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Wipe the phone and all is well

I have a smartphone.

I turned off the data plan.

I wiped the phone of all it’s apps and data.

All is well.

Turns out that I was getting too dependent on my phone for basic tasks and it was a convenient distraction from focusing on the work that matters to me.

Now all I store on the phone is just inspirational music. No names, no numbers, no calendar entries.

No apps: no email, no Facebook, no Google Plus, no Google Reader, no satellite navigation.

I now use the phone to:

make & receive calls, entering numbers by hand each time.
compose, send & receive text messages.
listen to inspirational music from stored MP3s.
set the alarm to wake up in the morning.

All is well.

Wiping the phone was a great move

I no longer worry about losing it, or the data on it.

I no longer worry about it being damaged.

If I lost it, or it became unusable, I would simply buy another basic phone (order a replacement SIM if required) and start using that phone.

How do I live without storing information on my phone?

Essential phone numbers are on a piece of paper that I carry with me (many of which I have now memorised anyway).

Non-essential phone numbers I simply jump on the web when next at the computer and get them from Google Contacts whenever I need them. This helps with batching phone calls too.

Calendar entries are stored on Google Calendar. I have a 1 month matrix on a single sheet of paper where I write down important things I have planned for the month. This helps to cut out the time-saps too.

Almost all inbound calls are treated without bias – if I don’t recognise the number, then my greeting has to be the same for everyone, right?

If someone sends me an SMS and I don’t recognise the number and they haven’t left their name, I sometimes ask my wife if she has the number – but I’m learning not to keep doing that, as it’s quite cheeky and I’m testing her patience!

How has wiping my phone impacted my life?

I still have to pay £35 per month for my phone contract for another 6 months, but the benefits of deactivating data on my phone far outweigh the unnecessary dent in my pocket.

Emails I leave till when I am online on my computer- I batch them up and try to get them all done in one go. I’m still struggling to keep up with email, but it’s better than the constant frenetic checking on the phone and not really keeping up anyway.

Driving routes I simply look up on Google Maps in advance, have a planned route, and trust myself to learn the roads better as a I go along. Yes, I’ve made a few wrong turns, but I’ve also got my trusted A-Z road maps to keep me on the right track. (There are times when my wife and I have used the satellite navigation on her phone when the paper roadmap does not stretch out far enough to cover the area we are travelling to).

Facebook – I deactivated my account at the end of last year – turns out I’m enjoying spending time doing other cool things such as reading, introspecting, and having quality time with a few select people.

Would you go data-free on your phone?

Not everyone will be up for this. Some of my friends are incredibly disciplined and use their data-enabled phones very wisely, but I don’t have that level of discipline just yet, so dropping data connectivity was the way to go, for now.

Try going data-free on your phone for a week or so, and see how it feels.

Have you done it yourself? How has it been for you?

Charities that lose credibility

Written by Suraj Shah.

“… pulling innocent suspects from the crowd and guilt them into donating …”

Charities do great work to compassionately serve those who require extra care and support in this difficult world.

They go to great extent to raise funds to keep their projects going.

However, sometimes they go just too far.

Stung by charities

My wife and I were meeting friends for lunch at one of the newer shopping complexes in London, where we got stopped by a person collecting funds for an animal-welfare charity, money-bucket in hand, who asked “Do you have a minute?”

In unison, we both politely said “no sorry, we’re on our way to meet friends” and swiftly moved on.

As we were walking away from the fundraiser, we considered whether he may have been thinking how uncompassionate we were, just like the other shoppers who also dodged and avoided.

But we both knew that most of these street fundraisers are paid by the charities to raise funds by pulling innocent suspects from the crowd and guilt them into donating. They probably don’t even care very much about the charity themselves.

Clearly, we’d both previously been stung by pushy fundraisers, getting in our way, delaying us, and bullying us to donate to their charity.

Your fundraising tricks won’t work on us

Dear charity,

We’ve learnt not to trust you:

We get stopped by fundraisers on the streets. We ignore them, or politely dodge them and continue on our way.
We get calls, harassing us to commit to “just £2 a week” to save some hungry child or another. We say “no thank you” and hang up.
We receive unsolicited mailings, with free pens and donations forms. It just goes in the recycling.
We are forced to receive stacks of garment collection bags used to fund some local charity or another. We use them as garbage bags.

You’ve got it all wrong. You push and push and push. You lose the the one thing that you need the most to survive long-term…

Pushy fundraisers destroy credibility

Credibility and trust is the currency of today. When you have that, you have everything.

When charities push for funding, they lose the love, and they lose credibility.

Something that an individual or an organisation has spent many years building up can be wrecked within a few reckless words spoken by brash greedy fundraisers.

Enhance credibility, lose the push

Charities who are doing great work, can keep doing great work, by focusing on doing great work… rather than scheme up ways to trick people into funding their projects.

By all means tell others about what you are doing. Tell the ones who are genuinely interested. Tell the ones who personally want to help and be involved.

Prepare platforms for them to voluntarily sign up for news and updates, and then send them messages of compassion, that inform, that intrigue, that inspire.

Tell them with love, and tell them with care. Truth and transparency work wonders.

Let them naturally, over time, discover their own ways to contribute, financially, with their time, with their heart.

Lose the push, so you need not lose the person.

(Photo courtesy of Annie Mole)

Attachment-free relationships

Written by Suraj Shah.

“Ain’t no sunshine when she’s gone.” – Bill Withers

Relationships are wonderful. Attachment sucks. Here’s why.

We go to a lot of trouble to be with someone we desire.
When we get them, we worry about losing them.
When they are gone, we feel sad.

Attachment = love + expectation = trouble

Attachments to people we are close to is love, coupled with expectation. That always spells trouble.

Our attachment to someone leads to greed – wanting them more, and wanting more from them. In trying to get more, our egos flare up and we tend to deceive and manipulate to get it. We become scheming and selfish. When we don’t get it, we become frustrated and spiteful.

Attachments, bad. Detached, expectation-free love, good.

What attachment-free relationships look like

Attachment-free relationships are magical. Here’s how they look:

A person arrives in your life at just the right time.
You feel blessed to have their positive presence.
All engagements and interactions with them are filled with love.
You care for them during life’s difficulties, but have no expectation of anything in return.
There is an understanding that they are doing the best they can do with what they have.
They leave at the right time, warmly and peacefully.
Life is filled with joy and trust.

How to have attachment-free relationships

Relationships free from attachment and expectation are pretty straightforward, so long as you know that:

People come into our lives at the right time, no sooner and no later.
They desire happiness and peace – they are no different from you or I.
Most people have fears of pain, loss and death – just like you and I.
They crave healing through love and care – just like you and I.
They don’t like to be forced into doing things – just like you and I.
They are doing the best they can with what they have – same for you and I.
They will exit from our lives at the right time, no sooner and no later.

Attachment-free relationships are the way forward. Go on, enjoy your first dance.

(Photo courtesy of Stephen Steel, via Sawan Gosrani)