Alex is fed up with his parents’ complaints about his phone overuse. To prove them wrong, he tracks his screen time and his online activities over the space of a week. The honest results are… well… mind-boggling.
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Is Entertainment Bad ?
Entertainment is anything that amuses, pleases, or diverts. It is engaging and grabs our interest and attention . Entertainment can be experienced through sight and hearing, whether in private or in public, and ranges from movies, TV shows and concerts to books, games, and social media. People see indulging in entertainment as a waste of time. Intellectuals even look down on entertainers but they actually play a major role in the society.
Helps with Burnout
When you are burnt out, you feel exhausted physically or emotionally, causing you to lack motivation. This is usually because of prolonged stress or frustration. Entertainment helps people with burnout because it can provide an escape from the burdens and responsibilities of life for a moment. It is a great relaxation tool that relieves stress and cools down your overheating brain. When you are done, you’ll find out that you are more productive. Are you in low spirits? Try watching a funny video and see if it lifts your mood.
Boosts your Creativity
Inspiration comes when you interact with the various entertainment platforms. You get exposed to other creative people and their craft. It is a great place to get ideas. Are you stuck or creatively blocked and don’t know what to do? Watch a movie or read a story about your field of interest and see the ideas that will flood your mind.
Edutainment
Entertainment helps you to gain knowledge and understand concepts that may be hard to grasp in a formal setting. It presents information in a casual and fun way. It also exposes us to new places, different people and their cultures. Some of us have never left our countries but we can engage with and at least have a vague idea of other cultures and other areas of life that we may not specialize in like law, medicine, and art .
Entertainment teaches life lessons in a way that isn’t too preachy, you can even learn soft and even hard skills through entertainment.
Games can even help you do better in school. Puzzles, trivia, and other related games, challenge the brain and can improve focus and memory.
One Love
Entertainment makes the world a global village and fosters community. It is the greatest platform for connecting with others. We are able to laugh with strangers in the theatres, root for our favourite sports teams, and there are wholesome social media trends that bring us together. It also encourages empathy and cultural understanding, as media teaches us more about a people than the stereotypes and one-dimensional stories we may have heard.
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BUT
Entertainment also has harmful effects. As they say, too much of everything is not good. Getting to unhealthy levels just to be entertained can cause problems. This content is usually addictive and affects the thinking capacity, literally rotting the brain, hence the term brain rot. Brain-rot entertainment is easy to consume but lacks substance and requires little to no brainwork. The term “brain rot” refers to how low-quality internet content may slow your brain function. It’s usually tied to watching specific types of content. It is the “mental or cognitive decline that seems to happen when you consume too much unchallenging or trivial content online.”
The Ultimate Thief
Playing games, watching movies, and so on can get you hooked to the point that you neglect everything else. Nothing seems to matter in that moment. You say to yourself, ” Just one more video. I’ll stop in the next 5 minutes,” but hours pass and your work stares you in the face, undone. What about the distraction that comes with checking your phone while doing tasks? Indiscipline with phone use affects your productivity and causes you to churn out average and even bad work because you are rushing to meet deadlines. It could lead to the point of addiction and brain-rot content becomes a strategy to avoid tasks that seem challenging. Entertainment can also steal your sleep time. Sleep is important for a healthy brain function and your phone should not be in the way.
Wasting your time is wasting your life and time lost can not be regained. Don’t let a phone stop you from realizing your full potential and exploring your creativity.
Eats Your Brain
Excessive consumption of brain-rotting content affects your ability to think critically. Entertainment is usually consumed passively and lacks substance. As a result, your analytical skills could weaken as brain-rot entertainment doesn’t stimulate the intellect.
People complain that this generation has a short attention span. Studies1 have demonstrated the detrimental effects of one’s smartphone on cognitive function e.g. working memory , attention and decreased cognitive ability with increasing attachment to one’s phone. We have witnessed the surge of bite-sized content. In the long run, it becomes difficult to focus on activities that require long hours, patience, and perseverance.
Mental health
People try to put on a perfect image on social media. This leads people to compare themselves to others. Comparison can be toxic and make you feel like you’ve fallen short and aren’t good enough. This can lead to depression and other mental health-related issues. Addiction to entertainment can make you feel bad and worthless but feel powerless to get out of that funk. This makes you feel worse and use entertainment as a coping mechanism and the cycle continues. Social media is known for cyberbullying. People are quick to judge and lash out at other people to fill the void and divert attention from their own insecurities. Even while being a victim of bullying, it can be hard to leave when there are no physical interactions, so the situation gets worse.
