I had planned on doing a post at the end of the year sharing all the books I’ve read this year, this book being one of them. After I finished reading this one, though, I realized that it needed a post of its own! (And I still plan to do the end of the year book review post for all the other books I’ve read this year. 🙂) 12 Ways Your Phone is Changing You was so convicting and life-changing. I knew that I had struggled with my screen time and social media habits over the years, but Tony Reinke really made some things click. He gets to the root of unhealthy phone habits – our hearts and the lies of sin. I love the balance he has in this book of taking an honest look at the dangers of technology, but also talking about the blessings of technology and how we can use it for the glory of God.
I told my family that I was going to shout it from the rooftops that every Christian who owns a smartphone should read this book! 😁 I’ve added it to my list of books that have impacted my life the most. Those currently being (besides the Bible, of course): Idols of the Heart by Elyse Fitzpatrick, The Shepherd Trilogy by Phillip Keller, The Power of Prayer in a Believer’s Life by Charles Spurgeon, The Hiding Place by Corrie ten Boom, In His Steps by Charles Sheldon, and then this book.)
And to make this an honest book review, I will mention that there were two things in the book that I personally did not like. Although they were not things that would keep me from reading the book. One was a reference to a magic mirror in the Harry Potter books to illustrate a point; there was also one of the footnotes where the author quotes someone who is talking about beer and wine to make a point about Christianity, and the comments came across as condoning strong alcoholic drink.
Here are the twelve ways that Mr. Reinke says our phones are changing us, along with a short summary of each one, and a quote from the book…
1. We are addicted to distraction
Our phones are distracting us to death – notifications, social media feeds, pings and dings left and right. Mr. Reinke takes an honest look at how our smartphones are adding a lot of unnecessary noise and distraction to our lives, why these distractions lure us, and how we can live an undistracted life for Christ.
“Our smartphones amplify the most unnecessary distractions as they deaden us to the most significant and important ‘distractions’, the true needs of our families and neighbors. My phone conditions me to be a passive observer. My phone can connect me to many friends, but it can also decouple me from an expectation for real-life engagement.” –Tony Reinke, 12 Ways Your Phone Is Changing You
2. We ignore our flesh and blood
Mr. Reinke points out how we know that we should not ignore people around us, but we do it anyway. Our phones can make us more prone to disregarding our flesh and blood neighbors, and even putting them at danger by doing things like being on our phones while we are driving. He also talks about how online connection cannot replace face to face fellowship, and it can lead to us viewing people just as online avatars as opposed to a real-life brother. If we are not viewing people as flesh and blood, then we can be more prone to not treat them as God would have us treat others.
“We assume we can ignore the people we see in order to care for the people we don’t see, but that idea is all twisted backward. We sin with our phones when we ignore our street neighbors, the strangers who share with us the same track of pavement.” –Tony Reinke, 12 Ways Your Phone Is Changing You
3. We crave immediate approval
The online world feeds our craving for immediate approval. Mr. Reinke points out how that in the online world, we can present ourselves in the best possible way, and we can also separate ourselves from people who don’t think like us, and only hang around people who do. This community of like-minded friends gives us a constant loop of affirmation. Mr. Reinke reminds us where we should be seeking our approval – from God, and it is the kind of approval that lasts much longer than the fleeting approval of man.
“The buzz of social approval has conditioned us to feed on ‘regular micro-bursts of validation given by every like, favorite, retweet, or link.’ This new physiological conditioning means that our lives become more dependent on the moment-by-moment approval of others.” –Tony Reinke, 12 Ways Your Phone Is Changing You
4. We lose our literacy
Mr. Reinke starts out this chapter stating how our Christian faith is built on, and we are spiritually fed from a book, THE Book – the Bible. Yet in our digital age, books are considered boring and a lot of people are reading less of them. Digital text is conditioning us to read over things more quickly and not linger over and really internalize what we are reading, and our concentration muscles are weakened.
“With digital text on our phones, we are conditioned to skim quickly. With a printed book in hand, we naturally read more slowly, at a pace realistic for retention. Simply put ‘If you want to internalize a piece of knowledge, you’ve got to linger over it.’ But we have been trained to not linger over digital texts.” –Tony Reinke, 12 Ways Your Phone Is Changing You
5. We feed on the produced
Social media can draw us into constantly consuming and feeding the celebrity culture. Mr. Reinke makes the point that technology can be a positive thing to use as a tool to post Christ-honoring things and point others to God, but he also warns about the danger of posting things that glorify ourselves instead of God.
“People used to do things and then post them, and the approval you gained from whatever you were putting out there was a byproduct of the actual activity. Now the anticipated approval is what’s driving the behavior of the activity, so there’s just sort of been this reversal. Phones with social connections transform us – and our friends and children – into actors. That’s huge.” –Tony Reinke, 12 Ways Your Phone Is Changing You
6. We become what we “like”
Mr. Reinke makes the point that in our search for identity and belonging, we can so often turn to social media and we, in a way, worship ourselves or what people say about us. He says that we have two options: we either worship created idols (which our phones and social media can become), or we worship and find our identity in Christ.
“Like Narcissus staring down into the water, enchanted with himself, we bend over our phones – and what most quickly captures our attention is our own reflection: our replicated images, our tabulations of approval, and our accumulated ‘likes’. Social media has become the new PR firm of the brand Self, and we check our feeds compulsively and find it nearly impossible to turn away from looking at – and loving – our ‘second self’.” –Tony Reinke, 12 Ways Your Phone Is Changing You
sincerely-amanda.com 
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