18. Leadership: Take A Break From Technology

Hey, my friend. Welcome back to Leadership in a Nutshell, where we're cracking the code of the driven mind. I am your host, Kenny Chapman. And today is critically important to your sanity, to your success, to your accomplishment, to your implementation. Today's episode, I'm going to break down some strategies around taking technology breaks. Take a break from technology, my friend, and. And watch yourself. Be just enlightened. Watch yourself. You're like, wait a minute, Kenny. Is somebody gonna come down from the mountaintop and scoop me up? I don't know, man. It might happen. Because technology has all of a sudden turned into this kind of gift. And the curse, it's a quote unquote necessary evil. It's designed to completely support and maximize and enhance our lives. And. And yet it also exists as a super big challenge and a massive addiction point. And there's all kinds of challenges that are arising and showing up, and we have new dysfunctions that have come from it. And OCD is showing up at a whole new level. And people that never displayed any types of this type of thing. When you think about how easy it is, Tony Robbins says, repetition is the mother of all skills. And when we start realizing how much we repeat certain things, how easy habits show up in the six dimensions of change. Habit is the second dimension. It's all about creating habits and then controlling habits, being intentional with habits, being aware of habits. It's not that all habits are bad, but understanding what that looks like. If I'm constantly checking my phone, I know for me, the technology has been a super challenge. And I've realized that, you know, I love my free time. I love my ability to embrace technology. I'm super grateful that, as a matter of fact, while I'm recording this episode, I'm spending a month in upstate New York near Christie's father. And the opportunity to travel and do what I do on a virtual basis. Super grateful for that. Now, that being said, if I can do it from anywhere, guess what the problem is? I can do it from anywhere. The problem for you is you are always accessible. The gift is you've got more information to run your business than you've ever had in your life. You can get emails you don't have to take a 30 minute commute to. Oh, man, I forgot to send that one email. I forgot to finish that one task. I can bring it home. I can do it on Saturday. I can do it from Jimmy's soccer game or Sarah's cheerleading practice. I can do it from anywhere. And the next thing you know, you're Doing it from anywhere and you're doing it all the time from everywhere. And that, my friend, becomes a problem. And leadership in a nutshell. Here we are cracking the code of the driven mind and we have got to create a break from technology to give us the space to crack that code. By the way, like what we're doing here. Click that five star rating, give me a quick review and make sure you join us@kennychapman.com group so you can stay connected in the leadership in a nutshell, private community. That being said, let's jump into a few ways that I'm going to encourage you to do this. I don't have this mastered. I'm not here to tell you that. Oh, Kenny's got this all figured out. However, what I have mastered is intentionality. What I have mastered is my desire and my goal to not allow technology to run my life and but rather to be a tool no different than the furnace. I don't leave the furnace on year round. As a matter of fact, in Arizona right now it's 110, 12, 15 degrees. Right. I don't have the furnace on while this is happening in the middle of the summer. However, I cut it off. Sometimes I use it when I need it, I turn it off. I don't run the AC year round either. Why do I use other technology nonstop, like it's going out of stock style? Because the odds are stacked against us. Number one, the people that run, whether it's social media channels, whether it's. They're all built in a scrolling technique and a scrolling feature where they just keep you engaged. There's this fear of missing out gene that continues to drive you. You want to see? Oh, did that get liked? You're stroking your ego. Did I get a, like, did I get a comment? Did I get something? Yes, I'm asking you to rate this and review this. Not just for my own ego. Sure, that's a component of it. Stroke my ego a little bit. Give me a rating. Sure, there's a component of it. I want to know how many listeners I have. I want to know how many people I'm impacting. But that's part of my bigger purpose. It's not so I can go to my friends and go, hey, look at this. Or I don't need that to feel good. I need that so the word spreads so I can impact more people just like you. So that being said, how do we take a better break from technology? Number one, I want you to focus on this planned time. It's A fallacy for you to wake up in the morning and think, okay, I'm just going to use it some today I'm going to find my different. No, you have got to schedule this. No different than you schedule something else. Do you check your phone at church? Some of you don't answer that because you know you're turning off to the side of your pew and looking and going, hey, wait a minute. They think about. There are certain places you would never think about you getting on your phone. Although some of you are on your phone non stop in the most disgusting, the most germ filled place on the planet now, aren't you? When you're in the restroom, in a public restroom, just gross some of you out, didn't I? In a public restroom. We're on our phones, we're doing. Hang on. Stop the insanity, my friend. Create a plan for taking time away. Maybe it's when you exercise, when we go, well, yeah, now I like to have my music, I like to have that, whatever it is, create some space. Don't take it on a walk with you don't have technology engaging when you're eating, especially if you eat with your family. The lovely Christy and I create space to where we can actually have a meal and engage with each other instead of these devices. Right. Make sure you're doing that another time. Your morning routine, make sure that you're not utilizing. Sure, maybe you have a meditation app, maybe you have something that you're utilizing. But make sure that you do not allow these things to sneak in as soon as you get on that device. You know, there are some crazy studies about how many people I won't reflect any statistics on here today because in three months those statistics are going to be completely interrupted as fast as things are changing. Most people sleep with their phone right by their bed and as soon as they wake up, boom, they're on it. No, stop that craziness, my friend, and, and plan time for you to have a break from technology. Second thing, project time. Now, I'm not talking about projecting time. I'm talking about when you are working on projects, when you have certain things that you need to do, maybe you're working on certain. Now I'm going to talk about different from social or your phone