8 step guide to overcome phone addiction!

Simple steps that helps you to reduce your screen time!

John Blanding/The Boston Globe via Getty Image

I got my first Android in 2011. It was a small Samsung Galaxy series phone, and it did not pull me in immediately. Coming from a generation of not having mobile phones, I used it for calling and sending messages only. The playstore was not fleshed out as it is now, and it did not have much going on. But, with time and with the Jio revolution(relatable if you are from India), by 2016, I was completely attached. Cell phones became an extended part of my hand and I carried it everywhere I stepped out.

Over time, it did not have much effect on my personal life. I did have a fun group of friends, a job which I liked and the relationships I had with my family were strong enough. In fact, it even helped me when I was by myself in the big city to not feel bored. This all changed with Covid and I returned to my hometown, cut off from friends, from my job, colleagues that I would see every day and ended up camping in my room to work from home.

With all the external dependencies and distractions cut off, I relied on my phone to provide relief from my overthinking mind and ended up pulled into the doom scrolls and endless mazes that social media offered. The changes did not happen immediately but overtime, and that’s the scary part of this. My concentration levels dropped enormously, and I became easily distracted and ended up feeling guilty about not doing my job properly. I also could sense a degree of dwindling of my focus and my memory too. That’s when I came across the concept of overstimulation, which I have covered in my blog.

I understood that overstimulation was the primary reason and that phone or digital device usage was the primary cause. Ever since then, I have taken a few simple steps to overcome my phone addiction, and it has immensely helped me. I’m sharing this so that it will help anyone who’s in the same boat as I was.

Uninstall or disable unnecessary apps from your phone

• Uninstall/Disable the Google based browser apps from your phone
  - Use browsers like DuckDuckGo or Brave with the history and caching disabled. They are not as accurate as Google, but that’s the point.
  - If you have to use Google, remove the feature to maintain history and cache
  - Log out of your account used in Google and login in if needed specifically
  - Disable or uninstall YouTube from your phone and do the same where you remove access to store history and cache. This reduces the suggestions that you get from them.
• Uninstall all the social media apps from your phone
  - You can still use it from a browser if you absolutely need to, from the browsers where the history and cache is turned off
  - Or you can download the lite versions of the apps. The algorithms are not as good as the fuller version and this will reduce your consumption too.

Do not keep your phones near you when you sleep

• Turn off the internet/Wi-Fi on your phone and keep it away from your bed to avoid reaching out to it when you can’t sleep.
• Something that helped me was to go to Spotify/Alexa and set a sleep timer for a podcast or a playlist that I liked to listen to for 30 minutes and keep it at least an arm’s distance away. Often times, I find myself sleeping before the 30-minute mark.
• You can keep a hard copy of a book or Kindle too, if you like reading before dozing off, but it’s not recommended if you are someone who will get hooked on story lines or narratives.

Use an app to block the app

• Use apps like StayFocused or Freedom to block all the apps that you absolutely do not need
• I use StayFocused, and I’ve kept a setting where you can’t use the blocked apps until you enter a 64 character random text in it.
• I also have a block from 6:00 AM to 8:00 PM on all the unnecessary apps that are not required.
• For my browser, I’ve added usage time for twenty minutes, and it will get locked after that.
• I can override these settings, but since I’ve made the override a bit difficult, I do not do it unless it’s absolutely necessary.
• These apps require Device Admin permissions. If you feel uncomfortable doing that, I would suggest using inbuilt apps like Digital Wellbeing. But, from my personal experience, since it’s easy to change, it was not that effective.
• Play around with these settings until you land on a solid plan that will help you.

Do not open your phone first thing in the morning

• Keeping your phone away from your bed and having the blocking apps helps in not using your phone first thing in the morning.
• Do not use any news apps unless it’s a necessity
• Plan your day ahead so that you do not sit idle as soon as you wake up and end up reaching out to your phone to fill the time.

Turn off all notifications in your apps

• Except the most needed apps, turn off notifications in all the apps
• Even on the most needed apps, check your notification settings and see if you can specifically turn off notifications for promotions and offers.

Do not check all your work emails/chats as soon as you begin work

• Schedule a time at noon after your lunch or before you log off from you work to check your emails and chat.
• Get out of all the chat groups that are not necessary and communicate your focus hours to the team or via calendar invites so that they will understand even if you reply late.
  - Utilize the DND feature of your chat apps in your core focus hours
• Checking your mail and chats, even if they are necessary, also affects your focus for the day (refer blog on overstimulation). So, choose what is necessary as per your requirement and do not get drowned in all the mails that you get. Not every mail or chat is important.

Log out of social media accounts after you’ve used them and add MFA to them

• Almost all the social media apps have MFA support. Enabling them gives you one extra step before you log in, which is a small hurdle that will help you to stop from mindlessly reaching out to your phone.
• Once you are done using the social media apps, log out.
• Use browsers instead of apps to use your social media accounts
• Use the ‘Delete history on close’ feature in the DuckDuckGo browser so that if you need to login, you are not automatically logged in with your existing cache.

Keep your phone away from the reach of your hand while focusing

• If you need to keep your phone nearby to use any MFA apps for your work, just keep it in a place where you can’t see it right away and away from you so that you need to walk to go get it. This simple step will reduce your phone usage to a major degree!

These might look like a lot, but once you start doing them, you will definitely see an improvement in how you live your life every day. Reclaim time from the ever-hungry apps that eat away at your precious time!

Feel free to share any additional tips in the comments too!