like, you can't judge them, right?
640
Like you just can't.
641
And you hope that like the family figures it out or the schools figure it out or something, but like, it's not their fault.
642
And that's a lot of this conversation too, is this stuff is like designed this way.
643
And we were told it was one thing and it's something else entirely.
644
So yeah, he's seen firsthand in this, you know, if you read the anxious generation
645
or heard Jonathan speak they talk about the ages and he is
646
that exact age group
647
but he was never allowed any of this stuff
648
now there was a person I knew who was never allowed soda growing up
649
and when I went to visit them they had stacks of stacks of soda in their apartment
650
so there is a chance that this all backfires on me
651
but I'm willing to roll the dice on that because what I'm seeing is his ability to have social skills.
652
Some might call it bullshit.
653
To be able to like look around and be present, to have hobbies away from the stuff,
654
and to find the friends that also are willing to be there with him,
655
playing, even at this age when everybody's on video games and social media.
656
is allowing his body and his brain to develop how it's supposed to, so that when this stuff gets introduced,
657
he has more of an ability to manage it.
658
Now, I don't think any of us can manage it, right?
659
I think we're all screwed currently.
660
I know.
661
I'm sorry.
662
I say it so frankly.
663
Honestly.
664
But at this point, I've been radicalized.
665
I thought when I started talking about this, that the tech companies would be like, oh my God, we didn't know.
666
Let's fix this.
667
All right.
668
Thank you.
669
Yeah.
670
No. So, yeah, I don't even remember the question right now.
671
No, no, but I've got another one for you because you mentioned the brain, right?
672
Last one and we're going pretty long.
673
But we now know that our brains are actually shrinking using these devices.
674
There's proof there now.
675
Yeah.
676
We used to not do that, arguably.
677
But then you look at kids your son's age.
678
Do you worry about where it's going for them?
679
Yeah.
680
I mean, this is one of the things
681
that keeps me up at night
682
because it's also one of the reasons I don't give him anything because I know what happened to my brain.
683
I had that experience.
684
I didn't have to wait for science to catch up, so I don't want it to happen to him.
685
But I think about what does it look like when an entire generation reaches adulthood with dementia?
686
What does that do to everything, to how our countries are run,
687
to how we raise future children? if we don't have the cognitive capacity to do that.
688
You know, people will talk about the dumbing down of the general population.
689
And yes, of course, you are what you consume.
690
The shorter the content, the more salacious, the more high fructose corn syrupy it is, it does impact you.
691
But I'm not even talking about that.
692
I'm talking just about like the gray matter shrinking in our brains to the point of an eventual diagnosis of digital dementia.
693
and people are 30 years old collectively.
694
I don't know how a society functions like that.
695
What do you say to anyone in that society right now who turns around and says, ah, settle down, this is sensationalist?
696
I would say that I've been hearing that for the past 13 years, and I haven't been wrong once.
697
And you probably have something to benefit from saying that to me.
698
The people that push back are those that have something to lose by the system changing,
699
or they're so entrenched in it themselves that they can't look.
700
Those people kind of come around later, though.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This speaking lesson is built on the video “The persistent struggle to undo screen addiction”. This video has 698 sentences and 7658 words to shadow. The speech runs for 45:19. The speaker talks at a natural 169 words per minute, close to everyday conversation. 86% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English; the rest is worth studying before you start.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| vacation noun | /veɪˈkeɪ.ʃən/ | An extended trip or journey away from home for rest or pleasure. |
| addiction noun | /əˈdɪkˌʃən/ | A state that is characterized by compulsive drug use or compulsive engagement in rewarding behavior, despite negative consequences. |
| ignore verb | /ɪɡˈnɔː/ | To deliberately not listen or pay attention to. |
| addict noun | /ˈæd.ɪkt/ | A person who is addicted, especially to a harmful drug. |
| pocket noun | /ˈpɑ.kɪt/ | A bag stitched to an item of clothing, used for carrying small items. |
| hire verb | /ˈhaɪɹ/ | To obtain the services of in return for fixed payment. |
| skill noun | /skɪl/ | A capacity to do something well; a technique, an ability, usually acquired or learned, as opposed to abilities that are regarded as innate. |
| hopeful adjective | /ˈhoʊpfl̩/ | feeling hope |
| dementia noun | /dɪˈmɛnʃə/ | A progressive decline in cognitive function due to damage or disease in the brain beyond what might be expected from normal aging. Areas particularly affected… |
| recreate verb | /ˈɹɛk.ɹi.eɪt/ | To give new life, energy or encouragement (to); to refresh, enliven. |
| infrastructure noun | /ˈɪnfɹəˌstɹʌkt͡ʃə/ | An underlying base or foundation for a building, organization, or system. |
| anxiety noun | /æŋˈzaɪ.əti/ | An unpleasant state of mental uneasiness, nervousness, apprehension and obsession or concern about some uncertain event. |
| publication noun | /ˌpʌblɪˈkeɪʃ(ə)n/ | The act of publishing printed or other matter. |
| recall verb | /ɹɪˈkɔl/ | To withdraw, retract (one's words etc.); to revoke (an order). |
| sheet noun | /ʃit/ | A thin bed cloth used as a covering for a mattress or as a layer over the sleeper. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| catch up verb | To pick up suddenly. | |
| set up verb | /ˌsɛt ˈʌp/ | To make ready for use. |
| wake up verb | /ˌweɪk ˈʌp/ | To stop sleeping; to awake. |
| grow up verb | To mature and become an adult. | |
| come around verb | /kʌ.məˈɹaʊnd/ | To change one's mind, especially to begin to agree or appreciate what one was reluctant to accept at first. |
| come out verb | /ˌkʌm ˈaʊt/ | To be discovered; to be revealed. |
| come out with verb | To say (something) unexpectedly. | |
| come over verb | To affect in a sudden, unprecedented or surprising manner; to overwhelm a person's ordinarily contrary impulse. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- I can't have it in my pocket?
- Why can't we just have it on silent in our pockets?
- Do you feel a little anxiety right now?
- How often were you on your phone?
- Do you worry about where it's going for them?
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect continuous have/has been + -ing — an action that started earlier and is still going on | you've been experiencing · I've been having · I've been hearing |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | we've been conditioned · I've drawn · you've just described |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | be distracted · we've been conditioned · be ignored |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | problem, which is · seconds, which is · people that were |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 201 contractions and reduced forms, such as I'm, don't, you're. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: eighth /eɪtθ/, ethics /ˈɛθ.ɪks/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: vacation /veɪˈkeɪ.ʃən/, addiction /əˈdɪkˌʃən/, dementia /dɪˈmɛnʃə/, publication /ˌpʌblɪˈkeɪʃ(ə)n/, sheet /ʃit/
- Long words — get the stress right: infrastructure /ˈɪnfɹəˌstɹʌkt͡ʃə/, anxiety /æŋˈzaɪ.əti/, publication /ˌpʌblɪˈkeɪʃ(ə)n/, intervention /ɪntɚˈvɛnʃən/, inability /ˌɪnəˈbɪlɪti/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like vacation, addiction, ignore.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.