112 How to Decrease Anxiety and Get Focused in a Hyper Texting Digital World with Caitlin Begg
In this episode of the MindBodySpace Podcast, Dr. Juna speaks with SOCIOLOGICAL RESEARCHER AND authentic social founder Caitlin “Caity” Begg about the effects of digital communication and hyper-communication on human relationships and interactions. They discuss how the rise of texting, social media, and constant connectivity has impacted the way we converse, date, work, and even think.
Caity provides insights from her research on improving communication and promoting more presence despite our tech-driven world.
Main Discussion Points:
How asynchronous communication (non real-time like texts) and hyper-communication (excess texts/notifications) causes anxiety and misinterpretations
The importance of establishing communication norms, especially when dating or starting new relationships
How starting the day reading physical books helps focus, productivity, creativity
Caity's “progression to analog” tips like phone-free mornings, taking photo film, and being present with people
Effects of digital communication on social skills and mental health
Advice for parents on limiting screen media for kids and having open discussions
Guest Bio:
Caitlin “Caity” Begg studied sociology at Harvard and wrote her thesis on digital communication and relationships. She founded her company Authentic Social in 2016 to improve workplace communication. Katie speaks globally on making human connections in a tech-driven world.
Company Bio:
Authentic Social provides business and communication strategies for companies, with a focus on optimizing technology's role in human interaction. Their research is aimed at facilitating more effective and less alienating communication in a digital age.
http://linkedin.com/in/caitlinbegg
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The following transcript is automated:
The following transcript is automated:
Dr. Juna: [00:00:00] Hi Caity. Thank you so much for being here.
Caity : So excited to be here. Very, very excited to chat with you. So grateful
Dr. Juna: that you're spinning your Friday afternoon with us. So
Caity (Caitlin): yes, wouldn't wanna be anywhere else.
Dr. Juna: Oh, and I love that neon sign behind you. This must be my dream. Is that something that you look at every day and remind yourself of the dream life you're living?
Caity : So it's actually a song lyric from the 1975 that I. I purchased a while back, uh, when I was still living in a, a studio. I chose the color lighting the pink because I, I like to work and experiment with different lighting. I have a blue neon light as well, so it helps with different moods and different construction of situations in the.
Caity In the office and department, which is nice.
Dr. Juna: So Caity, you're the founder of Authentic Social. You are a sociological researcher, and you founded this in 2016 while you were writing your undergraduate Harvard Sociology honors thesis. So can you tell us a little bit about why you started this and what got you so interested?
Dr. Juna: I'm assuming you grew up with tech, right? You're Gen Z, generation
Caity : Tech. So yeah, I'm a millennial kind of. It's late 94, so kind of that in-between where sometimes they wanna label as millennials, sometimes it's Gen Z, and I actually think that that particular. Year that I was born helped influence a lot of my interest in researching digital relationships.
Caity (Caitlin): Mm-hmm. Because when I was a senior studying sociology, I, you know, when I came in as a freshman, no one had Instagram. Social media was not a big thing. We started to get it freshman year and I started to see how it started to influence social behavior and, and the way that we interacted and how. That feeling where it would be great if you met a new friend and they followed you back, but then friends would mention, oh, this person unfollowed me.
Caity (Caitlin): And just this whole new unchartered territories that started to influence college. And it was really fascinating to me how it also influenced dating because dating apps were launched my freshman year of college and it started to influence the way that people were meeting each other even [00:02:00] on campus.
Caity (Caitlin): And I found that to be very fascinating. And in sociology, a lot of times when you study the most intimate relationships, so if you study kind of, um, dating, You can extract out things actually to more everyday interactions because people are kind of their most vulnerable in that situation. So one of the things that I studied in my, uh, honors thesis is around digital communication and the way that virtual impressions affect the way that we form relationships and perceive each other.
Caity (Caitlin): And so one of the most interesting things that I found was that, Almost a hundred percent of people, 94% of people found that they were anxious, um, while writing text messages or waiting for text messages. And this was in 2016? Mm-hmm. Before, uh, TikTok was a thing and in, in my findings from this study, I.
Caity (Caitlin): At that time, Facebook was the most used social media, and people
didn't
Dr. Juna: spend time. I was gonna say, you were at Harvard. Did they use Facebook a lot when you first got
Caity (Caitlin): there? Yes. Yes. Okay. And people didn't really spend that much time on social media as compared to today? Mm. There's actually over a 50% increase in how much time we're spending today as compared to 2016.
Caity (Caitlin): Mm-hmm. And so we're not only within the context of romantic relationships, but also interpersonal relationships. How sometimes when you send a text message and you don't receive a response, You are free to kind of create your own reality as to why that's the case. Is it that? Is it that they just are busy.
Caity (Caitlin): We don't really know. And so this notion of asynchronous communication, taking over and permeating our every day was fascinating to me.
