I’d have a hard time staying in touch with most of my associates if I didn’t include my  handset. But when we really do spend time together, I often wish we didn’t have smartphone at all– particularly if my companion doesn’t stop looking at theirs.

At some point, we’ve all been  phone-snubbed. That’s what happens when the people you’re spending time with seems more interested in their phone than you. You might be sitting right across from people, but when they’re laughing at a picture or image only they can discover, it feels like they’re a million miles away.

I’ve been innocent of paying more attention to my display than my friend and felt terrible about it afterwards. There’s nothing wrong with replying to an immediate Slack information or pulling up a humorous TikTok to communicate. But I know I definitely spend too much time staring at screens, and a lot of that day is bad doomscrolling. These times, when I’m not using my phone, I try to be more intentional about keeping it out of sight and out of mind. If I do need to keep my phone at side, I always have it face downward.

It may protect your phone camera

I have a couple reasons for making sure my mobile camera is turned away. The first one is useful: When my phone isn’t in my pocket, it’s likely sitting on a desk or table– which means it’s perhaps not far from a glass of fluids or mug of coffee.  

As a fairly clumsy man, I’ve spilled drinks on my telephone plenty of times. And even though most present apps are water-resistant, why take chances? With my camera hidden, I can maintain the most important part of my telephone protected from sprays and other errors.

For additional security, I have a  mobile case  with increased sides. This helps avoid the display from coming in direct contact with pieces and dust that might be left on the table.

My colleague David Carnoy told me about an event where he was charging his cellphone on his home desk with the camera face up. People dropped a tumbler on top of it and cracked the camera. Sadly, he didn’t have a screen protector on this machine ( he knows better then ).

It may help protect your smartphone battery

Another good reason to keep my phone experience down is that it didn’t turn on each day I get a warning. That means I can keep a little bit of power demand.

A second warning didn’t mean the difference between my telephone lasting the whole day or dying in the evening but notifications  you add up, particularly if I’ve enabled them across all of my programs. If I’m in a lot of team chats, my screen may end up turning on dozens of times throughout the day ( and that’s on the lower side– some teenagers  have hundreds  of messages a morning ).

It also shows that you pay interest

Keeping my mobile mouth down is also a good concept of cultural etiquette: If I’m hanging out with one, I keep my camera hidden from view as a simple way of showing that I won’t be distracted by it. I don’t like incoming messages to light up my camera every few seconds, especially if I’m in a club or another dimly lit environment. I want to keep my eyes on the guy I’m talking to.

“Eye email is one of the most effective forms of human connection. Neuroscience study indicates that when two persons make direct eye contact, their mental activity begins to integrate, supporting more effective communication and increasing empathy. This dynamics can be disrupted when focus shifts to a phone, yet quickly,” says Michelle Davis, medical psychologist at Headspace.

When I’m with the people I’ve chosen to spend time with, I want to become fully present with them. A sudden warning did encourage me to look at, or worse, pull up my phone in the middle of a discussion.

It minimizes your camera’s appearance

I also have a more specific reason for keeping my mobile face down and I suspect that other people have had this exact thought: My mobile takes up too much space in my life.  

I mean that very actually. My telephone is bigger than it needs to be. That’s been particularly genuine since I upgraded from my phone Mini to a “normal-sized” phone. Yes, I got a much needed boost in power life  but I even got a camera with more dots to pull me into the next news article or autoplaying Instagram clip.

A little handset isn’t something that really exists nowadays. My telephone is bigger and better at grabbing my interest. It competes against my friends and family, books and movies, the entire world outside of its 6-inch camera. It usually wins. But there’s still one little thing I can do to reduce its occurrence: I may keep the camera turned aside from me whenever feasible.

It can sometimes feel like there’s no escaping from my phone. Whether that ever changes, or phones evolve into some new form factor, I can’t say. I can’t control everything about my phone but I can control whether the screen stares at me when I’m not staring at it.