Is your most important relationship with your phone?

Most of us are now addicted to using our phones. We take them out when in a queue, when waiting to meet someone, when eating at a restaurant, even at the theatre (see Rosamund Pike's recent call for a ban on phones after she was distracted by an audience member texting during her performance). Checking our phone may be the first thing we do upon waking, it may be the last thing we look at before going to sleep at night (or in the early hours of the morning). We dare not leave the house without it, we have it by our side when watching TV - either to check who that main character is/where you have seen him or her before/how old they are etc, or just to scroll if the programme is not completely gripping us. We feel offended when others do it but continue to act in the same way. But what message is that sending to your friends or partner or child? That you are prioritising something else - something else that seems to know you so well, is aware of what interests you, what you need, what enrages you, what comforts you. Of course it does - every click, every pause, gives the phone (and the companies which are making so much money from us) more and more information about us - what our politics are, our insecurities, who we feel envious of, what clothes we would like to wear, whose posts we love to hate, what we think we need to improve our lives. The phones are designed to keep us engaged, to such an extent that we lose sense of time. What else could we be doing, what other joys are we missing out on? What relationships are we neglecting, what connections with real, live, human beings, could we nurture rather than giving our time to a device that will never care about us, that is just using us for making others money?

Although not conflating the use of our phone with the use of AI, it is almost impossible not to use it as any question we ask our phone initially brings up an AI answer. It can be used to help us organise our day, to remind us of certain tasks and how to avoid procrastination - more like a personal assistant. In addition, some now use AI for emotional support. But we do have to be aware of the dangers of asking for advice with relationships and how to manage our feelings. I am going to cite here what Pope Leo XIV has recently said about AI (and thanks to Alistair Campbell from The Rest is Politics for highlighting this section from his encyclical on artificial intelligence). Whilst I am not religious it is clear that there is wisdom and truth here.

"So-called artificial intelligences do not undergo experiences, they do not possess a body, they do not feel joy or pain, do not mature through relationships, and do not know from within what love, work, friendship or responsibility mean. Nor do they have a moral conscience since they do not judge good and evil, grasp the ultimate meaning of situations or bear responsibility.

They may imitate language, behaviour and analytical skills, or even simulate empathy and understanding. But they do not understand what they produce for, they lack the effective relational and spiritual perspective through which human beings grow in wisdom. Even when machines excel in efficiency, a human face that asks to be gazed upon remains the center of our history."

As human beings we need connection with other human beings, not a device. Let us not ignore those who really are closest to us, who know us and can genuinely empathise with us, who can listen with interest but also challenge us gently. Surely they deserve our time and focus much more than a commercialised gadget we have been trained to keep by our side at all times?

After writing this blog unsurprisingly this article from The Guardian came up on my feed. It may help to give you some tips on how to cut down on your screen time.

https://www.theguardian.com/thefilter/2026/jun/04/how-to-reduce-your-screen-time