Dr. Juna: And can you describe a little, um, in layman's terms for the audience, what you mean by
Caity (Caitlin): that? I. The explanation I like to give actually is a little bit longer and it'll help the, the listeners to understand it.
Caity (Caitlin): So in the 1960s to 1980s, everyday conversation involved mostly synchronous communication. So what I mean by that is in your everyday life, the way that you communicated with other people was through face-to-face interaction through the telephone, which although it is. There's [00:04:00] a, an object mediating that.
Caity (Caitlin): It still is synchronous, so it's still in sync. You are hearing someone waiting for the tone, things of that sort. Now what started to happen real time? Exactly, exactly. Now, what started to happen in two thousands was social media and texting started to come about and it started to influence our everyday a little bit.
Caity (Caitlin): Email. Things of that sort. And when emails started to come about, there was this notion of that's what kind of emojis were, and emoticons were invented as a way to express emotion because it doesn't naturally come through in text. Now that mattered and, and in a, in a, in a bit of people's every day. But now, If we think about the, how much we use our phones, we are communicating so often through this asynchronous and not in a steady stream manner.
Caity (Caitlin): So when we are communicating with others, I actually don't really like to call texting a conversation. It's really just exchange of information. It's not truly a conversation and it's, and its actual form because conversation in, its in its, uh, kind of. Real definition is not only exchanging information, but kind of forming relationships and understanding, and there's tone of voice and there's, there's a lot that goes on there.
Caity (Caitlin): It's, it's the exchange of ideas and it's in real time. So that really influences us a lot of ways because it, it. It causes a lot of room for misinterpretation and anxieties and, uh, I see this a lot of times in not only within the, the clients that we work with in, in the workplace and hybrid and remote work, but also within teenagers and, uh, young people.
Caity (Caitlin): And saw it in myself when, when I was in college and, you know, was the reason why I started to do all this research. Mm-hmm.
Dr. Juna: And so when you're talking about, um, Non-real time texting, and you were speaking before about how people get anxious waiting for a text to come back, for example, because there's no real.
Dr. Juna: You know, I guess there's informal rules depending on your age of how quickly you should be getting back to people. Mm-hmm. Right? Yes. [00:06:00] So I had a boss, uh, when I first finished residency, and she wanted it like immediate responses on text and. She was like, oh, you're awesome, because I would text back so quickly, you know?
Dr. Juna: But, um, but certainly there's people who take their time now, and like you said, with dating, especially, like, there's no real rules to like how you're, how quickly you're supposed to respond and, And I doubt that most people are having conversations about that when they start dating. They're not like, okay, exactly.
Dr. Juna: What do you think we should, you know, what should, should the response time be?
Caity (Caitlin): Exactly. And establishing those communication norms are so important. And I, I found before I met my boyfriend when I was dating, I mean, I text everyone the same. I send a lot of different messages at once and sometimes I will take a while to respond.
Caity (Caitlin): 'cause I like to be thoughtful in my. Responsive. Oh, okay. Uhhuh. I found that it was very difficult to, to start this new kind of, uh, endeavors with people, whether it's friends or it's dating or it's work, and not establish those communication norms. So that's something I always try to encourage people to do in a natural sense.
Caity (Caitlin): It doesn't have to be some formal or over orchestrated thing, but mm-hmm. Just as a, as a side note, if I'm doing one of my. Kind of crazy, 81 hours without a phone type of experiments. I will let my friends know ahead of time so they know that I'm haven't, uh, fallen off the face of the earth and, uh, there's no anxiety there without responding.
Caity (Caitlin): So things like that just
Dr. Juna: inform people. Are are you saying like some, you know, for normal people, I mean for most people, maybe you should take a moment and think, how do I wanna respond to this person? Um, especially if it's a new relationship. Do I wanna be setting it up for. Them to expect me to respond immediately or I'm gonna wait an hour.
Dr. Juna: Like you said, not over orchestrated, which is interesting also, but how do you establish that kind of rule with someone? Because you know, if you say, I'm not the per kind of person who texts back right away, then the other person might, no, that's weird. Not [00:08:00] like that. Right. That's weird, right? Or Well, I've heard that happening though.
Dr. Juna: Like people saying Yeah, like when they're dating, like they'll say, I don't. Text back immediately or, yeah. Is it almost like a match type of thing where if you're the kind of person who texts back immediately, the other person. Isn't, then it's harder to have a relationship. Is it like a personality thing?
Caity (Caitlin): No. I'll, I'll link, I'll link it to a larger sense of something. Is that? Mm-hmm. So say for example, that you have a group of friends and that you have brunch on Sunday and you're meeting together and you're excited to catch up. You haven't seen each other in a few weeks and say that this group of friends is a little bit analog.
