Habits & attention
How do I stop picking up my phone while reading?
Try a short reading window, a practical phone location and a stopping point that fits your actual evening.
Decide what counts as a reading session
Start with something small and recognisable: ten minutes, two pages, or one short section. Pick a book you want to open, not one you feel obliged to finish. Put a bookmark at the stopping point if a visible endpoint would help.
You are testing a reading setup. You are not proving that you can concentrate indefinitely or that every minute away from a screen must be productive. An evening can include both reading and deliberately chosen phone time.
Move the next distraction before you sit down
Choose where the phone will be during that short window. A nearby shelf may be enough for one person; another may prefer a different room. Keep essential calls, accessibility tools and caring responsibilities in mind. Do not remove access to something you genuinely need.
If you are reading on your phone, use the simplest workable arrangement: open the reading app and decide in advance what would justify leaving it. The point is to reduce repeated decisions, not to buy new equipment.
Give stray tasks somewhere to wait
Keep a small piece of paper beside the book. If you remember an email, shopping item or question, write a few words rather than switching immediately. At the end of the session, decide which notes still need attention.
For example, “check train time” can wait on paper if the journey is next week. An urgent message may not. Use your judgement; the experiment should support your life rather than compete with it.
Adjust the setup after a few attempts
Notice when you reached for the phone. Was the reading too demanding for that hour? Were you waiting for a real message? Did the book simply fail to interest you? Those observations give you something more useful than “I have no discipline.”
Try a different book, a shorter session or another time of day. Keep the change that makes returning easier. If you want to explore the amount of time involved, the screen-time calculator offers arithmetic estimates, not a prediction of what you will achieve.
Published by the books team. Examples are illustrative; practical exercises are editorial suggestions. Sources are linked beside factual claims. Editorial approach · Suggest a correction