HAre you tired of your piles of unread books? Or of all that climbing gear hiding in your cupboard? If you're one of the UK adults who, on average, spends $100 a day on 5 hours per day If you find yourself focusing more on watching a screen than participating in entertainment, it might be time to join the offline revolution.
Instead of staring at a screen for five hours, you could read 300 pages of a book. Climb Mount Snowdonor even a marathon depending on your pace. Some people choose to turn off their devices for the entire day.
On Sunday, more than 1,000 people Pledged The idea was to take back control of our downtime and do a 24-hour digital detox. The event was organised by Offline Club, whose mission is to “replace screen time with real time”. Those who sign up will be invited to a Zoom call on Saturday where they will receive tips and tricks on how to survive without the internet the next day.
One participant was Philippe (33), a branding director from Rotterdam, Netherlands, who works at a desk all day and then spends his time watching TV and “doomscrolling” on social media when he gets home, sometimes spending 14 hours a day in front of a screen.
He said: “I'm sick of it. I thought maybe I should try something to relax a bit. I want to live in the moment a bit more instead of scrolling through doom and gloom on social media and seeing what other people are doing with their 'perfect lives'.”
Philippe is keen to “interact more face-to-face and get outside more,” and although spending an entire day without relying on a navigation app to get from point A to point B and without constant contact with friends and family will be difficult, he said he is “thrilled” to be taking part.
Fernanda Grace, 38, a community manager from Barcelona, Spain, also plans to go offline on Sunday. She said the digital detox is Earth Hour People are encouraged to take 60 minutes for the planet by turning off unnecessary lights.
Grace said: “Sometimes you just want to get away from your phone. Doing something in a group setting has a bigger impact. It's like when you go to the gym and your buddies are there waiting for you, you have to go.”
Since finding out about the offline club, she has already started making small changes: “When I go to dinner with friends, I never leave my phone out of my bag.”
Another habit Grace has adopted is to use an old-fashioned alarm clock rather than relying on her phone: “Sometimes an email or WhatsApp can set the tone for your day. If it's an urgent matter, it adds tension for the rest of the day. I try not to do that anymore.”
She ultimately wants to get into the habit of reading books, sleeping better, and responding to others less frequently. “I want to have a better relationship with social media overall and not feel so guilty about disconnecting.”
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Offline Club held its first in-person “digital detox hangout” in Amsterdam in February; in the months since, the company has already expanded to Paris, Dubai and London. These hangouts lock down phones for a few hours and encourage participants to read and socialize with each other. Sunday will mark the club's first attempt at large-scale mobilization to get people offline.
Offline Club co-founder Ilya Knöppelhout said people were surprised at how spending a few hours offline “significantly reduced stress and helped them feel more connected to themselves and others.”
The company also hosts offline weekend getaways in the Dutch countryside, where people lock away their phones upon arrival. Tickets for the two-day event cost a minimum of 425 euros (£356). Of the getaways, Knepelhout said: “Participants left with a lot of mental space – some even quit their jobs after the holiday because they finally stopped and thought about their lives.”
Knepelhout said he was inspired to co-found the club after his own phone-free weekend: “I wasn't reading enough, writing enough, or spending enough time in nature. But I felt so much more creative afterwards. I came back so rejuvenated and inspired.”
He quit his job after the company started growing rapidly.[The Offline Club] It's not yet economically sustainable, which is one of the reasons we're expanding to other cities, but business is going well. [be able to] I'm thinking of using up some of my savings and borrowing some money from my parents for the time being.”
Knöppelhout believes the digital detox movement is just getting started: “I would love to see cell phone-free areas in cities and even cell phone-free holidays.”
