Do You Have a Healthy Relationship to your Phone?
Last month I attended a mindfulness retreat, and during our time together, we let go of our phones and paused our everyday interactions with technology.
When we were ready to return, we did so intentionally, as a group, with reflection and care.
After experiencing a simple 48 hours without our phones we asked:
What patterns am I ready to release?
What do I want my relationship with my phone to feel like going forward?
It was a powerful experience—releasing judgment of ourselves, and sharing in sacred community.
Many of us seeking presence may ask: How do we protect the sacred quality of our attention in a world constantly trying to hijack it?
When we check our phone we can become disconnected from our bodies, our breath, and the people in front of us, we lose more than time—we lose intimacy, sleep, health, and joy.
Let’s explore what it means to return to intention.
How to Be Intentional With Your Phone
Follow Circadian Rhythms
Power down your phone when the sun sets. Let that be a threshold into rest. In the morning, delay turning it on until after you’ve taken time to meditate or connect with your breath first. Attune with your body and your breath before your phone
Use an Alarm Clock
Let your first moment of awareness be for yourself—not your screen. Let your nervous system land softly into the day.
Shift your Screen to Warmer Colors After Dark (Nightshift)
If you must look at your phone after sunset, use the night shift setting in Display and Brightness on an Iphone. These small adjustments to warmer tones mimic candlelight and can support melatonin production, sleep quality, and overall circadian health.
Wear a Watch
Most people carry a phone just to know what time it is. Buying a watch is a simple choice, but a meaningful one. So often we pick up the phone to check the time and are swept into a dozen other tabs. I found this tip to be helpful when I was watching for nap times with my daughter. I didn’t want to be swept into my phone while watching her, so a simple watch helped me orient to time without distraction.
Put the Phone Away When You’re with your Partner or Children
Isn’t it just the worst when you’re looking forward to connect with your partner and in the middle of your conversation they check their phone? Eye contact is the medicine of this age. Let your attention be undivided. When it comes to children, they are going to want those devices even more if they see you using them when you’re together.
Use your Phone to Support Mindfulness, Not Erode it
Apps like Insight Timer can serve as daily reminders to come back to your breath. Time-limiting apps like Forest, Freedom, or Screen Zen can gently bring you back into rhythm when you’ve been caught in a scroll.
Turn off Notifications for Anything that isn’t Essential
Many people don’t know you can turn off notifications for apps, and you can mute Whatsapp groups so you aren’t constantly drawn into your phone. Most of the time, urgency is manufactured. Protect your focus and choose when you are going to check it.
Reframe How you Relate to Email
Instead of checking constantly throughout the day, create a ritual. Set a timer. Approach it as a task you choose to do, not as a reflex you fall into.
When you Take a Break, Choose Something that Truly Nourishes You
Stretch. Go outside. Sip something warm. Lay on the ground. Breathe. Let your break restore you.
Return to Presence
Each time we create space from the phone, we create space to feel again. We remember that empty space is deeply valuable. It’s when we empty we connect with our intuition, clarity, and truth.
Our attention is sacred. Something to protect.
What would it feel like to live in alignment with your nervous system, not just your notifications?
What would it feel like to turn inward, instead of outward, when the moment feels uncomfortable?
We are not here to be constantly reachable, endlessly responsive, or mentally fragmented.
We are here to be available to what truly matters.
We are here to be alive to this moment.
We are here to choose presence—again and again.
Reflection Questions:
What is the feeling in my body when I reach for my phone?
What emotion might I be avoiding when I open it?
What boundaries with my phone would feel like an act of self-love?
What would it feel like to check in with myself as often as I check my phone?
Every time you pause before reaching for your phone, you are choosing your life.
Let your presence lead the way.
Looking for more ways to live with presence and intention?
