Fighting Sound and LightSample

Day 2: Inspiration or temptation?

Much of our impulsive phone-checking is initiated by a notification. This is why apps constantly bombard their users with requests to send push notifications––it’s because they work. When you see your phone light up with a little bubble with a picture or text, your brain tells you that you’ve won something. It floods your brain with dopamine like it would if you won a slot machine. And if you receive a notification, the urge to check it is terribly overwhelming, no matter what’s going on around you.

Sometimes, we get notifications from shopping apps like Target or Amazon. They inform us of deals and new items, claiming to inspire our next purchase. Emails now look like how IKEA is different from other furniture stores. In addition to telling you what they have, they also tell you how you could use it and how it would benefit your life. Good marketing does that.

As the end users, though, we must be cautious of how we interact with those messages. Don’t be fooled. Marketers do not intend to inspire you to live a God-honoring life; they intend to inspire you to buy their product. In fact, inspiration is often close to temptation.

Seeing models with their seemingly perfect (but fake) families using a product is said to “inspire” us to live our lives well––like they apparently do...using the products being sold. I think there is no inspiration happening in this scenario. This is temptation and comparison. That advertisement entices you to compare your life to the one you perceive from the ad and tempts you to envy. Envy turns to discontentment and desire for the product.

Today, the question I ask is: Is it worth it? Sure, you might find a good deal one day on something you already meant to get, but is it worth all the times it distracts you and tempts you? One benefit of modern phones is you can control what apps are allowed to send you push notifications. Maybe a huge step to controlling the urge to check your phone is to prevent the thing that entices you: the glowing notification.