Caity (Caitlin): You communicate via text message to make plans, but you don't share every moment of every day. Then when you meet for brunch, you're gonna be so excited to see everyone. You share all these stories, you have some gossip, you have some fun different stories to share. You have up life updates, and it's really exciting to be able to share that news in person.
Caity (Caitlin): Now, on the flip side, say that this group chat is constantly going all the time. All the time, which is fun. Won't lie about that. It's not, not to say that it's not fun. I feel like that happens
Dr. Juna: more in
Caity (Caitlin): high school, right? It? Well, it depends on the age and the norms. Okay. Kind of, uh mm-hmm. Across things. But then when you see people in person, oftentimes when these types of groups who are, are speaking, uh, so often there's an element of hyper communication kind of communication that is accelerated and it's happening so often.
Caity (Caitlin): I. Then when you meet in person, you're not gonna have as much to talk about. Mm. And that's when oftentimes people retreat to going back on their phone because they're uncomfortable with those pauses. And then if we wanna extract that back out to dating, that also has to do with kind of. Why people don't really know what to talk about.
Caity (Caitlin): Because if they're texting all the time, there's not really much to talk about and you're getting to know the person. And that should be done more in a steady stream. Mm-hmm. And that it's extracted out to business as well as, you know, save some of the things that you wanna speak about with people for a meeting.
Caity (Caitlin): Um, use, I like to use digital communication as a way to exchange information. Mm-hmm. And not as a way to have conversations whenever possible. What if you're
Dr. Juna: like long distance though, [00:10:00] or like you, you talked about using dating apps. Right. Which dating app did you use, by the way?
Caity (Caitlin): All of 'em. All of them?
Caity (Caitlin): Okay. Day. But um, and did you meet your boyfriend, current boyfriend on an app? I did on Bumble. Bumble.
Dr. Juna: Okay. When you're meeting somebody online, what do you recommend that young people or single people do now? As far as, uh, setting up? A communication, texting, communication. 'cause obviously that's how they start, right?
Dr. Juna: On all of these apps.
Caity (Caitlin): Definitely. Yeah. So what I would try to do was just meet someone as soon as possible. That's not always possible. Mm-hmm. Because there's a lot of different life outcomes. But the more that you can make a plan and anticipate that plan and wait for that plan and get excited for that plan and actually establish in person whether there's a connection there.
Caity (Caitlin): The better. And that goes not only for dating but also for business connections. I think the more that if you're trying to see if there's a client fit, the more that you can get on, even if it's Zoom and and chat in a synchronous way versus send a back and forth a ton of emails, that could a better way to really just establish whether there's some connection or fit.
Okay,
Dr. Juna: so you've been giving this lecture called Everyday Conversation, the effect of asynchronous communication and hyper communication on daily interaction. And Sociotechnical systems. Can you tell us a little bit about that? Sure.
Caity (Caitlin): So my company, authentic Social, focuses on sociotechnical systems strategy for business to business technology companies and law firms.
Caity (Caitlin): Mm-hmm. And we do some special projects with executives as well. Mm-hmm. And so what that involves is sociotechnical systems, is the joint optimization of. Social and technical systems. Mm-hmm. So what that looks like within a company is making sure that the people and the processes are aligned. Um, so the technology and things of that sort.
Caity (Caitlin): So our main focus area within Sociotechnical systems are making sure that there's everyday learning with within the workplace, [00:12:00] because we've seen that employee attrition rates go down a ton when there is everyday learning. Um, also we work with making sure that there's not communication dysfunctions within hybrid or remote work.
Caity (Caitlin): Mm-hmm. And then also looking at social selling strategies. So how that relates back to the question you just asked is, I had founded Authentic Social in 2016 when I was a senior, kind of by accident, uh, from the thesis found that. The more that we aligned our digital and real world selves, that there was higher r o I, both in personal and professional settings.
Caity (Caitlin): Mm-hmm. And I thought that was interesting. And so when I was working at LinkedIn full-time after graduation, I worked on authentic social on the side. I was on the West coast. So getting up early at, you know, 6:00 AM starting all this, all this stuff. What did you do at LinkedIn? I was in the business leadership program, which unfortunately they just discontinued.
Caity (Caitlin): But it was a great entry level talent program. And I was a sales development representative. We did lots of rotations though, so we went through talent acquisition and customer success and learned a lot about the business and also made a lot of analog connections. 'cause I was in the office that have mm-hmm.
Caity (Caitlin): Kinda lasted through my career. But what I started to notice in sales was even at. You know, a company like LinkedIn, which does a, a great job with social selling and things like that, that there could be rooms for improvement in making, selling a little bit less alienating and a little bit more human.
Caity (Caitlin): Mm-hmm. And so that's what I've, uh, sought to do and kinda, I, I'll link that back to the research in a second. My dad is, has been in sales for, uh, as long as I can remember and, you know, top up it. His different companies and has also always used kind of really creative, interesting kind of people methods and so, mm-hmm.
