Zev Felix, DOCamp Grounded & Digital Detox
Imagine a circle of adults gathered under towering redwoods, their phones locked away, their attention fully present. For five years, that was my work.
Before I ever set foot in a hospital, I helped build Digital Detox and Camp Grounded alongside my brother Levi and a group of remarkably creative friends.
Camp Grounded was a summer camp for adults. No phones. No screens. No work talk. No last names or job titles. For a few days at a time, a few hundred people set all of it down in the redwoods of Northern California and remembered how to be present.
Over those years, our small team delivered 17 camps and 12 events for more than 3,000 people across the country.
The idea sounds simple. What happened was not.
People arrived carrying the same invisible weight: full calendars, overflowing inboxes, careers moving forward, and a quiet exhaustion underneath it all.
Around the fire, they spoke openly about loneliness, burnout, and hope. They made things with their hands. They sang. They slept. They reconnected with parts of themselves that had been buried beneath notifications.
I found myself listening closely, noticing what mattered most to each person, and helping them shape small habits that actually stuck.
It started with one question: What matters to you?
My brother Levi
None of this would have existed without my brother Levi.
Levi believed technology should be built with intention. He used to talk about reclaiming language from the tech industry: not rejecting innovation, but insisting that powerful tools serve people rather than the other way around. That idea still shapes how I think about technology in medicine.
He was diagnosed with glioblastoma, and he died in 2017. The New York Times wrote his obituary.
Building something joyful and deeply human alongside him, and later walking with him through his illness, changed what I notice about people, presence, and care. It is a large part of why I became a doctor.
What this has to do with medicine
That practice, beginning with What matters to you? and building from there, became the foundation of the physician I want to be.
I still believe a good prescription can include play, social connection, time outdoors, and a healthier relationship with screens, right alongside medication and procedures.
In a world of constant connectivity, I want to help people protect their attention, their mood, and their relationships. Not with guilt, and not with all-or-nothing rules, but with small, sustainable steps. It is the same balance I try to build into my own life.
