A Simple Idea to Reduce My Phone Time
22 Jan 2026 #miscI tell myself I’m not addicted to my phone. That’s exactly what addicts say.
This week, I averaged 2h39min on my phone. Today, it was 1h55min. I just checked it. That’s enough to produce some creative work.
In my defense, I only listened to podcasts while doing the dishes. But most of that time was scrolling to find what to listen to.
This year, my intention is simplicity: ditching my distraction machine to live lighter.
Replacing a bad habit with a good one
For that, I’m putting my phone out of sight, in a new place.
And in every place where I used to put my phone, I’m leaving a book and a zine instead.
This week, a rabbit hole took me to Austen Kleon’s rules of reading. He made a zine, a tiny magazine with eight pages created from a single sheet of paper.
And when you want to buy a red car, you see red cars everywhere. Today I discovered zines for free-form journaling and single-purpose notebooks. Credit goes to Cal Newport’s podcast for the notebook idea. Yes, I was doing the dishes.
What if I combine the two ideas? Maybe one zine per day for quotes and lessons. And another per project for ideas and questions.
That’s how I’m replacing scrolling with reading and even making my own zines.
If you want to follow along, here are the books I read last year. Perfect replacements for where your phone used to sit.