Caity (Caitlin): And when I studied sociology, I started to look at sales actually from an academic lens, which is. A little odd. People don't normally look at sales from a academic lens. And after I had worked on authentic social, so I left LinkedIn after a year full-time and um, have been full-time ever since. We actually have never had to [00:14:00] accept any venture capital and it's been completely self-funded and self, um, perpetuating through our, our clients and, and profits.
Caity (Caitlin): So that's been fabulous, been great. And mm-hmm. One of the things I noticed after a few years of doing authentic social was that it would be great if. You know, I, I started as a result of a thesis, but after a few years, you know, that research was what it was. It was helpful in starting this, but I wanted to continue that and make authentic social unique in that their cl our clients receive something that is not just.
Caity (Caitlin): Me Googling things or me building off of other things. It's having internal research. It's having that body of work influence what we're doing with clients and also have research that not only influences what we do with clients, but hopefully to make the world a more learning oriented, conversation oriented place.
Caity (Caitlin): So, mm-hmm. I started on this. Kind of interesting journey with my research, which I'm happy to, it's kind of an interesting story. I'm happy to elaborate on that if it's interesting to you later on. But of course. Mm-hmm. I, once I, this research started to kind of take off submitted to lots of different conferences and will be, have presented already in U C L A U C S B.
Caity (Caitlin): We'll be presenting at the American Sociological Association's annual meeting. Mm-hmm. Which is about the educative. Power of sociology and kind of centers around that kind of education narrative that we're working towards, which is the largest sociology conference in the world. I'll be presenting there on Sunday.
Caity (Caitlin): Mm-hmm. Then I take an Uber to J F K and from Philly probably, I don't know, train, planes, automobiles. Who knows how I'm gonna get there. I haven't really decided that yet. Um, then I fly to Helsinki and we'll be speaking at a future of work conference in Finland and. Presenting three different talks there, writing, starting up research, starting health thinking.
Dr. Juna: You're gonna be talking about digital communication, dysfunction, avoidance in the hybrid work settings. Basically trying to help people communicate more efficiently and prevent miscommunication. Right? I wanna come back to like what this all means for everyday work and for everyday people. So when you go into an [00:16:00] organization or when you're giving this conference, what is the basic message?
Dr. Juna: Let's say you're gonna give them like 1, 2, 3. How do you avoid dysfunction? You know, how do you set the rules for asynchronous versus Sure. How does the hyper communication affect? And by hyper communication, I. Think what you mean is when you're expected to text back almost immediately, right? And that what you were talking about before, you're telling each other everything that's happening throughout the day.
Dr. Juna: So maybe in a work organization, it might be a Slack channel, or when you're just texting your friends, just texting. So
Caity (Caitlin): first all, I'll define a couple terms for your audience, just so that it's helpful. First, what I'm speaking about is hyper communication is excess inbound or outbound communication.
Caity (Caitlin): Which is often precipitated by technology. So it means that there's so many pieces of communicative information that it, it kind of overwhelms our brain. Hyper communication, just how we, we think about a hyper fixation or hyperactive. There's so much going on it, it's a little overwhelming. So that's hyper communication was
Dr. Juna: there's with your mom or your or your friend group Exactly.
Dr. Juna: Or at your boss
Caity (Caitlin): on slack time all the time. Yeah, exactly. Okay. And asynchronous communication is conversations with a time lag between the messages. So it's not in that steady stream, and it's such as through social media and other related mechanisms like iMessages and text messages.
Dr. Juna: And because you don't have these basic rules set up, like we were talking about before, most people don't say, oh, this is how quickly I respond.
Dr. Juna: Or, you know, unless you have a message going back. On your email, like, I'll be back with you within 24 hours. Exactly. So most people don't do that in their casual relationships or their intimate relationships or with work. So I'm assuming that you're going into these places and trying to set some sort of template.
Dr. Juna: So that people know what to expect or what's expected of them, so
Caity (Caitlin): that there's no Exactly. So I have three talks at this conference in Turku, Finland, which is right outside of Helsinki. And the first one is that everyday [00:18:00] conversation, the effect of asynchronous communication and hyper communication. On daily interaction and sociotechnical systems.
Caity (Caitlin): Now a typical listener, they might be thinking, well, what did you just say? What does that mean? So I'll break it down for you and kind of, uh, help everyone understand kind of why we start with that and what people are are gonna get out of it. In simple terms. So what everyday conversation is about in the effect of this asynchronous communication?
Caity (Caitlin): Hyper communication is that it's looking at okay, everyday conversation. The way that we speak and interact on a, on an everyday basis in our daily lives. How does the fact that we are communicating not in a steady stream and the fact that there's so much information thrown at us on a daily basis? I mean, there's notifications, notifications, notifications, little message, little pinging, pinging, ping, ping pinging.
