We all know we should avoid screens before bed and checking our email in the morning, yet many of us sleep with our phones right next to us. Do you?
Photo by Matthew.
Over at Apartment Therapy, Kim McCormick did a little experiment where she banished her phone from her bedside for one month, and actually had a positive experience:
While I expected to notice the change the most at night, the morning has been the biggest improvement. Using a dedicated alarm clock has actually helped me get up earlier. I’m hitting snooze less often; the alarm has only one, pretty annoying sound. But really, it’s the peacefulness of letting my mind ease into wakefulness, rather than checking to see who’s shared an interesting photo of flowers or dogs, that makes me happiest about reshaping my habits.
This isn’t necessarily something everyone could expect from the same experiment, but it is an interesting thought. I sleep next to my phone every night and look at it first thing when I wake up, even though I know I shouldn’t — and I don’t even use it as an alarm. What do you do? Have you ever tried banishing your phone, and if so, how did it go?
Banishing My Phone from the Bedside: The Results, One Month Later [Apartment Therapy]
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5 responses to “Do You Sleep Near Your Phone?”
Get rid of Facebook altogether! My wife and I both deleted our Facebook accounts and are both happier for it. This solves the checking the phone issue for all times.
i, like many others, sleep with my phone as my alarm, right next to my bed. i have been considering relocating it for a while, this article might actually be a catalyst for a change!
I sleep with my phone next to me, but don’t use it as an alarm. I have it set to DND overnight anyway and it will only ring if someone tries calling me twice in a 5 minute period (emergency), with notifications disabled otherwise.
Yea, sometimes I wake up and groggily check my RSS feeds instead of just getting up, but meh, doesn’t worry me. I don’t use it as an alarm either, given nearly everytime there is an OS update for a phone and DST comes and goes people report alarms stop working, I just don’t trust them.
I use my phone in a docking station and have a program called Dock Clock Plus which allows me to set the text a dark red and all the buttons and such to off and remove any white off the screen so it doesn’t light up the room at night, but allows me to easily read the time if I happen to wake up at night. Also using another program called Alarm Clock Plus which allows me to set my alarm clock for certain times of day/week so it only wakes me up when needed. Also Samsungs DND options which won’t allow someone to ring me (unless its an emerg or they are white listed) .. no SMS disruptions or any other alerts to wake me up. All in All.. its just another clock whenever I use Tasker to put it in night mode and set the options to DND automatically.. That way if I’m out I can still take the phone calls if it rings too.
I’ve always found that if I put my phone just out of reach of my bed then I can force myself to actually get up to turn off the alarm in the morning.