How to Use Your Phone Less, According to Reddit
If you want to cut down on your phone usage time, redditor mukalodric has a few suggestions . The r / getdisciplined subreddit thread (a group “for people with procrastination, motivation, and discipline problems”) titled “How I Reduced Reckless Phone Use” provides advice from the original author as well as other contributors. … Here are some of our favorite strategies:
Keep track of your time
According to Mukalodrik, the first step to using your phone less is to understand how much you actually use. “Seriously, if you do one thing , do it. Because when you find yourself spending more than 6 hours a day on your phone, it will be sobering. If statistics only come to mind once a day, you will use your phone less. There’s Screen Time (iOS) and Digital Wellbeing (Android) for that, ”says Mukalodrich.
Make your phone less immersive
Instead of relying on your own willpower, Mukalodrik suggests restructuring your phone to make it less attractive. Here are some of their suggestions:
- “Remove unnecessary applications. Think about it well, because you might try to fool yourself.
- Put the leftover time-wasting apps in one folder and give it a name like Time Sink.
- Place this folder on the second page of your home screen. Place the apps on the second page of the folder itself.
- Get fewer notifications. Maybe leave them for email. Disable them for Instagram, YouTube, etc.
- Use shades of gray. IOS has an accessibility shortcut that lets you go back with three taps.
- Use a simpler wallpaper , not a multicolored one. Something inspirational or just plain.
- Change your home screen setting about once a month to disrupt muscle memory.
- Please remove certain applications and use their clunky mobile website counterparts instead. ”
Make your phone less accessible
In the same spirit, realistic passion for travel offered to complicate access to the phone by placing it in the glove box of the vehicle or charging it only in a place where you can not get to use it.
Label certain actions as “no screen”
Another tip from mukalodric: “Choose manually specific daily activities or places you go to, and just don’t use your phone there . You can stop using your phone: in the bathroom, in the gym, in the car, in the classroom, while eating, while walking, or before the shower in the morning. The latter is very important, at least for me. Please, please don’t start your morning by reacting to a person or news, because that will create a negative tone for the rest of the day. ”
Do something else with your time
So, you have a little time when you are not tied to your phone. It’s great, but it will be very tempting to take it back if you have nothing else to do, ”says Mukalodrik.“ Use this time to sleep better, work on a hobby, study or talk to your family. /friends. Usually, if you’re bored enough, you will eventually find something to do. So don’t worry too much, but at least have a vague idea of what you will be doing with all the extra hours of the week that you start to gain. If you don’t know what to replace your phone with, it will be difficult. “
Use something else as an alarm or clock (like an alarm or clock)
As redditor -screamin- points out , it can be really tricky to use your phone less if you rely on it for both clock and alarm. Fortunately, there is a fairly simple solution: “I started using a clock with a timer and an alarm. Boom, I’m more likely to set the alarms and timers I want without even unlocking my phone. In addition, it is better to have on hand things that prevent the use of the phone (for example, a book, magazine, knitting, etc.) out of boredom. And set an alarm when you start so you know when to switch tasks! “
You can read more strategies on how to put a phone on the original branch.