[Androider]

The most negative influence on my sleep by far is from using my phone in bed, as I suspect it is for many others. Not only when falling asleep, but also when waking up reaching for the phone is too easy and robs me of any chance of falling asleep again.

The only trick I've found that works quite consistently for me, is removing the phone from the room entirely. This makes my laziness work for me for once, as getting the phone from another room altogether is too much of a hassle.

Similarly, if you want to stop eating after a certain hour, 9pm in my case, brush your teeth at that exact time. After that I can't be bothered to eat since brushing my teeth again would be a hassle.

[Swordfish12345]

> removing the phone from the room entirely.

100%. Started this recently. It works perfectly if you can withstand the withdrawals!

The moment you start doing this, is the moment you have to confront how incredibly addicted you actually are to your phone and the internet.

It will feel like you are being tortured. And it's very easy to give in because the immediate consequences are quite tame (getting to sleep a bit later, little less energy the next day). But over time they add up.

I highly recommend trying it and observing your mind go crazy. You can truly start to understand addicts and what they go through.

The biggest revelation was that cold turkey doesn't work too well. Instantly cutting off access to your phone can cause you to be consumed by the desire to have access to it (moreso than you even felt before), and you lose a lot of mental energy fighting against this. Which can disrupt your work, and disrupt your sleep even more so than if you allowed yourself access to it.

I think this is the reason most people don't do it even though its such a simple and obvious advice.

Addiction.

[solumunus]

If you’re that addicted you’ve got real problems and you should absolutely be following through with this and other things to break that addiction. I question how many people would really react like that. I use my phone in bed at times I shouldn’t but it’s a complete non issue to not have it in bed.

[callalex]

I thought the same thing until I tried it ;)

[xeromal]

I struggled with insomnia about 6 years ago and realized using my phone and computer was the culprit. I now shower in the dark and go straight to bed after. No screen time. I fall asleep usually in minutes though occasionally I'll struggle with sleep if I haven't hit the gym that day.

[PlunderBunny]

I read something to the effect that for most people, the required willpower to not do something (e.g. not have a snack) is not achieved by gritting your teeth and forcing yourself not to give into the temptation that’s right in front of you, but to remove it all together. For example, I live in a city and ate dinner every night at a healthy vegetarian cafe on the way home from work, and ate a breakfast of cereals at work. This allowed me to turn off my fridge at home and keep no snacks or food at all in the house. I still had the urge to snack, but the amount of work it would have required (going out to buy some snacks first) made it impractical enough that I didn’t give in.