versus your computer. So when I'm saying take technology breaks, there's different levels of this. Sure. I'd love to say, hey, take 24 hours, don't get on your phone, don't get on the computer, don't do anything electronically, don't turn on the tv. Most of you just simply aren't ready for that. I know. I take true free days where I take 24 hours. No business conversation, no business reading, no Facebook, no social media. However, I still jump on my phone and text somebody personally. I'll still jump on my phone and plug in an address if the lovely Christy and I are going to find a new coffee shop or go somewhere for lunch. Right? So I'm not going totally technology free, but I'm using it as a tool. So one of the things that's effective is if you're in a project mode and you're writing or you're working on a project at work, you're doing an email batch, whatever it is, turn off those notifications, which is another thing we'll talk about in a moment. But set your phone on airplane mode. Get it away from you, whatever that is, right? Make sure that, that you are mindful of that when you're working on projects. You'll be amazed at how much you can get done. My friend, when you say, hey, I'm not going to squirrel over and look at my phone. I'm not going to go back and forth between tabs, shut all your tabs except what you're working on. You know, everything is designed to get your attention and that's why we've got to create this space. So that being said, let's talk about notification killers. Write that down. You've got to kill your notifications. So, you know, your notifications are your productivity killers. They're hand in hand. They go side by side. We go, wait a minute. You know, I'm getting updates on certain things. I'm getting social, reaching out, oh, hey, this or that. As a matter of fact, at the time that I'm recording this today before I had lunch, I, I got a notification from the weather channel that's got through somehow and snuck up on me and said, oh, you might be having these crazy storms. Well, as I looked at it, we're not having any storms, but it was a sensational technique to get my attention and suck me into their app. And guess what? It damn worked. It worked today and got me sucked into it. And how every single one of these platforms has these things built in to get you in there. Now for me, I went, wait a minute, I know what you're doing. I got right back out, get on to what I'm doing. I keep some notifications there open when I'm on the road, if I don't know is an area that I'm in, maybe you know, thunderstorms pop up, different scenarios like that, whatever it is, use them strategically. However, you've got news outlets open. Some of you, you've got a thing where it's popping up. Here's the layout. Oh, Trump tweeted. Oh, this person said that. Oh, CNN's got that. Oh, Fox has this. Oh, social media that. Oh, my software that, you know, I get my KPIs from my company has this. I have my, you know, some people in my office that notify me if this happens. If you're in type of a service business or manufacturing sales, different things where, you know, you keep score throughout the day. Some of you get notified when a certain sale is made, when you hit a certain level for the day. Stop the craziness. If you can't utilize it to change the game at the moment, you set it into a digestible report and have it sent to you. You do not need to be getting notified of every single thing, every moment of every time going on. That kills your leadership, creativity. It kills your productivity. It makes you stress out. You're on an emotional roller coaster. You're signed up for an emotional roller coaster. It's like watching the stock market throughout the day. That's your emotions. Oh, it's up. I'm excited. Oh, it's down. It sucks. Oh, it's back up. I'm going to be a zillionaire. Oh, it's down. I'm going to die in poverty. You go, holy cow, what's going on? Stop the notifications and set yourself free. Last thing I want to leave you with here today, my friend, is no different than planning time. Using your project time to create a buffer between you and technology. Having those notifications shut down create technology free zones. Have areas where you do not get on your phone. If it's summertime and you're out by the pool, maybe you don't utilize your phone by the pool. If it's a, you know, maybe you have a fire pit and after dinner you hang out with the family and have a fire. It's a technology free zone. You can't have your phone. Your kids can't have your phone. Maybe it's the dinner table. Certainly, you know, maybe if it's hiking for lovely. Christy and I do a ton of hiking. We have what we call our Zen room in our home where we, we do some project work, but we also meditate. We work out in there. We do yoga in there. If I'm not utilizing an app in there or sometimes I'll go in there for creativity. I do not allow myself to bring any technology in there. It's a technology free space because you need to free up your energy to stay connected, to stay grounded. You being in the know has unfortunately unconsciously snuck into where that's when you're most effective. You know what's going on. Stop the madness, stop the gossip, set yourself free and categorize this where you've got. Hey, wait a minute. Last, certainly not least, bedroom technology free zone. Don't sleep with your phone next to you. There's a zillion and five studies about how it's not good for you. Don't use your devices right before you go to bed. I'm not here to beat that drum for you. What I'm here to do is share with you. If you're a driven minded human being is one of the reasons you're listening to this right now. It's super easy to wake up in the middle of the night and go, oh, let me write that down. Let me put that into my project tracking software. Let me type that into my to do list. And what happens, you see an email, somebody on a different time zone had something come in. There was a notification on Facebook or one of your social media platforms. The next thing you know, you're engaged and you're sucked in. Keep your technology out of the bedroom. Okay? So make sure you just the number one thing to do utilizing these techniques and these strategies I'm sharing with you here today, my friend. Very helpful, very beneficial. But the first thing starts with you making a decision and setting intentionality around this. I'm going to be intentional when it comes to where technology can be used, what level it can be used, how often it can be used and and for how long it can be used. Technology is absolutely your friend, but you, my friend, have got to control it. One of you is in control. Make sure it's not the technology. Do me a favor, rate us, review us, join us in our private community. Our Facebook group is kennychapman.com group. Would love to see you in there. I'm your host of leadership in a nutshell. We keep on cracking the code of the driven mind. Stay in touch in until we talk. Make it a better than fantastic week. We'll see you real soon.