I could happily live without a phone. As it is, according to the Android "Digital Wellbeing" tool, I've opened / unlocked my phone only 10-20 times per day for the past week. I actually hate my phone (it's a three year-old budget model) and prefer to do everything on my laptop when I can sit down somewhere and focus.
But I have four small children, and my wife would not be pleased if I told her that I was just getting rid of the thing and would become harder to reach, or wouldn't be able to make an emergency phone call.
However, I'm also in the military and have worked in a number of environments where I couldn't have a phone. In those environments, there's always a 24/7 duty number that I can give my wife to call in an emergency, which someone will answer and start a process to find me.
Edited to add: In either Deep Work or Digital Minimalism, Cal Newport says that his wife made him finally get a phone when their first kid was born.
I could happily live without a phone. As it is, according to the Android "Digital Wellbeing" tool, I've opened / unlocked my phone only 10-20 times per day for the past week. I actually hate my phone (it's a three year-old budget model) and prefer to do everything on my laptop when I can sit down somewhere and focus.
But I have four small children, and my wife would not be pleased if I told her that I was just getting rid of the thing and would become harder to reach, or wouldn't be able to make an emergency phone call.
However, I'm also in the military and have worked in a number of environments where I couldn't have a phone. In those environments, there's always a 24/7 duty number that I can give my wife to call in an emergency, which someone will answer and start a process to find me.
Edited to add: In either Deep Work or Digital Minimalism, Cal Newport says that his wife made him finally get a phone when their first kid was born.