A day in the life : Day 444

This week, I ran into a small but annoying problem with notifications. My phone kept lighting up with updates from apps I barely use, and it was breaking my focus more than I realized. Around the same time, I noticed a trend coming back — people doing “notification diets,” where they only allow alerts from things that truly matter. It sounded a bit extreme, but the constant buzzing was starting to get on my nerves.

I didn’t turn everything off. I just went through each app and asked myself one simple question: do I really need to know this right now? Most of the time, the answer was no. Messages from people stayed on. News, random reminders, and marketing pings went off. The silence that followed felt strange at first, almost like something was missing.

Midweek, I missed one non-urgent update because I’d turned its alerts off. It caused a minor delay, nothing serious. But it showed me that this kind of cleanup needs a bit of fine-tuning. Not everything can be silent, but not everything needs to be loud either.

The weather’s been warm and a bit draining, so I’ve been eating lighter meals and drinking more water again. When your body already feels slow, constant interruptions just make it worse. Fewer alerts made afternoons feel less scattered.

By the end of the week, my phone felt more like a tool and less like a distraction. I still checked things, just on my terms.

This trend isn’t about disconnecting from the world. It’s about choosing what gets your attention. When fewer things shout for it, the ones that matter stand out more. And that makes it easier to focus without feeling cut off.