Caity (Caitlin): How does that affect not only daily interactions, but also on a larger, more macro scale? How does that affect sociotechnical systems? Now, a sociotechnical system can be something as broad as society. Or it can be an organization, it could, there's lots of different examples of sociotechnical systems, but that's kind of the, the broader view is let's establish this as being something that is important because it is, and researchers such as, Sherry Turkel who studies conversation and technology and people like that have have really established that this is of sociological importance.
Caity (Caitlin): The idea of starting with this talk everyday conversation is to show people in 2023, what does all this mean, and to make people understand and break them out of this kind of pattern that we're all in. Because the reason why I started all this research was I found myself. I was not feeling really well mentally.
Caity (Caitlin): I felt overwhelmed by technology. I felt like there was too much information that my brain was clogged. I call it phone brain. And I broke myself out of this phone brain through the methods and the solutions that I present at these conferences, and it's through something that I call a progression to analog.
Caity (Caitlin): And that's a progression to analog, which is, you know, saying kind of a, a play on words that we are moving [00:20:00] towards an analog. Now that does not mean that we want to throw away all of our technology, but what it is, is about exploring a more human every day. I. And that's what I wanna place in the audience.
Caity (Caitlin): And I kind of do think two different things. So I leverage sociological methods and practices and things of that sort like ethno methodology, which is the study of everyday conversation And the way that that I. It helps us kind of construct meaning from our, our situations and our surroundings. But I also write critical theory and look at kind of really dense literature review from, um, French and American sociological texts from the 1930s to the 2020s about everyday life.
Caity (Caitlin): I. And it's alienation under capitalism. Look at conversation trends over time, uh, over different decades and how it's changed. I, I, I got out of print technology magazines from over seven decades and looked at different patterns that might have, uh, be affecting the way that we speak. So what have you found?
Caity (Caitlin): So, one of the things I noticed in my, my own life is that this acceleration of information, so the way that we're getting all these notifications mm-hmm. If we're able to start each day without that a little bit. It helps downstream product productivity and also sense of home and wellness for the rest of the day.
Caity (Caitlin): So an example of that is on September 5th of last year, I had been carrying around Society of the Spectacle, um, which is a kind of a critique of spectacular and commodity society, uh, guide to board. Uh, if you wanna say it in other French terms, I carried it around for, for three months and, uh, ended up finishing it on September 5th.
Caity (Caitlin): And it just so happened that my phone was on the other side of the room, so I didn't touch my phone. Mm-hmm. And I noticed that for the rest of the day, I was so, I was in such a good mood. My screen time ended up being only like an hour, and I thought that was so interesting and actually kind of by accident, not on purpose to do this kind of project or research, but I just started to wake up every day and, and read.
Caity (Caitlin): And read. And read. And for years I couldn't finish a book and I was having trouble with kind of focusing and mm-hmm. It just started to have such a huge [00:22:00] downstream effect on my everyday life. My screen time has gone down 65% in the last year since doing that. So you wake up and you read for how long now?
Caity (Caitlin): It depends. I wanted it to work with my everyday life. So some mornings, if you have a 5:00 AM flight, Sometimes I will literally just read one page, but I will, I go in and I write in all my books. So I, I will write the date, the place, and the time, and I will read a page and, and underline and whatever. And that just starts to set the intention for the day.
Caity (Caitlin): Because as someone who has an A D H D brain and is not neurotypical, when people were saying to me, oh, to meditate, just sit and be. Still in the beginning of the day, well, that's not how my brain works. I don't wanna do that. They're
Dr. Juna: looking at people and, uh, almost everybody has these symptoms. So, and not pathologizing everybody, or not undermining people who actually have issues, but.
Dr. Juna: Yeah,
Caity (Caitlin): exactly. And actually South Korean born Ger, he lives in Germany. Um, young Han this philosopher who I'm obsessed with, he speaks about that actually how the, uh, acceleration of information in this digital age has caused kind of a generalized sense. Of this attention issues in everyone, even people who don't have actual A D H D.
Caity (Caitlin): Um, there's a, there's attention issues kind of with all of us because there's so much information, this hyper communication, how they're, we're expected to be, be responding all the time. So even just setting your day and, and reading one little page, it's really, and. People can read about anything. I mean, you could be interested in, in, you know, you don't have to read weird critical theory like I am.
Caity (Caitlin): You could read, you know, novels or something about something that interests you or whatever. That might be. A comic book. Comic book
Dr. Juna: or Calvin Mobbs was my favorite after exams
Caity (Caitlin): or anything. But it, it's, it really is helpful to kind of set intentions for the day and it's fun 'cause. One of the, one of these books I just had on my desk is, you know, I can open it and I can see, oh, okay.
