Do you struggle with spending too much time on your smartphone? If so, you’re definitely not the only one.
With more than 6 billion smartphone users around the world, many struggle to limit their screen time. It’s easy to pick up your phone intending only to check something quickly and end up scrolling through for hours instead. Social media, text messaging, and other apps are easy to spend a lot of time on without realizing it.
But it’s not healthy to spend so much time on your phone. You can miss out on real life, experience the fear of missing out, neglect your responsibilities, and invest too much time in other people’s lives. It’s important to set healthy boundaries around your screen time so it doesn’t consume your life from day to day.
If you want to effectively curb your smartphone addiction, here are 4 simple ways to get started.
Monitor Your Usage
You might be aware that you use your phone a lot, but you won’t know exactly how much unless you track it. Once you start monitoring your phone usage, it could serve as a wake-up call to limit your time and practice mindfulness around your habits. The sooner you track your usage, the more successful you’ll be at curbing your addiction.
Smartphones come with social monitoring apps you can use to check how much time you’ve spent on your phone daily or weekly. Many of them come with time limits that alert you when you’ve spent a certain amount of time on your apps so you can stay aware. The more aware you are about your habits, the easier it is to change them and make improvements.
Hold Yourself Accountable
Spending excessive amounts of time on your phone can lead to missing out on real life and failing to completing important tasks. To overcome this obstacle, it’s crucial to hold yourself accountable for how you spend your time.
It helps to tell a friend about limiting your phone usage so they can help you stay on track and check in on you about your habits. Doing it alone, especially when you’re used to using your phone excessively, can lead you back to your old ways. It’s easier to deal with when you have people supporting you and encouraging you to spend your time wisely so you can achieve your goals.
Silence Notifications
When you see notifications popping up on your phone screen, it can be tempting to check them right away. Social media notifications, calls, texts, and other app notifications might entice you to pick up your phone, but there are ways around this.
Silencing your notifications helps to curb your smartphone addiction so you aren’t alerted everytime your phone goes off. Do Not Disturb mode automatically does this for you so your phone stays on silent for texts, calls, and app notifications.
Focus on Other Things
To reduce your phone usage and create more mobile-friendly habits, it’s important to take your attention away from it. This is easier to do when you aren’t constantly disrupted by your phone going off and have other things to focus on.
Instead of scrolling through your phone, you can use that energy to invest in your hobbies and spend time with your loved ones. Working on projects you enjoy can boost your creativity and overall wellbeing. Staring at a screen all day does nothing to increase your motivation or get you closer to where you want to be. It’s important to put more effort into working towards your goals so you can reach success.
Over to You
If you’re guilty of spending too much time on your phone, these simple tips are a game-changer that will help you get started. It’s not easy to change bad habits, but with enough consistency and practice, you’ll be well on your way to improving them or eliminating them completely. How will you curb your smartphone addiction?