The 1 Gen Z Phone Habit Everyone Should Steal

As a preteen, I couldn’t resist the siren song of AIM, or AOL Instant Messenger. I’d hear that “door opening” noise or a message notification and rush to my computer, eager to see if the sign-on was my best friend or my boyfriend, both who were equally tethered to AIM at the time. (Naturally, all of our screen names usually contained the name of the person we were “dating” at the time ― NicksGirl4Eva88 was the height of romance in middle school in 2001.)

When I got my own phone not long after, I downloaded my favorite songs to use as ringtones, just like every other teenager I knew. I was as eager as ever to receive texts. (Phone calls? Those not so much. It’s true that millennials are phone call averse.)

Now that I’m in my 30s with a full time job, the thrill is categorically gone. If anything, I’m loath to look at my phone: Group texts reach obscene numbers in a matter of minutes, Slack notifications from work stack up and ruin my flow state, and there always seems to be one or two texts from a friend that I’ve been meaning to get to, but still haven’t yet. Color me surprised, then, to learn that a number of Gen Zers (and some millennials ― ones who are smarter than me) just leave their phones on “Do Not Disturb” all day. Going on vibrate isn’t enough anymore, it’s DND 24/7.

On TikTok, videos tagged “DND” and “DND 24/7” show teens and 20-somethings sharing how peaceful and productive they’ve felt since changing their notification settings.

To render your phone basically useless for the entire day is about as close to zen as I can imagine, but it also sounds weirdly frightening. But the way Gen Z sees it, it’s their phone, their time and their prerogative if they need to set boundaries.

“When I’m trying to study for