These days, our smartphones are increasingly at the heart of our everyday lives, and most people rely on these devices in order to do everything from tracking their next dentist appointment, to planning their next workout.
As smartphones have become more and more advanced, however, they have also become more and more vulnerable and more and more of a potential issue. Knowing How To Use Your Mobile Device Safely and avoid scams, viruses, and other forms of exploitation, is essential.
It’s also essential to be able to save yourself from falling into a spiral of perpetual distraction and procrastination thanks to your smartphone, which is why certain “distraction-busting” services such as Freedom web blocker exist.
All the same, there are definitely various things you could do with your phone, that you might not yet be doing, to make everyday life more interesting.
Here are a few suggestions.
Use it to play interesting audiobooks as you go about your daily business
Thanks largely to Amazon’s Audible platform, audiobooks are now more accessible and widely listened to than ever before, and a huge amount of audiobook listening is done on phones and other mobile devices.
Using your phone to listen to interesting audiobooks is as simple as signing up to a supported service, installing the app, saving the audiobook for off-line listening, and then enjoying the book as you go about your everyday business.
If you’re not already using a phone to listen to audiobooks while you do the dishes, handle your grocery shopping, or walk to the store, you are missing out.
There’s an entire world of fascinating novels and other engaging stories out there to enjoy, that can carry you away to rich and rewarding realms of the imagination. There are also all sorts of non-fiction books that you could listen to, and that could give you a deep and interesting look into topics ranging from things like history to sport, cooking, science, culture, and more.
Sitting down to read a book in the traditional way is a great thing, and has various unique benefits. But it also requires you to sit still and commit to reading the book and doing nothing else at the same time.
Audiobooks completely change the game. They’re like having your own personal storyteller or lecturer available at all times.
Capture moments of inspiration using voice recordings
Over the course of day-to-day life, while on the go and caught up in the obligations of the moment, there’s a good chance that you will from time to time experience certain flashes of inspiration, or ideas that you could really benefit from holding onto.
Unfortunately, what usually ends up happening for most people, most of the time, is that those golden ideas and flashes of insight get lost in the chaos of the day, and end up forgotten about completely.
But who knows what million-dollar ideas you might be letting slip, or what important reminders or insights you might be forgetting, that could have made your life richer and more interesting if you had just been able to hold onto them?
One of the great features that just about every smartphone has, is the ability to take quick voice notes or voice memos on the go, in order to capture those important snippets of information.
Of course, you could also create audio logs just to commemorate important or noteworthy experiences that you’ve had during the day – both for yourself to look back on fondly, and also potentially for your family, friends, and even descendants.
Use a photo journaling app to keep a visual record of your everyday experiences
Up until very recently, “journalling” was solely an introspective kind of writing exercise that had to be done in physical notebooks, and where you always had to be at least a bit paranoid that someone was going to stumble across your journal and page through it.
These days, though, there are all sorts of different powerful journaling apps that exist for smartphones which allow you to not only jot down quick text journal entries in the usual way, but that also allow you to keep a visual record of your everyday experiences in the form of a “photo journal.”
Day One is a highly popular app for Mac and IOS that lets you quickly and easily start and maintain a photo journal, and even allows you to get your journal turned into a book via a partnership with a print on demand services, if you so desire.
As the saying goes, “a picture is worth a thousand words.” So, how about choosing to commemorate and keep track of your days with a photo journal?
Use a habit tracking app to remind you to regularly do interesting things
Momentum and inertia are very real forces that affect all of us in our everyday lives.
When you’ve made a certain course of action into a habit, it can be – if anything – difficult to stop doing it.
On the other hand, when you have allowed yourself to lapse into a state of inertia, it can be very difficult to get back to doing the things that you know will enrich your everyday life and have a great positive effect on you as a whole.
Maybe there are things that you want to do, that you know will make your life better if you stick with them. Things like attending a class you’ve signed up for, or working on a personal project of yours.
It might just be that one of the best ways of helping yourself to remain “on track” with these habits of yours, could be to use one of the popular habit-tracking apps and services that are available for Android and iOS.
Today is an iOS exclusive habit tracker app that is known for its beauty and simplicity. Habitify is a cross-platform habit tracking service that offers you more in the way of metrics, trends and data.
