5 Ways To Lower Your Screen Time

Technology is here to help us, but I know I’m not the only one who feels that they’ve tipped over into the “too much of a good thing” territory, with technology being their main time sucker each day. The scrolling, comparison, the vacuum of opinions everywhere… It can be overwhelming and takes away time from my day-to-day life without me even noticing. I don’t know about you, but I find myself reaching for my phone in moments I don’t need to be, and I don’t like feeling like I’m living life through staring at a small black square. The “quick check ins” end up being 30 minute scroll sessions… and I’m not a fan.

The reality is, these apps are made to keep us on our screens as long as possible. The instant dopamine hit is just feeding the addictive (yes, it is an addiction) nature of it. That’s not to say that there aren’t positive aspects of the social side of social media apps, or technology in general, but when it turns to mindless clicking and numbing out, it’s up to us to take a hold of those tendencies and altar our habits for the better.

We are responsible for following through with the boundaries we set around technology. If you’re someone (like myself) who just taps off the iPhone Screen Time limit notification each time you see it, it’s time to take this more seriously.

So, how do we help ourselves get to a place where we feel like we’re in control of our screen time, instead of it controlling us? Here’s where to start.

As it’s always said, the first step is acknowledging the problem. It can be so easy to generally know we have an issue with screen time, without realizing the level that we mindlessly click into an app that sends us into scrolling spirals. I’ll go into more detail below, but it’s important to start by evaluating the current problem before going into solution mode. From there, you’re going to want to…

Establish what’s important to you. What do you want to prioritize in your days that you would have more room for if you were on your phone less? What habits do you want to have in your day to day? Write those things down. For myself, my priorities are: spending more focused time with loved ones, reading more books, and working on my business. Are your screen time habits taking away from those goals? Then let’s do something about it! Let’s get into how to audit your screen time to see where we gain back time to work towards your overall time saving goal!

PS. If you’re wanting to get more consistent with your habits, be sure to join my 70 Day Rhythm Reboot! This challenge is perfect for breaking bad habits and getting consistent with the good habits you want to have.

AUDIT YOUR PHONE USE

Like I was just saying, it’s important to be honest about your current problem. Let’s bring some awareness to just how often we’re picking up our phone mindlessly!

To evaluate how we’re currently using our phone during free time. Head to: Settings > Screen time, to see your daily and weekly stats. Here’s how to read your screen time stats:

• Under “(Name) iPhone), you’ll see your daily average
• Click “See all activity” under the graphic to see the breakdown of your use of each app amount for the day and week
• Scroll down to “Pickups” to see how many times you’ve picked up your phone today
• See “First use after pickup” to see your most common notifications that cause you to open your phone
• This will also show how many times you open your phone to scroll on apps that you don’t plan to

Is that what you expected it to be? For me, it brought a lot of awareness to how many times I mindlessly open Instagram or TikTok throughout the day that turns into 20 minute runs of scrolling that I’d like to avoid. Now that we’ve brought awareness to our priorities and mindless habits, let’s make a goal for what you want to improve on. More on this topic in point 1. below.

Here is a free worksheet to track your screen time, app use, and screen time goal tracking.

Oh, and while we’re on the topic, this would be a good time to go through and de-clutter your phone. Ruthlessly unfollow people that bring your negative thoughts (or in the cases where they may be people you need to keep following, muting them does WONDERs!), clear out apps you don’t use, and simplify your home screen. Anything that’s taking up tech and mental space that doesn’t do you service — get rid of it.

GO ALL IN

One way to go ahead and take control of your screen habits is by going all in and deleting your social (or any time-sucking) apps off your phone for a few weeks to re-center. This is a very effective in the process of deciding what you want to prioritize in your life without temptation to slip back into your habits. This process may not be for everyone, depending on work life and what you use socials for (for example, if you’re in a group that communicates frequently through DMs). However, if you do decide to do it this way, I would give it at least two weeks before redownloading! For when you redownload, or if you skip this part, let’s get into some micro-habits to help your screen use.

Now that we’ve started with the basics, Here are 5 other ways to actually get a handle on your screen dependency.

1. MAKE YOUR PHONE WORK *FOR* YOU.

Have you every used iPhone time limits? If not, it’s a great place to start. You can set hour limits on apps and create a “downtime” that shuts off any apps you want at a certain time (you can also whitelist any apps you want to always allow). What I love about the downtime feature is that you can choose to let it only show text notifications from certain contacts (ie. Favorites list) so you aren’t tempted to check every text that aren’t time sensitive after a certain time. The Focus tool does this as well for during work hours!

For those who are like myself and tap the “give me 15 more minutes” option on time limits, consider doing it with a passcode so that you have real accountability to keeping your screen time under your goal-time. Nothing is more humbling than me having to ask Matt to unlock my apps to keep scrolling, hahah. Another concern may be that if your phone is on do not disturb or on downtime, you may miss an important call or text. No fear! Like I said, you can opt in to let it pass through any certain contacts you want, and it has a setting where if someone calls you twice, you’ll get the ring so you don’t miss anything.

