DIGITAL
BY
CRYSTAL
DUCKER
GOES MAINSTREAM
Revisiting what disconnecting from technology means for spas in 2019
My iPhone’s software updated recently,
and I didn’t notice anything had changed
for a week. Then, I received
a notification I had never
seen before: a screen time
Needless to say, seeing those numbers
was a shock! Earlier this year, I wrote and
posted a LinkedIn article (“Leading the
Digital Wellbeing Movement”) about the
burgeoning trend of digital detox.
Suddenly, the concepts of digital detox
and digital wellbeing have become a very
real part of my life. Now, as the spa
industry leaps into 2019, it seems like a
good time to revisit the importance of this
trend to our industry.
While the concept of deliberately
spending time away from modern
technology is nothing new, the popularity
of the terms “digital detox” and “digital
wellbeing” is.
The first sign of a broad shift was last
May, when Google unveiled forthcoming
tools for Android phones that would track
time and usage across a phone and its
36
PULSE
■
December 2018
report. It informed me of how much time
I spent looking at my phone each day, on
average. My usage was broken down
by category: Reading & Reference,
Social Networking, Productivity.
apps. The suite would also show a wealth
of data on how you use your phone, such
as how many times you unlocked it, or
how many notifications you received.
Google’s term for this new dashboard of
usage data is “Digital Wellbeing,” a
phrase borrowed from spa-industry termi-
nology.
It wasn’t long before Apple and apps
themselves—like Instagram—announced
the launch of their own “digital
wellbeing” tools in 2018. Apple’s suite
includes the ability to schedule downtime
and set daily time limits for apps, in
addition to the aforementioned phone
usage data.
For decades, spas have espoused the
benefits of mindfulness, living in the
present and reconnecting both with
nature and with each other. It seems that
those ideas finally made the leap into
mainstream culture this year. Jeremy
McCarthy, group director of spa and
wellness for Mandarin Oriental Hotel
Group, has been front and center for that
leap. Since Mandarin Oriental first
launched its Global Digital Detox Initiative
in 2016, McCarthy says that “worldwide,
there is greater awareness of the
challenges that life with technology brings