dopamine-induced excitement is not the same thing as actual happiness.

an intensely focused state of distraction.

so present in the moment that you feel as if you’re outside of time.

when we train our attention on our phones, we miss out on everything else going on around us – and if you don’t have an experience to begin with, then it goes without saying that you’re not going to remember it later. What’s more, when we overload our working memories, we make it harder for our brains to transfer new information to our long-term me

One thought triggers another thought, which triggers another . . . and suddenly, you’ve had a breakthrough.

And just like time, once we’ve spent attention, we can never get it back.

IN THE PAST, if a person described herself as feeling happy, sad, excited, anxious, curious, frustrated, ignored, important, lonely, joyful, and existentially depressed within the space of five minutes, she likely would have received a diagnosis. But give me five minutes on my phone, and I can accomplish this and more.

Smartphones engage in disruptive behaviours that have traditionally been performed only by extremely annoying people.

if you wanted to invent a device that could rewire our minds, if you wanted to create a society of people who were perpetually distracted, isolated, and overtired, if you wanted to weaken our memories and damage our capacity for focus and deep thought, if you wanted to reduce empathy, encourage self-absorption, and redraw the lines of social etique