To get over his screen addiction, 18-year-old Garner Hall had to spend more time on his phone.
The contradiction isn’t lost on the teenager from Bainbridge Island, Wash. But Hall believes that what he’s been able to create has been worth it, and is serving a real purpose for other people battling similar issues.
Hall is the brains behind Brain Nourishment, a one-person media startup of sorts, focusing on providing daily motivation to followers who need a nudge to stay focused and reduce their digital dependence. In about a year, the Brain Nourishment Instagram feed has attracted 1.9 million followers.
“Just like anybody else, I kind of found myself in these continuous cycles of doom scrolling all the time and getting sucked into these social media feedback loops where the algorithms prioritize emotional drainage,” Hall said. “They prioritize isolating you to boost their engagement and user retention.”
Rather than delete his social feeds, employ an app to block them, or switch to a “dumb phone” as a way to combat his addiction, Hall is deploying memes as motivators to get people to consider how else they could be spending their time.
“Things you could be doing instead of scrolling Instagram,” reads the message on a post (with 137,000 likes) that offers click-through answers on subsequent slides, including, “Going on a run, reading a book, staring at the sky.”
The goal — while again acknowledging the contradictory nature of it all — is to help people establish healthier routines while not scaring them away from the Brain Nourishment feed. Hall knows he has to meet his audience where they’re at.
“To even see the message I’m trying to provide, you have to be on the platform in the first place,” he said. “Creating it on the platform where people are facing this issue is really important. By doing it through social media, I’m directly talking to people who it will most likely affect, which I think is important.”
In addition to what he’s building, he’s also secured a partnership with Opal, a New York City-based startup that’s also focused on improving focus. In comments on his posts, he offers to send people “the app that changed my life.”
Hall, a rising senior at Bainbridge Island High School, has dabbled in some data science coursework. He conducted his own research aimed at understanding whether Brain Nourishment has been effective in reducing screen time among its community of followers. While self-reported behavior tends to be overstated, Hall’s survey of more than 8,000 respondents found that its content has contributed to more than 34 million hours of screen-time reduction.
The Instagram feed is a jumping-off point to what Hall envisions as a broader company where other tools will be created to meet his addiction-fighting objective.
Hall is currently building his first iOS app primarily using Cursor AI for code development. The app is designed to address how scrolling is used to fill moments of boredom. It generates personalized tasks such as 20 minutes of meditation, 15-minute walks, or other actionable steps that users can check off throughout the day instead of overusing their phones.
Hall’s entrepreneurial and creative spirit runs in the family. His dad, Steve Hall, is a longtime venture capitalist who previously worked at Paul Allen’s Vulcan Capital. He went viral during the pandemic with his one-man cover of the Temple of the Dog grunge hit “Hunger Strike.” He’s also been involved as a producer on films including “Wildcat” and “East of the Mountains.”
In an age when content consumption, rather than creation, is how many young people spend their time, the younger Hall is nourishing his brain and his ambition via his startup.
“This whole venture sparked my passion for creating businesses or brands through this digital lens, creating something that ultimately makes a positive impact for many people,” he said.
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