Many of us executives, leaders and entrepreneurs are highly dependent on technology in our everyday lives. It has become an unhealthy technology addiction situation for many of us.  We deal with all kinds of information and media coming at us all day and night. If we’re not careful, it becomes an unhealthy addiction.

Here are some excellent recommendations for all of us to maintain when it comes to technology:

To avoid technology addiction, stop looking at computer, phone and tablet screens at night.

Researchers found in 2013 that the light coming off of our electronic devices can affect our melatonin levels. In simple terms, the chemicals we need to go to sleep (melatonin) are negatively affected when we are looking at the light that comes off our devices. Take a look at the research study for more information: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0003687012001159

Stop reading your email throughout the day.

According to a Fast Company article, we spend 13 hours a week on email. This article claims that we check our emails on an average of 15 times a day. Does your brain get a break from thinking about what it takes in from your email inbox? It’s doubtful. This is a classic case of addressing the urgent matters at the cost of the important ones. This articles recommends that you check your email three times a day. This approach makes sense and keeps the anxiety of “missing that important email” to a minimum. Check out this article: https://www.fastcompany.com/3043689/6-ways-to-cut-the-amount-of-time-you-spend-on-email

Stay away from binging on social media first thing in the morning.

Your brain has been processing things during your sleeping hours. Now it’s ready to go and wants new information to process. So what do you give it? Just like you wouldn’t give your body a lot of empty calories and loads of sugar, you don’t want to give your brain a load of worthless things to consider. Catching up on the latest music trends, finding out what happened on the latest episode of “The Bachelor”, and getting involved in political debates is probably the worst way to wake up and get moving. Instead, give yourself a diet of balanced, healthy and positive information to process. You don’t want to wake up and try to process a crisis, either – which social media is full of crises for you to think about. Skip it.
Look at this conversation on Quora: https://www.quora.com/How-do-I-avoid-looking-at-social-media-as-soon-as-I-wake-up

Set goals, eat well and exercise every day.

Sure, we know these things are good for us. If we maintain these good habits, our brain won’t be bugging us for other stimuli as much. When you consider that your brain is the number one organ for energy usage, you want to make sure you are fueling it for maximum performance. By giving it productive things to think about, and then giving it plenty of good fuel and exercise, you’re optimizing your brain for best performance. You won’t need that phone or that tablet as much as you thought you did.

This article gives us some healthy recommendations in place of our cell phones: http://www.webmd.com/balance/features/morning-habits-health-experts-swear-by

The closing thought: give your brain a break. Avoid the unhealthy causes of technology addiction. Monitor how much technology you take in and manage it well.