Caity (Caitlin): This was on, uh, February 9th. I was at my friend Alisa's House in Costa Rica and I was, I was reading by the beach here and I saw a Spider [00:24:00] Monkey. It was the first time. Spider Monkeys have been there since 2004, and I'm, I'm. Immediately kind of brought back
Dr. Juna: there. So you're saying that you haven't been able to read a book in a long time, but because you started this new habit, you've been able to finish
Caity (Caitlin): books now and not just books, but I went from not being able to even finish a beach read to in a year with no other changes in my life.
Caity (Caitlin): There's not anything other health-wise. To finishing almost 50 full books on everyday life, sociology, uh, psychology, philosophy, all these different things. Wow. Well, I just
Dr. Juna: have to pause here and ask you a little more details on this. 'cause this is so relevant to so many people, including myself. Like, it's very hard to finish books these days, right?
Dr. Juna: 'cause we have so much that we can read on our phone. So you start the day reading something on paper, depending on how long it's gonna be. You don't give yourself any time limits. You don't give yourself a minimum or
Caity (Caitlin): maximum. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. No, because actually part of it, and this was in society, the spectacle by Guide the board is there's this idea of, uh, spectacular time and pseudo cyclical time, and the amount that modern society makes us constantly keep track of time.
Caity (Caitlin): Yeah. That actually is a huge weight on our brains. Mm-hmm. And that's, uh, I, I mean, it's normal. I'm not someone who lives in a fantasy land. You know, I'm from New Jersey. I live in New York City. I know there's a reality and there's a thing that. There's, there's life that we need to, you know, we need to be on time to things and things of that sort, but to be able to set up your day, to lose track of time, even for a couple minutes.
Caity (Caitlin): Through reading is really wonderful and reading through something that isn't a screen, because then you're not distracted by anything else. Mm. It really is a nice way to set intentions for the day. Okay. So for the first thing
Dr. Juna: you do when you wake up is whatever you need to do, brush your teeth or whatever, drink coffee, and then, but you're reading, you're reading actual analog.
Dr. Juna: Paper. Yes. And then you don't, when do you get on the phone? Like when you have your first appointment or something or, and do people know, like your boyfriend, does he know that you're not gonna be answering him? Does your mom know? You know, like Caity's okay. She's
Caity (Caitlin): not answering, but, okay, so, so she's reading, so it's fine.
Caity (Caitlin): I have a funny answer to this. So yes, actually in this progression to analog, I've done all [00:26:00] these fun, interesting projects to help. Kind of return my every day to a little bit more human oriented and creativity and learning. And I actually got a analog phone Got it. On eBay and love it. I,
Dr. Juna: A picture of you holding it ready
Caity (Caitlin): is, oh, that's cute.
Caity (Caitlin): So what's nice about having an analog phone, is that in case of an emergency or something like that? I gave the number to my friends and they can, they can call it. And on days when I want to. And have the opportunity to, which isn't every day or even every week sometimes, but if I wanna just totally be off my phone, I know that there's a way to communicate with the outside world.
Caity (Caitlin): Mm-hmm. Which is nice. I also like it because I, I speak with my grandmother often and it's really nice to just sit and look out the window in my apartment and just be on the phone and be doing one thing at a time. And it's just helped me so much and focusing on one. Item at a time. Mm-hmm. Because when you go on your phone, there's so many d, there's a whole different world that opens up and that world can be great.
Caity (Caitlin): I'm not discounting the fact that phones make life a lot easier. I mean, I have no sense of direction. So Google Maps is wonderful, but the reality is, is if you see that a message is there, you're gonna wanna respond to it, and then your brain kind of, you start out not really being able to complete tasks in the day.
Caity (Caitlin): So just by starting out the day, completing one thing, even if it's just a page, it doesn't have to be a full chapter. That was the other thing with reading, was that I would kind of think, oh, well, I have to read a whole chapter every time I. No, you could read one page and then that really adds up. It really makes, makes your everyday more about learning and not about consuming the news, which is just exhausting to learn about whatever political party affiliation.
Caity (Caitlin): It's just, there's so much noise. There's so much I. Kind of awful things going on in the world. Um, and it's important to keep informed, but not to not be bogged down with all this information and to kind of set your day up for success as soon as you wake
Dr. Juna: up. Like you don't want that. Yeah, exactly.
Caity (Caitlin): It's like waking up and taking like 10 tequila shots.
Caity (Caitlin): I mean, it's, it's like that's what going on your phone
Dr. Juna: is like, I love that you say you give yourself absolutely no rules about [00:28:00] how long you're reading and how much you're reading. No, no. So that, I think that's really key. I'm gonna try that. I love it. Yeah. Okay. You're an Ironman, right? You've done Ironman, which is so impressive.
Caity (Caitlin): I think that's amazing. Yes. When I was 18, I did Ironman, lake Placid, and when I was 14 I did a half Ironman. Wow. And I rode at Harvard for two years. Unfortunately, I had to stop because I have a chronic illness called, Pop syndrome. So it's postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome. Mm-hmm. And they, when I went in for my physical sophomore year, they were finding some issues with my heart, and heart rate was really high.
