101 THINGS TO DO INSTEAD OF SCROLLING // ideas to have a fun, productive summer

The internet provides an eternity of content to mindlessly scroll through, but you don't have to let it suck away all your time and energy and attention. If you want to do something else with your time, here are 101 ideas. Of course, if you're going to scroll, let's try a couple of better ways to do that. Set yourself a time limit that you'll actually stick to. I like to use Apple's built-in time limits. Only look at a particular account that you know you like and you feel good scrolling through. Only scroll when you're walking or standing, because then you become very aware of time passing. Declutter your following feed. Leave thoughtful comments instead of just likes or very generic comments that you don't actually really think about. Go on Pinterest. At least for me, I find it a lot more relaxing than every other social media platform. Block or click not interested on anything you don't really like. Fine-tune that algorithm for yourself. Turn off endless scroll. I know it's not an option on every platform, but if it is, turn it off. Check your screen time. It's good to be aware and to hold yourself accountable. Turn off notifications, because then you can't get reminded to check things when you never really wanted to in the first place. You can make those trendy beaded necklaces that I see everywhere by just buying beads at Michael's and stringing them together. Crochet something. If you've never done it before, I think a hat or a scarf or some other rectangular thing can be a fairly easy beginning project. Write a poem or song lyrics or anything. Just write something fun. Also, you could write a letter to a pen pal and put some effort into decorating things nicely. Paint some decorations for your room. Even if you're not very good at painting, there are a lot of beginner options for slap and paint onto a canvas. Try making a fancy tea or coffee drink or some other sort of beverage, whatever you like to drink. Consider baking something. Cookies, cake, pastry, whatever you're capable of. Do a photo shoot with your friends. I recommend checking out Instagram or Pinterest for some inspiration. Embroider your backpack. I think I did a video about this if you'd like a kind of sort of tutorial. Make friendship bracelets. Maybe try origami. You can make a garland of origami things to decorate your room or just learn how to fold paper. Write a song. Maybe you can use the lyrics from that poem you finished earlier or maybe if you know how to play an instrument, you can play that and write a song. Knit a scarf or any other project you like. I just think a scarf or any other sort of rectangular thing is the easiest thing for a beginner to work on. Tie-dye a t-shirt. There are a lot of great tutorials online and you can do a lot with any old white t-shirts you have sitting around. I've seen a lot of cool eclectic looking jewelry dishes going around and you can try making one of your own using air dry clay. Cook yourself a meal. Maybe you're already a master chef or maybe like me, you want to learn how to cook. Either way, it's good to get some practice in and have something nice to eat at the end of it. Print out some posters to decorate your walls. Pro tip, you can find higher resolution images on Google by going to the search tools option and then filtering by size. You can also make paper garlands to decorate your room. I made these with cutouts from a Cricut machine but you can also cut out simpler shapes to make a still very cool looking garland string. Try putting together new outfits. If you're not going out, it's a great time to experiment and document your favorite looks for later. And the most dramatic, you could try coloring your hair. Go with temporary or semi-permanent just in case you don't like it though. Watch a documentary. If you need a recommendation, one I recently watched on Netflix was My Octopus Teacher. Use a language learning app to start or continue learning the language of your choice. They're great because they come with so many structured lessons. Join an online course. If you search up MOOC, you can find free online courses and lectures from top universities and professors. Go to the library. Find a nice book to read. It doesn't have to be non-fiction, it doesn't have to be that educational, but reading is fun. If you don't want to go to the library in person, you can download books on the Libby app which allows you to borrow ebooks from your local library. Maybe read a news article. It still allows you to scroll on your phone too. Or maybe read a magazine. One of my favorite things to scroll through that's mildly more educational than Instagram is just going down a Wikipedia rabbit hole. Watch a YouTube tutorial for a new skill. Whatever you feel like would benefit your life at the moment. Like plumbing or something, I don't know. And you can search through the internet or cookbooks to find a new recipe to try. Virtual museum tours are a great option. A lot of museums made digital collections after COVID hit and you can still explore museums around the world just on the internet. You can go thrifting as a more sustainable way to add to your wardrobe in person or online. The app I'm using here is ThredUp. Go to a restaurant in your local area that you've never been to and get takeout if that's necessary for your safety. You can also explore the world in Google Street View. Check out the streets of Europe from the comfort of your home. All that stuff. And in more fantasizing about places we do not get to go, you could research and plan a dream trip for your future. Bringing it more local. Try something new at Starbucks. And staying home. Research your home city as if you were a tourist. I know I spent my whole life underappreciating my home city, but it's actually not that