That said, there are some GREAT new screen time apps out there that have been so helpful to me!

• ScreenZen: This one is my current favorite. It creates a shortcut to any apps you want (for me I have IG and TikTok toggled on) so that when you open the app you want to limit, it reroutes to ScreenZen first and asks you if you’re sure you want to open that app. You can pick how many seconds it delays (mine is set to 20 seconds)– it’s been SO helpful for me in realizing how many times I mindlessly pick up my phone and open those apps! So every time I open TikTok, it gives a loading wheel for 20 seconds asking me if I really want to go into that app or not, which has been extremely effective in me cutting down scrolling time. ALSO, it has another feature where you can pick your limit on how long you scroll (I have it set to 10 minutes), and once that time is up, it will turn off wifi on that app with a VPN so it stops working. GENIUS for accountability. You can still turn it off, but it’s extra steps and is just enough effort for me to snap out of the mindless habit. And if you’re someone like myself who uses social for content creating or work, don’t worry, you can turn it off for an hour and it won’t kick you out or anything. It’s SO helpful.
• OffScreen: This one is SUPER informative on stats for your screen time. It will track how many pick ups, how long your pick ups are, your “detoxes” (aka breaks from your phone), etc. Very detailed stats for you to track! There’s also a focus tab where you can start a timer to focus and it will lock your phone so you have to do it (you can use this for work, work outs, reading, you name it). You can whitelist apps during this time to not count towards your screen time, too, so if you’re like me and record reels, you can batch that task and it won’t count against your stats.

Click here to download a template to log your screen use and make your goals.

2. SET A TIMER.

When you decide to scroll, keep a time limit on it. If you download ScreenZen, the app will do it for you. But if not, go right into your phone clock and time how long a sitting is on your phone and/or on certain apps. Like I was saying earlier, sometimes it takes seeing the problem to begin to move towards a solution. Seeing a 20 minute time waster that you didn’t plan for hits different when you see the number on how fast it goes by!

3. DO ONE THING AT A TIME.

There is a time and a place for multi-tasking, but I’ve recently realized how chronic multi-tasking has negatively impacted my life. I do not have to be listening to or watching something every time I’m working on a work of home task. Monotasking is officially back in style (aka doing one thing at a time). This goes for work or personal life. When you are about to start a task, put your phone in the other room, or at least out of sight, while you lock in to the task. Of course, if it’s a mindless task and you have a podcast to catch up on, there’s nothing wrong with that. The purpose of me saying to do one thing at a time is to make the point about the power of keeping your phone out of sight when you need (or want) to focus on something. Half of the battle is kicking the habit of the mindless pick ups, so this will help stop that!

4. READ UP ON YOUR HABITS.

Not quite feeling the pull to make a change yet? Sometimes for myself, it will take multiple podcast episodes, friend conversations, or books for me to fully accept something I need to take into my own hands to change. Okay, maybe not all of those things, but sometimes it takes a second. Here are some resources for ya with some one-sentence descriptions:

• Podcasts: Here’s a playlist I made of podcast episodes on screen time, and just habits in general.
• How to Break Up With Your Phone: This is a 30 day plan to better habits with your phone!
• Digital Minimalism: How to rewire your brain to not having the urge to reach for your phone in the middle of a task or conversation by decluttering your phone space (and in turn, your brain).

Gospel-minded books on the topic:

• Social Sanity in an Insta World: Balancing social media accounts in a gospel-minded way, discussing the positives, pitfalls, and principles on having good boundaries online.
• Redeeming Your Phone Time: A Bible study and workbook for accountability on screen time with thoughts and questions to ask each day.
• To Hell With The Hustle: Fighting against the cultural urge to constantly “do more” in a biblical manner by establishing boundaries in your life.
• The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry: How to Stay Emotionally Healthy and Spiritually Alive in the Chaos of the Modern World.

5. CHARGE YOUR PHONE IN THE BATHROOM

Before you start worrying about how you could miss an emergency call in the middle of the night, remember that you can always keep your ringer on for favorite contacts (re: earlier when I talked about iPhone’s downtime setting). Get a real alarm clock and kick the habit of being on your phone in your room (especially when you’re laying in bed). We had done this since we got married (we kept the TV out of our room as well) and it has served us so well with conversations, reading, and just all around winding down at night. We have slipped out of the habit this year (since being post partum I got sloppy with my habits) and have been itching for that boundary, honestly. It’s harder to fall asleep at night if you’re using screens while in bed — I know my body will feel better and more rested the next day if I actually use my time to wind down and to keep my phone out of reach that last hour or two before bed.

Feeling like you have a direction to go in? I know it can feel overwhelming to think of where to start when it comes to breaking habits, especially when it’s something so constant and available to us. Take a few weeks off, pick an app or two, and start one or two of these habits and I promise you will start to see a change. Happy mindful tech use!