Caity (Caitlin): They didn't know if it was like pulmonary embolism. And so it took oh my gosh, a while. And unfortunately had to stop rowing because they had, they couldn't rule anything out. Mm-hmm. It actually took me, that was in 20 or 2013 or 2014
Dr. Juna: pots is like orthostatic hypotension. So you can
Caity (Caitlin): faint. Yes, exactly. And I, that had been happening.
Caity (Caitlin): Kind of my whole life. Mm-hmm. But it, it didn't actually get diagnosed until, 2020 until I actually saw a TikTok and went to Columbia Med and brought all these things and they were like, TikTok, you're the first person. They're like, you're the first person to successfully self-diagnose yourself off of TikTok.
Caity (Caitlin): TikTok. Which I do not recommend to any of the listeners that this was like years and years of stuff and uh, but there is a lot of
Dr. Juna: information on TikTok I have to admit,
Caity (Caitlin): and it goes. And kind of the point I wanna make here is that social media can be good. It can be a way to spark connections and meet different people.
Caity (Caitlin): It's just about the level that, that we use it. But, but with pot syndrome, once I got officially diagnosed with this, because I always felt that something was wrong and off, but I never, there was never a word for it. And I sometimes thought I was crazy because it took forever to get diagnosed. And so when I received that diagnosis, I really, this kind of inspired this research as well because I thought, I need to find a way to make myself less stressed and less anxious each day, and just more at peace with things so that it doesn't influence my health negatively.
Caity (Caitlin): And I, and I think that goes for everyone who's listening to this, whether you have a, a chronic illness or not. I mean, I always [00:30:00] say POTS is annoying, but I don't have cancer and I don't have, uh, something that's, You know, shortening my lifespan. I have a lot of, I have super low blood pressure. I can faint and, you know, passed out even on, on my birthday, you know, a few weeks ago at, in a grocery store in the Hamptons.
Caity (Caitlin): But, you know, it was fine afterwards. It's not. Well, happy birthday, Caity. Thank you. You, you know how to prepare for these things and you, I think. Technology can make us so anxious about things 'cause we're constantly anticipating things and waiting for things. And you know, in the past when I, when this stuff from Posse to happen, there was a lot more anxiety associated with it and I feel a lot more at peace.
Caity (Caitlin): With things more generally, just because of the, the work that I've done over the past year or so that I think everyone can benefit from, even if it's not reading. I think trying to integrate some analog elements into your every day is really great. Mm-hmm. And an example I can give is my cousin Caroline, who is going to be a sophomore at the University of Pennsylvania.
Caity (Caitlin): Mm-hmm. Um, she's in m and t and she kind of noticed that I was shooting film a lot. So as a part of this progression to analog, I kind of stopped taking pictures on my phone. As much and uh, started doing, uh, taking more film and she has brought disposable cameras and film and stuff back to college and says that it's a lot of fun to kinda be off your phone and taking pictures with friends and shows that sense of anticipation.
Caity (Caitlin): And when you drop off the film, you have to wait for it. And that's nice to not have to get everything immediately to be so stressed about how you look. And everybody's
Dr. Juna: checking how they look on the pictures, the a hundred pictures they took right away. Yeah,
Caity (Caitlin): exactly. And I think the other thing is just being present wherever you are.
Caity (Caitlin): Something I've been really impressed with is I have another cousin, um, Ella, who's also 19, and we love the 1975 and go to their concerts together and something I noticed every concert we go to, she is Gen Z, but she doesn't touch her phone the whole time unless it's to take one quick picture. She just has this amazing ability to be so present and it is that analog element of just wanting to be present with the people that she's with because she values her family.
Caity (Caitlin): So much that times is really meaningful. And [00:32:00] so I think that the more that we can integrate analog elements into every day, not because technology is a tool. Mm-hmm. Let's use it as a tool, but not use it as something that makes us miserable when we're with a friend. Let's not go on our phone, let's put our phone on, do not disturb and answer things after we speak with that friend.
Caity (Caitlin): Let's not try to be everywhere.
Dr. Juna: When you were talking about anxiety related to texting and like waiting for people to text back, I thought it was fascinating that you did mention stress as part of pots because that is not well known, but it is true. Stress can trigger pots. Sure. Did you see any relationship to controlling your disease along with getting control of your social media and phone usage?
Caity (Caitlin): So not so much with pots because I have had that forever. Like that was, you know, I was in kindergarten and I passed out at the farm, things like that. Mm. So, but what it has helped with the stress management around kind of the anxiety of passing out, but what it has impacted weirdly enough is my gut health.
Caity (Caitlin): I was diagnosed with, you know, some different stomach issues, um, throughout the years and. Cut out dairy, cut out gluten. Even though growing up I could eat tho these foods. And, um, since this process, I have been reintegrating it into my diet with no problems. I don't get the stomach aches that I used to get, uh, at all really.
