Thrilled by his initial success, the artist has now traded the instant gratification of Instagram for longer and more meaningful interactions on Substack, takeaways for home-cooked meals and emails for handwritten letters.
“I find the rewards for doing difficult things are absolutely massive,” says Semple. “I grow, I get better at things and I expand.”
Semple and others may be onto something. According to some of the leading experts on the psychology of technology, there is an upside to inconvenience – if it’s harnessed correctly. Strategically adding friction back into our lives by reducing our reliance on technology can retrain our brains for better focus, cultivate resilience and create a positive sense of autonomy.
“We have been letting technology take control of our behaviour,” says Larry Rosen, a research psychologist and professor at California State University, Dominguez Hills in the US, and author of the 2016 book The Distracted Mind. “We have to take back control of ourselves.”
Do our attention spans really need healing?
Awake and asleep, the brain’s attention system hums with activity. When attention is internally directed, toward your emotions, memories and thoughts, the brain’s default mode network is activated. When it’s attuned to the outside world toward what you see, smell, hear, taste, touch and perceive in the environment around you, the brain’s frontoparietal attention network is involved instead. Sometimes attention works automatically, like the way a loud noise might instinctually whip your focus into one direction, while other times it’s voluntary, like the concentrated effort you’re making to read this article.