boring. And if you can, go to one of those cool places that you find during your research. I don't know about you, but I'm constantly saving posts about places to go and things to eat near me. So I like to organize all this stuff in Google My Maps. Take a walk around your neighborhood if you can and it's not too unfriendly to pedestrians. I know the U.S. kind of sucks with walkability. Do some stretching. It's not too strenuous and it is good for you. You could go swimming. Go for a run or jog. It doesn't have to be really fast. Take it easy. Maybe learn a TikTok dance. I look incredibly dorky doing this because I do not know how to dance. Do a plank for about a minute or however long you can survive it for. I know it's not the funnest of times. If you're on your phone already, maybe open YouTube and do a yoga video. Or you can do some other sort of workout video. Go out for a bike ride, another more low-impact way to get your cardio in and see the sights in your area. Or you can go out to hike. Even if you don't have nice trails near you, maybe you can just find a bit of a hillier route through your neighborhood or to a local park. Learn how to do a handstand. Please don't break your neck while doing this. I am not liable for anything you try. Talk to an old friend. Talk to a new friend. Leave a thoughtful comment on the social media of one of your friends. Leave a thoughtful reply to a story to start a conversation that way. Reach out to someone new. Just say hi. Promise won't be that awkward. Talk to a family member or someone who is part of your chosen family. FaceTime and call someone. Play a group game with your friends. Maybe Scribblio or Town of Salem. Compliment a stranger on the street or online. Whatever floats your boat. Wish someone happy birthday. I recommend sending some cool gifts or GIFs to go along with it for that virtual birthday card. Color code your Google Calendar. It is so satisfying and genuinely helpful for keeping track of everything. Try Notion for digital planning and organizing. It's what I've been using since quitting bulk journaling. Sort everything that's in your backpack. Especially if you just finished a school year. There's a lot of old papers in there that you can get rid of. Declutter some part of your room. I recommend reading Marie Kondo's Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up book as well before you do that. To declutter your digital space, you can delete unneeded files from your laptop. The download folder and desktop are two main areas to scope out. Clean out your photo library of duplicate photos or like random pictures and screenshots that you don't need anymore. Start a bullet journal. I don't use one anymore, but I still think it's a great method that works very well for many people. Delete apps that you don't use off of your phone because they're just wasting storage space and slowing down your phone. Deep clean your room. That depression coating of random junk, it needs to go away. And clean out your email inbox. Get rid of those 10,000 unread messages by deleting and archiving them as needed. Journaling is also very great fun because it's a way to have a conversation with yourself and document it. Here are a couple prompts. 10 things that you want in your future. They don't have to be physical things. They can be like concepts like I want to be happy. Make a vision board, a kind of visual representation of the things that you want in your future. Write about what you did today and you can include some pictures and mementos and other things to help you document the happenings of your life. Check in with your current thoughts and feelings. This is something I've been working on. I'm not very good at it, so it's all right if you find this hard. Write about your regrets from yesterday, from three months ago, from your entire lifetime. Whatever you want. Write some affirmations. This means positive statements that you want to repeat over and over to yourself until you maybe finally actually believe them. Write down your goals for the next month, year, five years, decade, your entire life. Think about what does happiness mean to you. Write a letter to your future self. Any point in the future you like. 5, 10, 50 million years. Or write a letter to your past self. To play frisbee, I found it to be the easiest group game sport to get a handle on. Spikeball is also great fun. It's just a little more complicated because you have to buy that spikeball net equipment. I love card games. If you want a fun one to play with your friends that's also relatively easy to learn, I recommend BS, which stands for... Actually, I can't say that word without getting demonetized, but you can google it for instructions. Like an old person, I also like board games. The Resistance is a fun one. Scribble is a little less fun. Scribbly-out. Very fun to play with friends, especially if you can't see them in person. Play an instrument if you know how or you want to learn how. Most common instruments have tutorials and lessons for free on the internet. Crossword puzzles are also very great fun to play by yourself, except when you get to the last clue and you have no idea what it means and you have to google it. Regular puzzles are also great, especially because you get a fun artwork thing that you can mount on your walls at the end of it. And coloring pages. Not just the ones for kids. And last but not least, you can watch a couple more of my videos. No, I'm kidding. If that's mindless scrolling for you, you don't need to continue. I hope you found this video helpful, and if you have other ideas, feel free to share them with other people in the comments down below. I upload new videos about student life every week, and you can visit my Instagram, my TikTok, and my second channel for some sometimes-studying-related content. See you next time!