How can we reduce the time we spend on devices?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Thank you.
How can we reduce the time which we spend on the screen or on emails or on device? Well, I am not the right person for this because I spend a lot of time on this. So I would say rather than reduction, we can talk more about regulation. So regulation means that it is whether the time I am spending is purposeful or not.
Whether it’s my time so time which I spend if it’s being used constructively then that is not the problem. It’s not necessary that I have to reduce the time but I have to see whether whatever time I am spending is used constructively or not. So some of us if we have software jobs we are going to spend a lot of time on the computer.
My job is writing. I am going to spend a lot of time on writing. So it’s not necessarily a bad thing.
As I said, the problem comes not because we are using the device a lot. The problem is because we don’t have control over what we are doing. So Prabhupada writes in the paraphrase of 2.60 Prabhupada says over there the yogi is one who controls the senses according to a plan.
That means the yogi knows this is the time when I engage my senses, this is the time when I withdraw my senses. So it is not that the yogi will never engage the senses but the yogi engages according to a plan. So broadly speaking, if we can evaluate what am I doing with my device and then we can evaluate how much of it is productive.
So two things we can see when we are actually using devices that that means whether we like it or not we have a digital social life and we have a physical social life. Through technology we connect with people. And that’s also social life here.
Now, it’s not necessary that digital social life is necessarily bad. Sometimes we just get along with some people very nicely and it’s very difficult to be with them physically. So then online we connect with them, that’s nice.
It’s not necessarily wrong. But it is that whether this is happening according to a plan or whether this is disrupting my plans. That is what I need to see.
Now in some situations if some devotee is living very far away from other people, is living in a place where there are no devotees or there is no like-minded association then for that devotee the digital social life may actually be the relief. May actually be the only association that is available. So we have to basically see whether it serves the purpose or not.
And within that it’s good to good to basically for different devotees things work differently. Some devotees I have found that they just decide that I am going to answer emails one hour a day. I am not constantly going to look at emails.
But others may find it there may be urgent messages that come up. I may have to answer those messages. So we have to see what works for us best.
It’s different for different people. For some people they may decide I will check emails only for once a day and whatever one hour I will spend on that or half an hour I will spend on that or all my messages. But I decide I will spend one hour a day but throughout the remaining hours I am anxious.
What if some urgent messages come? What if some urgent messages come? And you know we are dissipating our energy by that. So it’s there is no rigid formula that works for the mind. And for the same mind sometimes different formulas work.
Sometimes when we are like an intense project at that time we say no I will just check emails at this time. But other times we may decide no I will check my messages or emails regularly. So basically when it comes to dealing with the mind we alone know what works.
It can become actually if we try to apply a formula which works for someone else and impose it on ourselves we may find it too repressing for ourselves. By the same time that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t we needn’t have any formula. We also need to have some formula some plan and by observing ourselves we can learn this.
So I would say that this is like eating. Nobody can tell me how much I should eat. Somebody may say you are eating too much or somebody say you are eating too less.
But then I know best so how much I should be eating and sometimes I may feel that is too much eating. I am eating too less. And then by observing we regulate ourselves.
So like that we can say that there is physical consumption of food and there is digital consumption. So then I have to observe myself and when does it come too much for me. So may be at the end of the day we can think you know today I did this but this year I went too much off.
Here I could have done this a little bit more. So for this it is in the in the Uddhava Gita in the eleventh canto there is a verse which says that that we have to become our own guru. So Jiva Swami explains in his commentary that this does not mean that we don’t need a spiritual master but rather it means that under the guidance of the spiritual master it is we who have to guide ourselves based on the instruction that we take from the spiritual master.
The spiritual master is not going to be there always with us. So in that sense, see in the heat of the moment we may make certain decisions and that’s okay but afterwards we can evaluate was this decision right or not such a sound decision I could have changed it. So that way basically for this the essential principle I would say whatever works for us and we have to learn by our own experience and based on our situation.
Does it answer your question?