I have found myself mindlessly scrolling Facebook and Instagram instead of engaging my mind. It’s easy just to sit and open the apps up rather than find something fun to do.

Nathan uses a site blocker when he tries to focus – unfortunately it isn’t compatible with my phone. So we looked up various apps for focusing/blocking sites.

I found this one called “Forest” and it is my first day with it, but I have only been on Instagram/Facebook very briefly when I got home from work. And I have 17 trees/bushes planted from 9.5 hours of focused time – this means that I did not use my phone over the course of the day for a total of 9.5 hours!

The way the app works is that you select an amount of time (90 minutes is my “go to” for hanging with baby Eva between naps). Then pick the activity (work, rest, study, entertainment, friends, etc). Once you click PLANT, the tree or bush grows over the period of time you picked – But if you close the app to do something else during that time, within a minute, you get a notification saying to go back to the app and focus before your tree dies.

I had two trees die because I was texting someone quickly but the conversation went on too long…

I think it is effective for me during the work day and hopefully it will mean I am not as interested at home as well. I had it on while I was relaxing and working out.