As an advocate for software and digital technology, it’s sad to realize how problematic my relationship with my smartphone became. I’ve found myself wasting hours of my day scrolling different apps that leave me feeling emotionally drained and mentally exhausted. The experiences I once loved - sending and receiving Snaps from my friends, for example - have all been degraded to squeeze attention and money out of their users with relentless notifications, sponsored content, and psychological engineeering.
After cracking the screen on my Pixel for the second time, I decided to switch to a flip phone - partly to have a more durable device, but mostly to break up with abusive apps. It hasn’t been easy, and there are a lot of trade offs, but I’m feeling much better now that my smartphone has a smaller role in my life.
The Cat S22 Flip 🔗
One of the most popular flip phone options in 2025 is the Cat S22 Flip (I’ll call it “the flippy” going forward). It is very similar to the pre-iPhone devices that we loved in middle school. The major difference is the inclusion of a touch screen and the Android Go operating system, which includes things like Gmail, Google Maps, and Play Store.
Doom Scrolling 🔗
When trying to remove destructive apps from my phone in the past, I had always sought like-for-like replacements, for example, replacing Tik Tok with Instagram Reels. I was trying to find a replacement for a behavior I had grown used to. This was just another algorithmic feed of short-form video content engineered to make me depressed and anxious. What did work instead was rediscovering my childhood GameBoy Advanced SP and copy of Pokemon Emerald.
I had thought TikTok was providing me valuable educational content when I would learn something new on the platform, but I was wrong. The actually proportion of videos that provided new and interesting information was very low, and those videos were sporadically spread through my feed encouraging me to keep scrolling for that dopamine hit.
The actual value doom-scrolling provided was to distract my busy mind with a simple, engaging activity. Instagram, TikTok, and countless other mobile apps take advantage of my need for this. Instead of providing value, they are a net-negative. Once I understood this I was able to identify an alternative way to quiet my mind. This is where vintage Pokemon games come in.
Offline games from the early 2000’s were not designed to make you addicted, depressed, or anxious. They were designed to compete for your attention by leveraging positive emotions instead of negative ones. Pokemon Emerald offers a simple adventure, fun battle minigame, a depth of competitive exploration, and random events that can give a massive dopamine boost.
Convenience 🔗
I have long been wary of convenience for the sake of convenience, but I hadn’t realized just how much convenience carrying a smartphone afforded. The cost of convenience is often hidden as loss of privacy or loss of independence. My pocket held the modern, mega-swiss-army knife with GPS, camera, music player, web browser, and so much more. Getting by in modern American society without a smartphone is quite difficult, but the flippy can just about manage.
The flippy has almost all of the features of flagship smartphones, but is extremely difficult to use. Texting more than a sentence is something I reserve for idle times where I have 5-10 free minutes. Typing a destination into the GPS is possible, but almost never worth the hassle. The camera produces images that sometimes struggle to capture the basic elements of the scene. It’s only convenient feature is calling, which turns out to be pretty great if you are trying to ditch addictive smartphone features.
In addition to using my handheld gaming device more, I also use a dedicated camera more (read more on that in this post about digicams). So, I can capture moments with my digicam, fight boredom or quiet my mind with my GameBoy, and make calls with my flippy. I find that I don’t really need much more convenience than that, but I have my PC and smartphone in the event that I do.
Wait, you still use a Smartphone? 🔗
Yes, I ended up repairing the screen on my Pixel and still use it. However, I never switched my SIM back to my pixel, so I can only use it on wifi or through a hotspot from my flippy.
My work requires having access to apps that are only available on most flagship phones, so I can’t fully get rid of it. I also think there are requirements of society that make having a smartphone necessary, for example, to park in my city or access the package locker in my apartment complex. This is really unfortunate.
Not having a SIM installed does mean that I don’t carry my Pixel most places, instead it mostly sits on my desk. I still use it as an audio player to avoid using SoundCloud or YouTube on my work devices. I do carry it with if I’m going somewhere unfamiliar, where it serves as a GPS via hotspot.
Addiction Cured? 🔗
My smartphone addiction isn’t fully cured, but it’s much better. I think curing an addiction requires understanding desires and channeling them into healthy behaviors. My desire for a quiet mind is now addressed through some cozy offline gaming, but a thirst for learning still has me falling down fear-mongering YouTube rabbitholes. I’ll keep working on this; reading has worked in the past and maybe it’s just a matter of keeping diligent.