Some days I purposefully leave my Airpods at home and instead of riding the bus or metro glued to my phone, I sit there, silently.

I watch everyone else with their heads down and ears stuffed. Most commuters are listening or watching something. Which is what I also normally do but as I said, some days I don’t.

During this time I can hear and see it all. The sounds of footsteps of people walking through the train station are louder. I can see the details on people faces. I wonder why one stranger is reading some sort of handwritten letter. Was it from an ex-lover? I don’t know.

Cutting the constant stimulus from my phone also lets me finally sift through my mental backlog I’ve been neglecting.

I think for most of the time I wear my Airpods or instinctively reach for my phone, I’m really just self-soothing. I don’t know what else to do with myself so I pull out my digital dummy and start sucking at the tit of big tech.

When I revolt from this cope, I often notice a small number of other people in public silently existing in their own space. This makes me wonder who they are and why they’re checked out? Or perhaps the better way to describe them is checked in. Two sides of the same screen I guess.

It’s scary when you realize how valuable our attention is an how easily we can give it away. Even when I’m out and about, walking, browsing stores, or doing any kind of task, I often find myself blasting music or a podcast into my ears. It’s almost too easy to just put in your headphones and not have to think, or better yet, interact with someone.

Existing in my own bubble is much easier. Perhaps that’s why the algorithms have become so addictive, because they serve me exactly what it knows I will likely engage with.

Hence why I need to do things like purposefully leave my Airpods at home, even if it means learning to embrace a little boredom on the bus.

Ironically though, I wore my Airpods on the way to work this morning.