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Negative Social Effects
Entertainment ought to bring us together but it can be harmful when it becomes a breeding place for lies, unhealthy arguments, and bullying. It influences viewers negatively when the media reinforces stereotypes and promotes an unhealthy lifestyle.
The world is now a global village with the advent of the internet. We ought to be closer together and have understanding and unity. But the downside is that we are more selfish and self-centered as we don’t interact with people in physical spaces as much.
The Cure
1) Cease and Desist
Set limits to reduce your time on social media and other apps that don’t contribute to your productivity. If the damage is too severe, you can log out of the app or delete it entirely. There are no scroll web extensions and focus apps that block distracting apps, so that you don’t get sidetracked while performing tasks. You don’t have to do it alone; there are no scroll and anti-scroll clubs to hold you accountable and keep you on track.
2) Learning is fun
Not everyone enjoys school, but there are many ways to educate yourself besides the traditional path. Look out for educational content that imparts knowledge in a unique and engaging way. I’m talking podcasts and audiobooks if you’re an auditory learner or animated explainer videos if you prefer visuals to reading books, and so on. Librivox is a site where you can listen to free audiobooks. YouTube channels like Crash Course and Extra History teach history in a way that makes you laugh while learning .
Gaming can actually bring out the brainiac in you. Instead of mindless games, strengthen and sharpen your thinking faculty while having fun with apps like Neuronation and Peak.
3) Phoneless hobbies
A. Set your phone aside and pick up board games. You’ll gain soft skills like strategizing and problem-solving. It’s also a great way to connect with people. Get ayo2 and play with your parents, they’ll secretly praise you for being grounded; “Ah, my child has not forgotten his roots.”
B. The Artistic You
Take a break from passive consumption and try new things. You’ll tap into a creative side of you that you never knew existed. Read a book You could try writing. It’s a good skill to have as it helps you express yourself. Get that jotter and start scribbling your thoughts and stories. You could try drawing and painting. It helps you pay attention to details and appreciate the world around you. Don’t think too much about being perfect, just have fun. Music is another great option. Try to learn a musical instrument. Take the bold step and use your leisure time to do things you haven’t done before. Improve yourself while being entertained.
C. Gist
Relating with others is the quickest and most engaging way to learn. You can gain easy access to info that would otherwise have taken you years. It stimulates your brain as you learn to think on your feet, present your ideas, and develop your communication skills.
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Dopamine Menu
Dopamine is a hormone that, amongst other things, deals with our feelings of pleasure. The brain releases dopamine when you derive pleasure from doing something, and as such, you’d want to keep doing it. This is a major reason for addiction and doomscrolling, binge-watching. Creating a dopamine menu basically gives you a healthier way of deriving pleasure and satisfaction by providing alternative sources of excitement and enjoyment.
Divide your hobbies and sources of entertainment like a food menu : appetizer, main course, desserts and so on. It’s just an easy way to lay it all out so that you don’t focus on only one mode of entertainment, which would most likely be brain rot.
Appetizers are activities that you’ve decided to do in less than 15 minutes . You can do them in between breaks while you’re working. E.g. journaling, exercise, going for a walk.
The main course takes over 30 minutes and that time should keep you “edutained”, not watching every video on your TikTok feed . E.g. watching educational videos, documentaries, or reading one chapter of a personal development book.
Sides are activities that you can do while performing other tasks. E.g. listening to music, a podcast or an audiobook.
For Dessert, you can decide to relax with a movie, a novel or social media.
Specials are for the non-routine. Do something different, treat yourself to the movies, learn something new, or find a new hobby.
Boredom is Good
Whether you’re a chronic doom scroller or a workaholic, you can benefit from shutting everything out. Be comfortable with silence. Your mind needs time to refresh and reboot. Silence helps with focus and concentration. The movie Winnie the Pooh says that, “Doing nothing often leads to the very best something.”
Entertainment is essential for a balanced life, as the saying goes: all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. It is not a crime to watch TikTok videos or play games, but moderation is key. The mobile device was made for man, not man for the device. So, let’s use it as a tool to learn, get things done, relax and connect with the rest of the world. Go outside, take a walk and have meaningful conversations. You will surely become healthier and a better version of yourself. I’m rooting for you.
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- Emanuel R, Bell R, Cotton C, Craig J, Drummond D, Gibson S, et al. The truth about smartphone addiction. Coll Stud J. 2015. Summer;49(2):291–9. [Google Scholar] ↩︎
- Ayo (Opon Ayo and Ayo Olopon) is a traditional game played by the Yoruba people of Nigeria. It’s a two-player board game played in a carved wooden box, containing twelve holes (six holes on each side), and forty-eight Ayo seeds (four seeds in each hole). ↩︎
