This is one devastating effect of a dopamine debt I had never considered - and you've completely opened my eyes to it.
You're absolutely right. A scroll session on the commute home could have you bringing a shell of yourself home to your family. But the point you raised about misattribution is even more insidious - the sour mood gets blamed on something else entirely, triggering unnecessary rumination that further poisons the quality time you rushed home for.
Your "evening airlock" framing is something I'll be thinking about for a while. There's something in the idea of a deliberate decompression chamber between work-self and home-self that goes beyond just phone avoidance - and I think this is a practice we would all be wise to adopt.
Thank you for spreading awareness about this. And for walking the talk, no less. This was a great read! (And I truly appreciate the shout-out.)
Not at all! Thank you for the great piece. And for the thoughtful comment.
Insidious is the word… the brain would happily blame a spouse, a boss or even a child before they fixed on phone use in the hour before. And I’ve been guilty of trying to scroll away that anxiety, which is a nightmarish circle.
Reading your piece about the chemical imbalances in the brain has made commuting home surrounded by scrollers even stranger. I had been pretty convinced beforehand that it wasn’t a great idea, but now - at the risk of sounding a little pompous - it is genuinely poignant.
Made me realise I’m quite odd on Substack, advocating for something but being surrounded by its opposite for two hours a day. I suspect there’s a loooong way to go in our cultural understanding until the Evening Airlock becomes a thing!
Anyway, that said, must head off to it now. Thanks again!
The irony is not lost on me, believe me. (I advocate for engineering your environment to minimise dopamine hijacking yet promote such messaging on a platform designed to do just that! I like to think we’re fighting fire with fire.)
I wonder about what I do often, whether it's hypocrisy. But really I'm convinced it's not - by now honestly I'd rather not infinite scroll Substack Notes (lovely as so many people on here are!)
But at the risk of being pious, I genuinely believe in this message, and I wish I'd come to it years ago. When my kids were younger.
This is one devastating effect of a dopamine debt I had never considered - and you've completely opened my eyes to it.
You're absolutely right. A scroll session on the commute home could have you bringing a shell of yourself home to your family. But the point you raised about misattribution is even more insidious - the sour mood gets blamed on something else entirely, triggering unnecessary rumination that further poisons the quality time you rushed home for.
Your "evening airlock" framing is something I'll be thinking about for a while. There's something in the idea of a deliberate decompression chamber between work-self and home-self that goes beyond just phone avoidance - and I think this is a practice we would all be wise to adopt.
Thank you for spreading awareness about this. And for walking the talk, no less. This was a great read! (And I truly appreciate the shout-out.)
Not at all! Thank you for the great piece. And for the thoughtful comment.
Insidious is the word… the brain would happily blame a spouse, a boss or even a child before they fixed on phone use in the hour before. And I’ve been guilty of trying to scroll away that anxiety, which is a nightmarish circle.
Reading your piece about the chemical imbalances in the brain has made commuting home surrounded by scrollers even stranger. I had been pretty convinced beforehand that it wasn’t a great idea, but now - at the risk of sounding a little pompous - it is genuinely poignant.
Made me realise I’m quite odd on Substack, advocating for something but being surrounded by its opposite for two hours a day. I suspect there’s a loooong way to go in our cultural understanding until the Evening Airlock becomes a thing!
Anyway, that said, must head off to it now. Thanks again!
The irony is not lost on me, believe me. (I advocate for engineering your environment to minimise dopamine hijacking yet promote such messaging on a platform designed to do just that! I like to think we’re fighting fire with fire.)
Totally with you on fighting fire with fire!
I wonder about what I do often, whether it's hypocrisy. But really I'm convinced it's not - by now honestly I'd rather not infinite scroll Substack Notes (lovely as so many people on here are!)
But at the risk of being pious, I genuinely believe in this message, and I wish I'd come to it years ago. When my kids were younger.