I was recently reading some short notes on Substack with suggestions for how to break a cell phone addiction.
People shared the usual strategies that they’ve been sharing for years about how to break up with your phone:
- turn off your phone;
- leave your phone in another room;
- delete all social media and email apps;
- do everything from a desktop, which becomes very boring.
I felt like I was back in 2017. Back then, it was people trying to figure out how to break their Facebook addiction. Today it’s Substack. Next year it will be something else.
And most people are resorting to the same strategies, which are simply not going to get the job done.
To be clear, it’s not that these methods cannot be effective. They can be effective for a short period of time.
The problem with these “solutions” is that they don’t solve the actual problem underlying cell phone or social media addiction.
They blame the device instead of putting responsibility on the user.
And they punish the user by depriving you of the convenience of your device.
As a long-term strategy, deleting all your apps from your device or keeping it permanently off or away from you reinforces a subconscious belief that you can’t be trusted around your device. It’s a disempowering way to address a problem that begins with your inner patterns.
If you have to lock up your technology to avoid the addiction, then your technology is still controlling you. That’s not a healthy relationship; you’re still a prisoner to it.
Addictions Are Habits
If you truly want to solve a problem you must solve it at the cause.
The first step to breaking any addiction is to recognize that an addiction is a symptom, or result — not a cause.
All addictions are habits. A habit is an action we automatically perform in response to a trigger. The trigger might be something external — like the ping of a phone notification. But it can also be internal, like a feeling of discomfort or an emotional state we want to avoid. Often, the trigger can be something outside our conscious awareness.
We can easily address the external triggers like ringing phones and notification alerts by putting a phone on silent or the “Do Not Disturb” setting. My phone is on DND by default, unless I’m expecting a scheduled call.
Addressing internal triggers is where the harder work lies. In this context, addiction is a habit of escape. Whether it’s your phone, food, drink, social media, busy work, or a thinking habit like worrying or rumination, it begins as a strategy to escape something that is uncomfortable.
To truly break an addiction, you must recognize this dynamic; you have to see the pattern in order to interrupt it.
And you must take responsibility for your role in the process.
How to Actually Break a Cell Phone Addiction
Address the Cause
To actually break a cell phone addiction, or any other addiction, you must address it at its cause.
Unless you address the underlying cause, the energy you direct into the phone addiction (or any other addiction) will simply go to another distraction vehicle.
If it’s not your phone, it might be food, busy work, errands, or even spacing out. There’s no shortage of vehicles for escape, and any of them can become an addiction.
The energy you put into your phone is a vehicle for escaping something that makes you uncomfortable, bored, anxious, or fearful.
To break the addiction, you must first understand why you are constantly checking your phone — what’s the trigger?
- What inner state of being are you trying to escape?
- What external circumstances trigger this inner state?
Slow Down the Process
In a well-established habit, there is almost no space between a trigger and response. To see the trigger, you must slow down the process: create a space between the trigger and response.
This is where the strategy of putting your phone across the room or in another room can be helpful.
Having the phone in another room or deleting certain apps can help you interrupt the pattern by creating friction. It slows down the process between trigger and response.
With the phone in another room you need to think twice about whether it’s worth it to go get it.
But that’s the starting point, not the end.
Having the phone in another room doesn’t address the cause of the addiction; it gives you the space in which to see the dynamic and work with what’s underneath.
Work With the Real Cause
Once you start to see your triggers, you can work with them. This is where mindfulness tools and practices can come in.
Learning to sit with your discomfort can help you develop a healthy relationship with your phone — or whatever other vehicle you use for addiction.
Phones Are Helpful Devices
Phones are meant to be helpful devices — when we have healthy relationships with them. They give us access to information and connection and can help us do constructive work.
The addictions and attachments we form to them are real, but these aren’t the fault of the devices or the apps we use.
By taking responsibility and claiming our own agency, we can retrain our habits and develop healthier relationships to our technology.
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