Turn Your Smartphone to a Simple Voice Phone

1. Turn off the notifications

We do not want unwarranted distractions of any kind. We have let go of everything to live in the moment. Therefore we cannot allow our smartphones to distract us once in a while. Only we must decide when we want to be distracted. To avoid unnecessary distractions, deactivate the notifications of your phone except for calls and personal messages.

The goal is to only allow important notifications. That is, those that are personally addressed to us, and not allow any other unnecessary notification. In this way, we will only be distracted when someone talks to us or when we deliberately decide to distract ourselves. Let's regain control of our time and don’t give away our concentration.

2. Leave the essentials

How many times have we looked at the screen of our smartphones and ended up doing something else that we had not planned to do? When it comes to (accidental) distractions, the less the better.

We will start by deleting all those applications that we never use. Here we do not need to reflect much as we can always reinstall them in the future.

Once we only have installed only those applications that we use, we will evaluate the ones that we do use. It is not enough that we use an application every day, we must consider if it makes us happier.

3. Clear the home screen

You have already deleted all the applications that you do not use. And of those that you used often, you have been left only with those that add some kind of value to your life. Now you have to organize them.

Let's imagine for a moment that you have a fondness for skiing and that every winter you go skiing. No matter how minimalist you are, you probably haven't gotten rid of your ski gear, since even though you don't use it often, it has a seasonal utility and partly contributes to your happiness. The same thing happens with applications. You’ve already filtered them and you have kept the essentials, but we do not want to see all the applications every day or every time we turn on our phone screen. We don't want either temptations or distractions every time we look at the time.

This last trick consists of simply putting in a folder (or eliminating from the home screen or main screen) all those applications that you do not use more than once a day. The goal is to have the home screen as clear as possible.

Goodbye to notifications, applications that don't make us happier, and distractions. This is a clear example that minimalism is not limited to material objects and also has a place in the digital sphere and that it is possible to have a simple voice phone.