Battery health or mental health?

These days we all have cellphones. No matter what kind of phone you have, we all follow a similar pattern. When our battery gets low, we plug them in and charge them back to 100% (or whatever level we need to get through until our next charge). Over time the batteries in our phones deteriorate (battery health). It’s inevitable. Do you ever wonder why your new phone could get through a day and a half when you first got it? Only now it barely gets through a single day of light use?

The health of our batteries degrades.

Battery health degrades

The iPhone’s battery has a life expectancy of 400 charge cycles. After 400 charge cycles, the battery’s capacity drops by about 20 percent from when it was brand new (source). That means even if you charge it to 100%, your battery is only operating at about 80% of its full potential. I choose iPhone because I bit into the poison Apple, remember?

Want to see what your battery health is? On iPhone, go to Settings>Battery>Battery Health. On my 3-year-old iPhone Xr, I’m surprisingly still sitting at 92% of its original max capacity. When using a brand new iPhone XR my battery was at about 2942 mAh. However, with battery deterioration, my battery can only charge to about 2706 mAh.

On iPhone, go to Settings>Battery>Battery Health

So my battery isn’t 100%?

In a meeting today someone asked, how was everybody’s holiday? It wasn’t until today that I made this connection to battery health. No matter how long my holidays are, no matter how many long weekends I take (an extra Friday or Monday here and there), my battery is no longer at 100%. 

Sure, on the outside my charge will SAY that I’m at 100%, but there is no way that my battery health is 100%. No matter how many extra days of holiday I take, my battery’s max health (mental health) has deteriorated.

No matter how long my battery is plugged in (in this case, a metaphorical holiday) once I unplug, my battery is draining much faster. I wasn’t actually at 100% capacity.

This is me on holiday

COVID-19 has stopped us from enjoying our lives to the fullest extent over these past two-plus years. If you, like me, find yourself draining quicker (like your cell phone’s battery) maybe your mental health battery isn’t refreshing to 100% either.

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