The Ultimate Gen X Guide To Ditching Your Smartphone

We rode off into the sunset blasting eclectic mix tapes with nothing but a dying pager connecting us to the outside world.

We danced at raves and smoky goth clubs until dawn, raced home to check the answering machine and used the library card catalog to write essays.

Gen X, what happened? We used to be cool.

Though we have very little evidence of that coolness. Nobody had smartphones to document the long, humid evenings in the garden of a boho coffee shop. Nobody posted fit checks of their Doc Martens paired with floral skirts.

And many of our deepest friendships survive now only in black-and-white yearbook photos.

But we still have vivid memories of how it felt when an obscure song by The Cure came on the radio.

Because we lived in the present moment and had few distractions to whisk us away from our feelings.

We were the last analog generation before the onslaught of smartphones.

And you’d think we wouldn’t give up our analog pleasures that easily. Because we knew – better than anyone – how good it felt to lie in the grass between classes or gossip over endless coffee refills at Denny’s.

But here’s the irony: we’re just as trapped in the pit of the bottomless scroll as anyone else.

Social media promised us a space to express ourselves, make new friends and stay in touch with old ones. So we reluctantly signed up for Facebook even though we already had MySpace.

Did we ever imagine, decades later, that we’d be riveted to our screens watching AI videos of cats making hot chocolate and arguing with bots over the ethics of free school lunches?

Probably not. But here we are: nostalgic for that golden analog childhood – but powerless to log off our screens.

We don’t want to lose touch. We need social media to learn new air fryer recipes and our next book club pick.

But here’s the harsh truth: Gen X spends roughly 4-5 hours daily on their phones, mostly on Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram.

And more than half are actively unhappy about it, with 50-60% of Gen Xers saying they use their screens too much and feel digital fatigue.

So what are we going to do about it?

The digital detox guide

We all miss growing up analog.

But here’s the good news: cultivating a more offline life doesn’t require learning a completely new skill. We just need to reactivate the muscle memory we already have.

So how can we harness that nostalgia for our offline teenage years to motivate ourselves to get off that damned phone now?

1. Listen to music – and do ONLY that

From rough and loud grunge, to New Wave, Hip Hop and Electronica, Gen X loved its music. We grew up polyjamorous and witnessed the explosion of several massive movements from Seattle to SoCal.

Music defined our identities as goths, ravers or skaters. And it shaped our communities as we gathered in independent record shops, passed out flyers to indie gigs and traded CDs of obscure bands.

But when was the last time you really listened to music? I don’t mean a Spotify playlist to create a particular ambiance.

I mean just laying back and listening to an entire album?

Set aside an evening to listen to a few of your favorites. Focus on the lyrics, the melodies and the transitions.

Listening to music:

• heals a fractured attention span
• triggers a flow state that boosts relaxation and creativity
• de-escalates your nervous system
• lowers cortisol (the stress hormone)
• accesses unprocessed emotions.

And you can dance to it.

2. Get a radio alarm clock

Screens thrive in the bedroom. And most of us scroll to fall asleep – and check our phones the minute we wake up.

Give your brain a better start to the day.

Buy a classic, standalone radio alarm clock. And wake up to music or the local news for an immediate screen-free buffer.

The songs and chatty DJs give you something to focus on besides your email inbox and your cousin’s vacation photos.

3. Reframe your thinking

Recognize that social media is a corporate tracking device designed to collect your data and feed you ads.

It profits off your fragmented attention span – and it only wants to keep you scrolling. It wants to keep you reliant, addicted and weak.

We’re the generation that birthed Rage Against the Machine and we’re not built for that kind of digital slavery.

So the next time you see a waiting room, an airport lounge or a line at the cafe, notice how everyone is bent over their screens.

Is that the life we dreamed about when we snuck out to see Metallica in concert?

4. Replace Facebook likes with phone calls

I know calling people out of nowhere is kind of rude.

But we grew up waiting around for hours just to hear a “what’s up?” from our crush. We knew how to stay on the phone all afternoon chatting.

You can still call someone for no practical reason.

Call an old friend and ask them how they’ve been. Have a mindless chat about the new dip you discovered at the Farmer’s Market. It doesn’t have to be profound. Just talk.

It’s good for the soul – and a lot better than online drama, rage bait and political arguments.

5. Read the Sunday paper

The Sunday paper is thick and full of lifestyle features, reviews of your local restaurants and event listings you won’t find in the echo chambers of Facebook.

Swap your digital news for the pleasures of a weekly magazine or Sunday newspaper.

Gen X grew up in a golden age of print journalism and there’s nothing as comforting as sleeping in and flipping through the newspaper on a quiet morning with a coffee.

6. Swap your notes app for a bullet journal

Ditch the overflowing notes app and the folders full of assorted screenshots, schedules and lists.

Consolidate everything in a physical bullet journal, which gives you a clear system to gather your daily to-do lists, random thoughts, work projects and appointments.

As Gen X, we grew up with physical planners, handwritten notes passed behind the teacher’s back and ranting diary entries.

Get back to writing longhand to sharpen your focus and boost mindfulness. Handwriting has a slew of benefits that typing on a screen can’t compete with.

7. Dust off your old analog hobbies

Gen X grew up with analog hobbies, from gluing collages for local zines to doodling favorite comic book characters.

Maybe you spent hours reading song lyrics inside CD booklets and taking quizzes in teen magazines. Or maybe you painted your Converse sneakers and made collages from photos developed at your local drugstore.

Gen X was a crafty, hands-on generation who invented countless solutions to boredom.

But now our smartphones are an easy source of quick entertainment – and we scroll by default whenever we have a free moment.

Spend a weekend reconnecting with your favorite teenage analog hobbies. Chances are, they’ll still make you happy.

Dig up that set of watercolor paints you bought last year and were meaning to try. Or take an adult ballet class if you grew up in the studio.

We spent years growing up fighting to be ourselves in a world of adults who wanted us to conform. And chances are, what brought us happiness then will still make us smile.

8. Put your phone back in the kitchen

Remember running down the hallway to pick up a ringing telephone that was hanging above the kitchen counter?

If you’re Gen X, you grew up with a phone sitting in one particular part of the house (if you weren’t lucky enough to have your own phone in your room).

The phone had its specific spot in the center of the home – and that’s where you made plans with friends, caught up with distant family and made dentist and oil change appointments.

The phone wasn’t an omniscient device that was available anywhere and everywhere.

Why not re-establish that old boundary and keep your smartphone on your kitchen counter? If you need to check your WhatsApp group, you’ll have to physically walk over to the station to access your phone.

This reestablishes your boundaries and keeps you from automatically doomscrolling at every free moment (or picking up your phone hundreds of times a day for no reason).

Read next:

5 Surprising Truths I Learned After A Long Digital Detox

How To Simplify Your Life: 8 Quiet Shifts For Calmer Days

15 Things To Do In The Morning (Instead Of Scrolling)

Reclaim your life from the digital noise.

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