What’s a “Healthy” Digital Life?

What’s a “Healthy” Digital Life? a reader asks…

Hi Coach, you’ve talked about having a “healthy” digital life, but I’m having trouble understanding what you mean. Can you explain it a bit more? Thank you!

I think a good way to understand it is to compare it to your physical life. Having a healthy physical life means (among other things) not being overweight, having at least some muscle tone, having the ability to deal with carrying heavy things, moving fast when needed, and eating mostly good-for-you foods and nutrients. If you think of your body as a machine, it needs to be in good working order and have the necessary fuel and lubrication in order to perform as designed.

Now think about your digital life, made up (among other things) of your virtual identity, online communication and sharing, and using the various technology devices and services as often as needed. Being healthy in this regard means that the technology is working for you – making your life easier. So when you need your computer to work, it does without giving you operational problems that you have to solve before you can get to the work you want to do with it. When you want to use your smartphone to video chat with someone, you don’t have to waste time figuring out what app to use, how to use it, and how to fix what often seems to go wrong that stops you from just chatting. When you want to conduct any online banking chores, you want to be easily and securely identified and allowed to perform your chores without interruption and without having to deal with the hiccups that so often stop you from getting things done. You want everything to work perfectly all the time, and without any risk of bad guys getting hold of your files, photos, or identity information.

Of course, we don’t live in a perfect world. It’s easy to find food that’s not good for you, just as it’s easy to find apps, devices, and services that don’t work well. For both, they may offer an attraction that’s hard to pass up – low cost (or free!), quick and convenient to get and consume/use, and tasty (satisfying in some way). And maintaining a healthy physical condition takes some work, you have to get up and move around quite a bit, do at least some exercise daily, and avoid some bad habits (like smoking, excessive drinking, and jaywalking) that might or might not have an immediate effect on your health. Maintaining a healthy digital condition means performing the basic maintenance tasks to keep your technology working well, always keeping good security habits in mind when using your technology, and avoiding the kind of mistakes with your digital life that can seriously degrade your digital health and well-being.

So all of the above are generalizations, but I bet you want more specifics. I have a ton of them in my Safe Computing Practices, which I hope you’ll take a good look at. Below are some more examples side-by-side with physical ones (not related, just so you can see the overall relationships). I hope this helps you better understand a healthy digital life, please feel free to add comments below.