Buddhist tips for the digital age

Is staring down into our phones all day long really a good way to live? This sometimes feels to me like the Emperor’s new clothes – yes, people talk about it sometimes, but is our addiction to the machines causing us to overlook just how weird and robotic we’re becoming?! Nor is this likely to get any better with the staggering incursions of AI and VR.

We should not let our habits dominate our behavior or act as if we are sleepwalking.~ Ven Geshe Kelsang, Meaningful to Behold

Carrying on from this article: Can we talk about the phones. Thank you for the helpful ideas so far in the comments.

In a few large groups of people recently, all ages, in a couple of different places, I’ve been asking if anyone does not feel that their phone has taken over their life? So far, fewer than a handful have replied in the affirmative. This is a mass addiction; I think we know that.

In the chapter called Guarding Alertness in Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life, the Buddhist master Shantideva gives many practical precepts to address our daily bad habits so that we can lead an ethical and mindful life. I have been wondering what he would have to say about all of this. True, he would have a lot to say about the radio, TV, and early internet as well. But now, never separated now from distraction, I feel that we are passing beyond something relatively quaint into something altogether more ominous.

After all, in one of his final teachings, modern-day Buddhist master Venerable Geshe Kelsang pleaded with us to overcome our distractions, citing them as the biggest danger to our spiritual practice.

We know that meditation can cure tech addiction!

Tech is upending our lives and our society. Many apps are literally anti-meditation, actively undermining concentration, mindfulness, attention, and inner peace. The human brain may have changed more in the past 18 years since the invention of Smartphones than in the previous 180 years! and not necessarily for the better. I am even wondering if this endless distraction at our fingertips represents the biggest single threat to the spread of meditation and Dharma (Buddhism) through our world. Perhaps I am overstating this, perhaps the phones have benefits that can outweigh these disadvantages; and I’d love to hear what you think.

Like having an addiction to food, it can be tricky to wean ourselves off a tech addiction cos we do need our phones these days for so many things. But it is by no means impossible to change our habits around the phone. By some counts it only takes 40 repetitions for a new habit to be made, so if we start a small new good habit today, we could be looking at a freer life in as little as a month.

Last night we had a meditation, love panel, and party to celebrate Valentine’s Day at our local Kadampa Meditation Center; and people stayed for a long time, chattering happily away. At some point I realized there were no phones in sight, not one; and, as people left, they were saying what an incredibly fun evening this had been. I couldn’t help thinking, this is more like it was in the old days (pre 2007), when people could just talk with each other IRL, making actual eye contact, for two hours straight without feeling the itch to check notifications. It shows we can do this.

In particular, addressing the meditators and Kadampas amongst you … do we need to deliberately set a good example? (I know a lot of you are trying.) Can we talk about this more in our teachings and at our Centers and with our friends, including (especially) those under 35? Can we provide a practical counterculture by giving constant encouragement and ideas on how to address this issue? Can we sometimes provide a phones-free environment? I know Gen Samten talks about this a lot, for example, at the upstate KMC NY temple – he has been on this crusade for as long as I have.*

Self-regulation and digital detox

If the attention economy companies won’t increase the friction that allows us to lift our heads from our screens, for example by adding alerts, “Hey, you’ve been doing this for hours!”, we have to do it ourselves, take charge. (Though you can check out some apps such as ClearSpace, AppLock, ScreenZen, and Opal).

We have to use our phones for so many things, like I was saying, but don’t we also have to use our car? In our car, we seem to be able to focus on getting to our destination without scrolling through video shorts or veering off course. And, once we’ve arrived, we simply get out of the car. We could have a similar approach to our phone – approach it just for the task we need to perform, perform the task, put the phone away.

As with dealing with any attachment, the moment we have control is before the inappropriate attention has really set in – for example, when we notice that part of us doesn’t want to do it, but we can’t stop. We can stop. We’re not fully absorbed into it quite yet, there’s an inch of space. That’s the red flag telling us to step away from the phone.

Actually, even better is to nip this attachment in the bud before those itchy fingers pick up the phone in the first place. So here’s one idea I’ve been sharing which people seem to like:

Instead of “How are you?”, Buddhist Master Atisha would famously ask people, “Do you have a good heart?” In one of the numerous little gaps in the day, those times when we find ourselves automatically reaching for the phone, we can first ask ourselves this same question – “Do I have a peaceful mind and a good heart?” Ifno, we can take a few moments to breathe, relax, feel peaceful, and perhaps remember whatever Dharma comes readily to mind. Then, and only then, when sanity is restored, do we give ourselves permission to pick up the phone. That is, if we even still want to. It might well turn out that, “Actually, I was only picking up the phone because I was bored or dissatisfied. I’m not bored any more, I’m happy. I have found what I need inside me.”

Even earlier, we could put the phone in a place (with zips, in a drawer, in another room!) where it takes some effort to dig it out! Not on the table right next to our itchy fingers.

Another tip I suggested here some time ago, Pausing in the pursuit of happiness to be happy,  is now being recommended by sleep experts – namely keeping our phone in another room at night and using an old-fashioned alarm clock.

We can put some boundaries up, such as no tech before breakfast or morning meditation, and gaps of digital detox of an hour or two interspersed through the day. Or whatever you can make work. We can soon get used to these liberating new habits – it’s only hard at the beginning.

Something else I find helpful is to have (paper not digital) Dharma books strategically placed around the house, including on the bedside table, so that we can easily pick them up when there’s a pause in the day, when we’re eating alone, and especially in the half hour before we go to sleep. We’ll have much better dreams! And most likely wake in a better mood.

Talking of mealtimes, if we’re eating with others, that’s definitely a good place to start pocketing the phones and paying attention to real people.

All this self-regulation is actually modern-day mindfulness and moral discipline. Shantideva would approve.

Curate your mind (update May 2025)

Kadam Kyle, a Millennial who teaches at a great Kadampa center in Brooklyn NY, shared this suggestion in the comments to the last article, and I hope you find it as helpful as I do:

And that helps give a sense of standards, like a world-class museum would have for entry. That then lead to a question: “what really makes me feel alive? What brings me deep joy? What makes me get up in the morning with a true sense of thrill? What really PAYS OFF when I put time into it?”

One last article on this subject is on its way. Meanwhile, your feedback, ideas, and suggestions are welcome & needed!