Do this to your phone’s lock screen for a calmer day

Michelle Woo
Forge
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2 min readJun 5, 2021

🔓 Tip: Set up a “mindful lock screen.”

We touch our phones an average of 2,617 times a day. While some of those taps and swipes are necessary, a lot of them happen because we’re bored, or anxious, or avoiding that one task we’ve already put off for the past 27 days. What if every time we lifted our phones, a little voice asked: Hey there, buddy, do you really need to do this right now?

A mindful lock screen serves this purpose. It’s a phone lock screen that you customize with words that will help you be more intentional about your phone usage. Niklas Göke’s lock screen says “Why am I in your hand?” (He found the dimensions of his screen and then created a wallpaper design using Canva.) Göke writes on Better Humans: “When I look at this screen, I don’t just mindlessly unlock. I think.” Try a phrase that makes you pause for a moment. Your future self who just needs to check something real quick will be better for it.

🏃 More from Forge on freeing yourself from your devices:

12 Things to Do Instead of Picking Up Your Phone
Read more >>

A Radical Guide to Spending Less Time on Your Phone
Read more >>

My Smartest Move Was Switching to a Dumber Phone
Read more >>

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Published in Forge

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Michelle Woo
Michelle Woo

Written by Michelle Woo

Author of Horizontal Parenting: How to Entertain Your Kid While Lying Down (Chronicle Books)

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