Let's start looking at some of the things you can do to better care for your technologically-saturated self in 2026 while, at the same time, more effectively protect your mental, spiritual, and physical health:
1. Start "unsubscribing" to your email clutter. Regardless of how many email accounts you have, it's a good place to start. Even if you unsubscribe from two things every other day, your inbox(es) will be cleared out of it's incoming "not-junk-but-is-now-junk" in no time! I was SO over seeing the same emails from Harbor Freight (I don't even know who they are or what they do!) coming in as "Other" inbox emails. They're done. Unsubscribed. Big Yay.
2. Delete any unused apps, games, and files from your phone....and your laptop/desktop computer. Same logic applies as 1. above!
3. Back up your important photos, documents, and contacts. If you aren't sure how to do that, ask ChatGPT or Perplexity.AI...or any AI-based "assistant" who can point you in a right direction. Or.... your enlightened adult kid/grand(s)---whomever you have good-enough access to assist you.
4. Review your current online accounts and passwords. Decide which need to go and which can stay. Then update your passwords and document them for those key accounts you intend to keep using in 2026.
4. Instead of not accepting, keeping, or tracking your receipts for purchases, do this for a month. Then identify your spending pattern for that month. Do it again next month. And the next. Through this process, you will certainly know what your patterns are that you may have never noticed before---and choose to change accordingly. (Like the client who was spending on average $300 a month inside 7-11 buying "stuff" to eat/drink at work each day! Or the "Amazon shopper" who realized how easy it was to spend $1,000 in a couple of months on "gadgets"!)
5. Set your boundaries regarding your time spent "working", versus your time on screens for each month of the new year. If your work is primarily online, then establish "when" you can and will be offline each day for your own mental health's sake. Without realizing, too many of us are on screens 16+ hours each day between our work, phones, and other devices---and haven't even noticed! The Mills-Gen Alpha generations understand this reality better than the rest of us do...
6. Delete your old screenshots and duplicate photos, files, and documents....or anything else that doesn't serve you "now". I am notorious for texting clients screenshots of youtube videos I suggest he/she/they watch. Not a good plan to let them pile up in my phone over time!
7. Make a micro-habit of wiping down your screens and keyboard(s) at least once each week. If you have a desktop, clear it and wipe down all surfaces once a week.
8. Unfollow accounts that drain you of your energy...or your time! Which leads to 9. below...
9. Consider detoxing yourself from those accounts you have become addicted to. For me, it was Tik Tok. If an hour can go by and it felt like 10 minutes, you ARE addicted. Start by pursuing "Dry January" as it pertains to whichever account you know you spend way too much time watching each day. If that's too hard, cut your time "watching" in half for one month. Then cut it in half again the second month, etc.
10. If your phone is connected to you like the plague, try keeping it at home for a day and see how it feels to be without it. Then, after you are used to this change, make it two days. Eventually, you may have your phone "with" you, but you won't be glued to it like you once were. You may actually NOT RESPOND/ANSWER when it is a non-emergency incoming call! Imagine that!? Believe me, there was a time when all of us did NOT have a phone immediately accessible to us and guess what? We lived through it! You can too!
As an aside, people on dating apps are now sharing that any "date" who puts their phone on the table during dinner should translate to NO SECOND DATE FOR YOU! I agree. Who is SO important that their phone has to be visible to them no matter where they are? Reminds me of the fool who was yelling about his stock trade over the phone in the dairy department at Meijer's years ago. So. Important. NOT! LOL
Technology has its perks, of course it does. You just don't want to end up confused as to why you feel your technologies are controlling your life instead of the other way round...
Until next post....