Almost every evening, at dinnertime, I have to remind my children to put their phones away. With all of our our busy schedules, I try to make connected time a priority by protecting that time from all other distractions of the day. It’s the place and time where the family can connect and stay in sync. But I have 3 school-age girls who want to stay connected with all of their friends all of the time. When my requests for distraction-free dining didn’t work, my appeal turned into the threat of taking their phones away. It took some effort but we adjusted to a life where there are no phones at the table – period.

It seems quite paradoxical, but staying connected has really disconnected us. It seems like everyone is addicted to their phone. Before we know it, we can be swept up in the never-ending vortex of checking our feeds, emails, and text messages, losing touch with ourselves and the joys of an authentic moment.

What is it that possesses us to be so attached to our screens?

The other day I misplaced my phone and realized that the ringer had been silenced. I thought that I might have left it in the last Uber I had taken. I concluded that there was a low chance that I would be able to recover the phone and that I was going to have to go through the drudgery of buying a new phone, tracking down all of my contacts, and restoring all of the other data on the phone. Soon, total panic came over me. It was like I had lost an eyeball.

One of my cooler-headed friends thought to search for my phone using a “Find My Friends” app. After a few moments of navigating the app (while I managed my little panic attack), she located the device, and its location was much closer than the car I thought was long gone. It was right in front of me on the table.

That experience made me realize that I had a leash. Somehow, I had become emotionally attached to that phone. I was being controlled by that little innocent device. I realized that my phone had become really good at stressing me out and at that moment of clarity, I knew it had to stop. Since then, I have been slowly weaning myself away from my screen time and I don’t plan on reverting back to this smartphone addiction. It’s actually quite liberating and I noticed that I feel more free and present.

There’s also another issue I’m facing. People are so used to me responding immediately to their calls and messages. I normally would respond right away. But the noise was non-stop and I felt like I was in a tunnel where nothing existed outside of my digital conversations – many of them on topics that weren’t important or meaningful. I have been allowing myself to not always be “on” and connected, and I’ve been gently letting people know about my newly-found needs. It’s a restructuring of my time and attention, and I have great friends that have been helpful and accepting.

How did we handle things before the smartphone came along? When I was a kid no one ever called our home during dinner time, because it was considered to be rude. We all waited patiently for responses when we left voicemails. We wrote letters that took days to reach their destinations. What happened to that etiquette?

Now we are in the microwave-era of communication; everything is instant. Many people have no patience for others, and some people don’t even have patience for themselves. Our new accelerated culture of noise and overload may be changing us. We might need to fight for a kind of digital etiquette that helps us ALL to slow down, truly BE with those we care about, eat peacefully, and live intentionally.