Episode 157. Digital Detox: Declutter Your Mind And Stop Feeling So Scattered

You wake up, grab your phone, and before you even get out of bed… your brain is already going.

By the time you hit the office, you’ve checked a hundred things, reacted to everything, and you already feel behind.

Then all day it’s:
 starting something → getting interrupted → forgetting what you were doing → picking it back up → repeat.

And somehow by 2PM… your brain feels fried.

This episode is going to connect the dots on why that’s happening—and why it’s not your job, your team, or your schedule making you feel this way.

It’s the constant noise your brain never gets a break from.

We’re talking about what a digital detox actually looks like in real life (not the extreme version), how all the digital clutter is messing with your focus, and simple ways to start clearing it out so your brain can finally slow down.

If you’ve been feeling scattered, overwhelmed, and like you can’t think straight lately…

this episode is a must listen for you.

HEY THERE! LET'S CONNECT...I'D LOVE TO GET TO KNOW YOU BETTER!

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Tell me if this sounds like a typical morning for you. The alarm goes off. You don't even sit up before you grab your phone. You check the time, text, email, and there it is. Something from the office, the schedule changes, a patient messages. Something instantly puts you in a mood. Now you're awake, but not in a good way. And then you scroll for just a minute. And now you've seen someone posting their perfectly organized kitchen like they've got their whole life together. Or someone who already went to the gym before sunrise, like, okay, good for you. A post that just for some reason annoys you. You can't put your finger on it, but it's just annoying. And then someone talking about hitting big goals, and now are you like, cool, I'm just trying to survive the day. And you're laying there thinking, why do I already feel off? Like I literally just woke up. You get up, but your brain, it has already been running. And then you're in the shower, you're going over the schedule, thinking you're going to be late, what's going to go wrong today, thinking about all the things you didn't finish yesterday. You haven't even had coffee yet, and you already are at work mentally. And the crazy part, this is most of us. Like almost everyone grabs their phone first thing. And yeah, it's normal. But also look at how your day starts. Before you've had one second to think your own thoughts, you've already reacted to someone else's, compared yourself, you've been annoyed, you've felt behind. No wonder you feel behind before you even leave the house. You didn't wake up and start your day. You woke up and got pulled straight into it. On today's episode, we're going to talk about something that sounds really simple, and it might be the missing piece for why you're feeling stuck. We're going to talk about doing a digital detox. So let's get started. Welcome to the Dental Life Podcast, where we explore how you can have both a successful career and a meaningful personal life in and outside of your practices without sacrificing one for the other. A digital detox. Like what the heck even is that? And before you're like, uh yeah, no, I'm not throwing my phone in the lake and just disappearing. Relax. That's not what this is. When you hear digital detox, it kind of sounds intense. Like you have to delete everything, go off the grid, never look at Instagram again. That's just not happening. This is way simpler than that. It's just this. It's not letting your phone have access to you all day long. That's it. It's not every minute, not every notification, not every time you're bored for 10 seconds. You still use your phone, you just stop letting it run the show. This isn't about deleting everything and going MIA. It's not about ignoring your phone all day because you've got a job, and that's just not happening. And it's not suddenly becoming that person who's like, I really don't go on social anymore. That's not real life. It is just about your phone not having access to you every five seconds. You still use it, you just don't reach for it every time there's a pause. And then there's the part nobody really talks about. It's your digital stuff is such a mess. And it's messing with your brain more than you think. What I'm talking about is opening your Google Drive and you have no idea where anything is. You type in a file name and still can't find it, or scroll through your camera forever trying to find that one photo, and it's buried somewhere in the 6,000 random screenshots, the blurry pics, and the stuff you don't even remember saving. It's not just annoying, it's making everything feel harder than it needs to be. Like your brain has to work overtime just to find simple things. And that low-level frustration, it's there all day, whether you realize it or not. A digital detox is simply this. It's simply creating space between you and that constant input. It just clutters everything up. Because right now, there is no space. Your brain is never off. Even when you're thinking that you're relaxing, you are still consuming, you're still scrolling, you're still watching, you're still checking, you're still refreshing. Your brain never gets a break. Let's just talk about how it shows up in real life. It's not like you're on your phone for hours and hours straight, but you're picking it up all day long. That quick little check, that quick little scroll, just one second. And those seconds add up to like a hundred plus times every day. It's not just the time you're on your phone that's messing with you, it's how many times your brain is getting interrupted. Think about your day when you're trying to check in a patient, answer a question, finish a chart note, figure out the schedule, and your phone lights up. So you look. Now your brain just left what it's doing. It went over there for just a second, but now it has to come back. But it never comes back clean. It's like when you're trying to talk to someone at the front desk, but the phone rings, someone walks up, the doctor asks you something, another patient is standing there, and you're like, wait, what? What