3 apps that will make you smarter, kinder, and more focused

The average person has about 30 apps installed on their phones. Among those apps, they access 9 daily (some in depth reports are shown here).

In some countries, some people spend as much as 5 hours/ day on mobile devices. During a lifespan of 80 years, provided that the usage patterns don’t change throughout life, such a person who started using a phone in their early teens would waste 14 years of their lives.

Most of these apps are used for distractions, getting a quick reward and instant gratification. They are designed in such a manner that exploits our psychology and makes us addicted to them. Research has found that our brain is always seeking novelty and new things make us feel good.

That’s why, we are naturally drawn to the dozens of new interesting apps available each day. Even if we didn’t have such a variety to choose from, a single app like Facebook offers us endless novelty at the cost of a scroll down and some of our time.

But what if some of these apps have a greater purpose than just exploiting us and giving our addicted brain whatever it needs ?

What if, some of them could help us grow as individuals and even extend help to others in need?

Here are 3 apps which are designed with a greater purpose in mind:

1. Forest

Distraction is the most corrosive disease of the 20th century. — James Victore

This is even more valid in the 21st century where smartphone and internet usage have exploded. With this in mind, we can admit that distractions are plentiful in our everyday lives.

Having acknowledged that, the first step would be to try to gradually eliminate distractions, and then cure our phone addiction (severe for many people).

Forest is designed especially with that purpose in mind. As their motto states, it encourages ‘‘staying focused and being present’’ by detaching from our phones.

How do they plan on doing that?

Well, the principle is simple: you have to plant a virtual forest, one tree at a time. First you select the type of tree you want to plant. Then, you need to set how much it takes for the tree to grow up. It can be anywhere from 10 minutes to 2 hours. The longer the planting time is, the larger the tree and the reward (virtual coins).

After you plant it, you cannot access other apps or your trees die — except for incoming calls of course, those are allowed. This means that if you minimize the application, and don’t reopen it shortly after, the tree will die and you need to plant it all over again to get the reward.

After the specified time has elapsed, you receive a bunch of coins, badges and achievements.

But there’s a catch…

Those virtual coins can be used to buy a real tree. This means that you will trade the coins and then the Trees for the Future foundation will plant a real tree in Sub Saharan Africa. These efforts are aimed to support the locals and increase the overall quality of life for them.

If those people using their phones 5h/day would use Forest instead, they could plant a real tree every 23 days. That’s 16 trees in a year — not bad at all, I would say.

To get a better idea, 88 such users would plant a real miniature forest, the size of an American football field, in a single year.

Besides from forcing you to detach from your phone, it offers a variety of calming sounds like rain falling, sea and forest sounds which I found particularly useful for meditation and sleep.

Forest manages to offer well thought gamification concepts which appealed to my gamer side and a snappy and fluent interface which the tester inside had nothing to object to.

So, if you want to try some detox from your phone, thus gaining more focus and presence, or you just want to plant some trees, Forest would be a good place to start.

2. Medium

If you have knowledge, let others light their candles in it.
― Margaret Fuller

The idea that nowadays people don’t read books anymore is a bit exaggerated. While there are many who don’t actually read any books, there are still some who regard books as great teachers and sources of wisdom.

The main problem, as I see it, is that some are discouraged when picking a book up, by its number of pages. Even if they begin reading, for some it’s hard to find the right time for this activity and often, it’s easier just to turn our TV on or switch to the phone. So, we start reading a book, but never get to the end so we get discouraged since we never get the satisfaction of completing it.

If this is the case, a quick fix would be to read something which is shorter, something we see the end to and get that sense of completion after a shorter time. This is where Medium comes in.

Medium is a large creative community where people all across the world publish their thoughts and ideas. The beauty in this is that you gain access to the aggregated wisdom of all these ideas, within articles which on average take 7 minutes to read. Unlike a 300 page book, it’s a small effort to read such an article from start to end and you get that feeling of completion at the end.

If you follow the right people you most likely learn something from each article. Moreover, you are exposed to various perspectives which challenge the way you think and see things.

Your phone suddenly contains an endless source of wisdom, knowledge and shared experiences. It would be a shame not to take advantage of that supply and try to tap into it as often as you can — it’s a much better investment than checking who liked your photo in the past hour or see 100 new irrelevant posts.

3. Share the Meal

Do your little bit of good where you are; it’s those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world. — Desmond Tutu

What can you buy with 0.5 $? The first thought is: “nothing relevant”. In consequence, those 50 cents mean nothing to you.

On the other hand, those 50 cents can decide if a person goes through an entire day hungry or not. This is the case for people living in areas affected by war and famine.

The World Food Programme launched an app called Share the Meal, which aims to cut hunger dramatically all over the world.

How does it work?

Using your phone, you donate 0.5 $. The money is transferred to the United Nations World Food Programme which then distributes it in famine affected countries. The money is converted to a voucher which is exchanged at local stores with food.

Since all costs are significantly lower in underdeveloped countries, that sum of 50 cents is enough to feed a person for an entire day whereas you would probably only buy a bagel with it.

WFP has an ambitious long term goal to reach a world with zero hunger. This target is attainable with the help of normal people like you and I if you remember to donate every once in a while.

To get a better idea of the food situation worldwide, roughly 800 million people are malnourished. On the opposite pole, 2.2 billion people worldwide are overweight. This is something to think about especially since roughly ⅓ of the food produced in the world gets wasted.

The resources are definitely there, we just need to better manage them.

In conclusion…

The message I’m trying to pass on is that the main purpose of these really high tech devices we use everyday should be to serve us. To make our lives easier and help us develop in ways which were not possible a few decades ago.

Even though worldwide statistics state that basically we serve our devices, not the other way around, I have a strong belief that things would shift in the opposite direction with the help of apps like those presented in the paragraphs above.

If you have not heard of them, give them a try. Give up your bagel and feed a child for a whole day instead!

Also, if you find this post useful, share it with your friends or share the apps you think have the potential of making a positive change.

Thanks for reading! :D