What's on your wallpaper?

In reading yesterday’s Daily Stoic email from Ryan Holiday, I learned that the average American checks their smartphone 344 times a day!

Is that news to you, too?

Given the number of functions our phones serve these days, I guess that number should not have come as a surprise.

I just returned from a whirlwind trip to 3 different cities across the country and, in retrospect, I used my phone for seemingly everything – my boarding passes, inflight movies, LYFT rides, accessing hotel reservations, as a room key (a new one for me), for the GPS function, for the QR code function, for emailing, texting, taking photos, and counting my steps. I even used my cell phone for the occasional phone call!

It’s tough to avoid using our devices. Taking time off from them these days involves real planning (and a lot of printing).

That’s why I loved Ryan Holiday’s idea that we use our devices to support us further - finding real inspiration and creating moments of reflection as often as we check them. Holiday's idea was to create a series of downloadable wallpapers that would help us contemplate our character before we contemplate our Twitter feed or Amazon cart. Do you think it might change our social media scrolling habit to read something like Seneca's "He Who is Everywhere is Nowhere" each time we reached for our phone?

What if each time you picked up your cellphone your wallpaper reminded you about the person you wanted to become or something important you were trying to achieve? Maybe it’s not a quote from Seneca or Marcus Aurelius that excites you. Maybe it’s more like your daily intention or your one big goal for the week or the month.

Regardless of what we choose as inspiration or motivation, it’s hard to imagine not moving the needle in a profound way if - 344 times a day - we were reminded of one thing that makes us better or one goal we're trying to achieve by our phones.

What could your wallpaper say to you?

In love and living wisely,

Molly