was I saying? That is your brain all day. So now it makes sense why you walk into the sterilization room and you stand there like, why did I even come in here? You open a chart and just stare at it for a few seconds, like trying to get your bearings about what you're trying to do. You read the same thing over and over and over. I am so guilty of that one. You feel like you were slammed all day, but somehow nothing actually got finished. And then you start making it mean something about you. I can't focus. My brain is all over the place. What's wrong with me lately? Do I have ADHD? Nothing. Nothing is wrong with you. Your brain has just gotten used to being pulled in a hundred different directions all day long. Your brain is not built to be bouncing around like that. We have enough interruptions in the day without adding to it ourselves. And then we expect it to just shut off at night. You get into bed, you put your phone down, and then suddenly your brain's like, okay, cool. Now that it's quiet, let's just go over everything. And so now you're replaying the day, you're thinking about tomorrow, remembering random things you forgot. You are wide awake even though you're exhausted. It's not that you can't sleep. Your brain's just been go, go, go, go all day. And this is the first second it's had to actually catch up. But when do you actually sit down and do anything about it? Think about that for a second. Actually do it. Most of us don't because the second there's even a tiny pause, you just grab your phone. You sit down at night and like, okay, I'm gonna look at my budget real quick. Phone's already in your hand. You open up your bank app, turns into checking email, then you click on something else, and now you're just scrolling. And at some point you're like, wait, why did I even pick up my phone in the first place? Or it might be this. You sit down for a second before making dinner, just for a minute, and now you're watching random videos, reading comments, looking at stuff you don't even care about. And then you look up and it's like, oh my God, I haven't even started dinner yet. Or it might be when you're at work. You got a couple of minutes before patience. This could be the second to think something through, reset your brain, get one step ahead. But instead, phone, scroll, time is gone. And it's not that you don't care about your life, it's that you never get any real space to actually do anything about it. So all those things sit there in the background, and then it starts to feel like I'm always behind. Why can't I get my stuff together? So what do you do? You avoid it. You grab your phone, you start scrolling again, and now it's just on repeat. Same pattern, different day. This isn't about discipline. You're stuck in a habit of filling every open second instead of using it. And look, I get it, it is hard to stop because your phone isn't just there for you to use, it's built to keep you coming back. There's always something pulling at you, always something to check, something to react to, or something to click on. Your brain loves that. It's wired for that quick, easy right now, and your phone delivers that every single time. But here's the part that matters when you put it down, everything goes quiet. And now it's just you and your own brain. That's not always comfortable. So what do you do? You pick up that phone again. Not because there's something wrong with you, but because it's easier than sitting in your own thoughts. Now, here's the part that kind of surprises people. When you stop being on your phone all the time, even just a little bit, things start to feel different pretty fast. Nothing dramatic, just you feel a little more calm. Your head isn't as noisy, you're not snapping at every little thing. You've got a little more patience, which be honest, that matters a lot when you're in a dental practice. You're not lying in bed awake as long. You feel a little more in control of yourself. You actually start noticing your life again. You're not just running through the day trying to keep up, but you're actually there for it. And when I talk about a digital detox, I'm not talking about some all or nothing dramatic reset. I'm talking about doing this in a way that you will actually follow through on. So I want you to do this. I want you to pick one boundary, just one. Maybe it's no foam for the first 30 minutes of your morning, or no foam for the last 30 minutes before bed. That's it. You don't need a whole new life. You need one decision. I've started to do this more and more. So several years ago now, I decided not to pick my phone up first thing in the morning. I would go to the bathroom, grab a cup of coffee, walk around in the living room, sit there for a few minutes, thinking about what I was grateful for. Lots of times it was the clean floor under my feet, the fire in the fireplace that would just come on and keep me warm. The quiet and the stillness that allowed me to calm my nervous system down. And then I started not picking it up until just before I got in the car to go to work. Then, after the morning huddle, I would put it in my purse until afternoon. Now I'm working on the evenings with intention. It's a lot easier now since I've eased into the mornings without it. And here's what I've noticed. I've noticed how sneaky our brains are. I thought I was doing a great job, but you know what I noticed? Instead of my phone, I was on my freaking laptop. Somehow I could justify that easier. So now I focus on the digital devices and not just my phone. Next, I want to encourage you to turn off notifications that don't matter. Is your phone buzzing all day? Of course you feel on edge if it does. You've basically given the outside world permission to interrupt you whenever it wants. Take that permission back. This was an easy one for me because when I first got my phone, those notifications and the screen lighting up way too much. So distracting. I shut those off a long time ago. But it's interesting. Sometimes I've at dinner with my friends and their phones are just constantly flashing. It would drive me insane. Now, this one might feel weird at first. Don't carry your phone everywhere. Put it down, leave it in the