Caity (Caitlin): I mean, it's extremely rare. It used to be an everyday thing that my stomach would hurt all the time, um, you know, uh, for, for so long. And it really has helped my gut health. Feeling, uh, bloated or feeling kind of, you know, pain, um, digesting foods. Did you try
Dr. Juna: the low food map thing? Is that what you tried?
Caity (Caitlin): I did.
Caity (Caitlin): Mm-hmm. I did a while ago, but that's not really what made the impact. Mm-hmm. Um, what, what has made the impact more is. Slowing down for me and not being so hyper accelerated in, in my every day. Mm-hmm. I don't even know if that's a word, but you know what I mean? Just not going a million miles an hour because, so how do you slow yourself down?
Caity (Caitlin): I hate to sound like a broke record, but for me, really waking up and not being on [00:34:00] technology is huge. 'cause I, you start out your day and there's just so much information thrown at you. That it's just too much. And even if you don't like reading to start out your day and do a couple yoga moves, I don't know the proper term 'cause I'm not a, you know, I rode and, you know, did triathlons.
Caity (Caitlin): I, I don't, I've gone to some hot yoga stuff, but that didn't work out 'cause I've popped Oh yeah, that's not a good idea. No, that was not, I was like, dizzy. Yeah, not, not great, but whatever it is, if it's just sitting with your thoughts or something that's not having to do with technology, then it makes you better able to kind of understand things because so much is expected of us now.
Caity (Caitlin): Because we we're expected to always be on and always be available, and we think that remote work is this real big freedom thing, which it can be in certain senses. It really has helped get more disabled people and women into the workforce, which is great. But there are fifth facts and figures in a recent insider report kind of showed that remote work, while it gets more people into the workforce.
Caity (Caitlin): Some people have trouble kind of getting promoted because they're not kind of in, in person, um, and not kind of in front of people. So one of, one of the things I like to, um, think about is, you know, as it relates to work and as it relates to everything, how can I carve out time for work, but also carve out time for life and, and make sure to interrelate them as much, uh, as possible?
Caity (Caitlin): Because one of the things that was better about when we were in person for work is you went to work and then you came home. And I think mm-hmm. We don't think about that as much. Like we are really expected to be on 24 7. Okay,
Dr. Juna: so last time we spoke, we had this fascinating conversation about how young people, you know, kids are, kids who are growing up with social media and teenagers and even college students.
Dr. Juna: Like what do they want to present themselves? How do they wanna present themselves in the internet world? Right? Because, um, these things are out there forever. Whatever pictures you take, even if you think you're in a private chat, for example, in, I think it was 2016. They, um, Harvard, actually, no, sorry, it was class of 2021, [00:36:00] Harvard rescinded admission of 10 students, for example.
Dr. Juna: And, you know, they thought they were speaking in a private chat and. Uh, this opens up a whole can of worms because obviously if you are making racist comments or if you're being a horrible person, whether in real life or on the internet, you know, I think those two things have to merge and so we're not, I'm not promoting, uh, let's say, you know, pretend you're a great person on the internet and then say all these horrible things and racist things.
Dr. Juna: You know, in real life it's about merging your core values. And I think that's what you're saying with authentic social, right? Like be authentic, but yeah.
Dr. Juna: Me too.
Dr. Juna: Mm-hmm.[00:38:00]
Dr. Juna: Mm-hmm.
Dr. Juna: Hmm.[00:40:00]
Dr. Juna: Mm.
Dr. Juna: Mm-hmm.
Dr. Juna: Mm-hmm.
Dr. Juna: Mm-hmm.[00:42:00]
Dr. Juna: So what would you tell parents of, let's say, kids in grade school? I mean, I've seen parents talk about how their kid is so addicted to the iPad that. You know, when they took it away, they started, you know, having fits and like banging their head on the wall. I mean, I've heard all these kinds of stories, like they're actually addicted.
Dr. Juna: So what would you tell these parents and then go on for like middle school, high school, maybe some stages of life.
Dr. Juna: Mm-hmm. I love that. Okay. Thank you so much for all of this information, and I [00:46:00] hope, uh, one of these days I can come to one of your keynotes that you're doing. Maybe you're speaking in New York, um, sometime soon. Hopefully. Um, yeah, this was awesome. Thank you so much, Caity. This was such an enlightening conversation and I would love to have more of these and I wanna find out about your experience also at Harvard being a d d and having a chronic illness, like how that was for you.
Dr. Juna: You know, that would be really interesting for our listeners as well.
Dr. Juna: Yeah, tell them where you, they can find you.
Dr. Juna: Oh my gosh. Fantastic work. This is so important and when you do that talk on ai. I want, I need you to come back on this podcast. We're gonna talk about ai. All right. Thank you, Caity. So great to see you. Okay.