other room, put it in your purse. You don't need to be reachable every second of the day. And look, this is what you can do instead, because this is important. Sometimes it might feel challenging to just stop grabbing for your phone because you're going to reach for something. So you got to give yourself a different go-to. Instead of automatically picking it up, try maybe sitting in your car for a minute before you go inside. Just breathe for a second. Drink a cup of coffee or a glass of wine without anything in your hand. Maybe step outside for just a quick breath of fresh air instead of scrolling between patients. Try jotting down what's running through your head instead of trying to escape it. It almost sounds too simple, doesn't it? But that's the whole point. You don't need to take more in. You need a little less coming at you. Okay, here's something about your digital world you may not have thought about yet. Your phone, your laptop, all of that is a mess. And it is low-key stressing you out all day long. Here's what I'm talking about: your phone screen, pages of apps you don't even use, notifications that pop up nonstop, stuff everywhere, and you can't find anything without really thinking about it. And then there's your email, 5,000 plus unread. Emails from companies you don't even remember signing up for. Stuff you scroll past every day, but don't actually deal with. And then there's your photos, 47 pictures of the same thing trying to get a good one. Random screenshots you swore you'd go back to, but you don't. The blurry pics, the duplicates, the memes, the stuff you don't even remember saving. And every time you open your phone, even if you don't realize it, your brain's like, oh my gosh, where is anything in here? It just feels so cluttered. Like trying to find something in a junk drawer that is stuffed to the top. And it's not just annoying, it makes everything feel harder than it should. Like even the simplest thing, sending a photo, finding a file, checking something, it takes so much more effort than it needs to. And that little bit of friction, you feel it all day. Here's something I started to do a while back. And honestly, it really makes life feel less chaotic. On Sunday afternoons, maybe for 45 minutes or an hour, nothing intense. I just go through and clean up my digital stuff on my phone. Because if you really think about it, your phone is full of things you don't need anymore. Videos you took, never will watch again, screenshots of stuff you thought you were going to use, random notes or downloads you forgot about, old group text blowing up your notifications. And it just keeps building. You don't notice it all at once, but every time you open your phone, little by little, it has become a lot. It's the same with your email. You open it up and it's like, I don't even want to deal with this. So you close it and now it's still there. Plus more tomorrow. So now on Sundays, I just sit down and start cleaning it out. Delete what I don't need, unsubscribe from stuff I never opened, clean up a few things. I don't try to make it perfect. I just make a dent. And with email, I stopped trying to catch up. That was never gonna happen. Now I just handle what comes in that day and I let the rest go. And this is really simple. It just makes everything feel less heavy. Like there's not so much noise following you around all the time. And look, we're not turning this into some big project. Set a timer for 15 minutes. Pick one thing, delete a few apps you haven't touched in forever, unsubscribe from that junk you never read, clear out a chunk of your photos, maybe clean up one messy folder. That's it. You're not trying to get it all done, you're just making things a little less chaotic. Now here's where it gets interesting. After even just one day of this, I want you to pay attention. Do you feel a little less on edge? Like your brain isn't going a mile a minute, like you're not rushing through everything. Because that right there, that's what matters. You don't have to do this perfectly. You just have to decide when are you going to pick up your phone and when you're not. That's it. Not every second is up for grabs anymore. Because this isn't about trying harder or having a bunch of willpower. It's about not being available to your phone all the time. So if you've been feeling like your brain is all over the place, you can't focus even when you try. You're tired, but you still can't shut your brain off. Before you go thinking you need to overhaul your whole life, just start here. Start noticing how much stuff is coming at you all day long. Because it's not that you need more hours in the day or more discipline or some perfect plan. That's not it. You just don't have any space. And when you start creating even a little bit of that, things will shift. You'll start to think clearer. You'll feel more calm. You're not on edge as much anymore. Nothing in your life has changed. You just finally have some room to breathe. So I want you to give it a try. Just for the next seven days, pick one thing with your phone and stick to it. That's it. Not five, not perfect, just one thing. Maybe it's no phone first thing in the morning. Maybe it's putting it down at night. Maybe it's not grabbing it every time there is a break in the day. So just pick one and pay attention to how you feel. Because something will shift, even if it's small. And when it does, remember this. It wasn't about doing more. You just finally gave yourself a little space. And if this is hitting you and you're like, okay, I need a little more of this, come hang out with us in my free Facebook group Beyond Dental Burnout. We talk about this kind of stuff all the time. Real life, no fluff. And you're gonna see pretty quickly you're not the only one feeling this way. Have a fabulous day. I'll see you in the group and on next week's episode. Hey, have you had a chance to download your free copy of my mental hygiene checklist yet? Visit Beth Heilmancoaching.com to get your copy. It teaches you the practical skills you need to achieve the same level of excellent mental hygiene as your dental hygiene. Don't miss out on this valuable resource for both your personal and professional growth.