Phone Experiments - Week 1

This is an update post based on my 4-week experiment to reduce or shift my smartphone usage patterns.

During week one, I made tons of small adjustments. They all have contributed to less overall usage, but also shifts in how I use the phone and what pulls at my attention when I do.

Blocking Apps

Using Blank Spaces app, but not for the minimal list homescreen launcher feature. I’ve used this in the past because it looks so focused and minimal. I’ve gone with only using the app locking feature for things like my RSS reader (Unread), YouTube watch later app (Unwatched), and many more. If I attempt to open these apps, I’m presented with the option to do a 30-second breathing exercise. Do that, and I’m asked again if I actually want to use the app. If yes, for how long out of 2, 5, and 10-minute options. This is a great point of mental and physical friction.

Reading articles and newsletters via RSS is great. Unread is a great app experience to do it. I recognized that while it is definitely not an algorithmic feed, it is a pull-to-refresh mental slot machine to see if there’s a new item to read. By locking it, I mentally prepare for it to be a short time period of use. In fact, I haven’t been using Unread on my phone much this week. Instead, I have been processing RSS and email once a day during a dedicated morning session.

Visual Tweaks

• Removing lockscreen and homescreen wallpapers. The cool depth effect and beautiful blur and gradients are pleasing to the eye. My phone is not a piece in an art museum deserving of my gaze for the sake of visual appreciation of its parlor tricks.
• Removing lockscreen widgets other than one that reads “Be intentional” above the clock. Tap that and it prompts me for text via a shortcut input window. That text gets written to the Apple Journal app without it opening. Phone back away from my eyes, thought logged without any distraction opportunity. For those interested, I’m using Any Text to accomplish this.
• Two columns of apps down the center of my single homescreen. The apps on the left stay the same. The apps on the right change based on if I’m in my default Focus mode or my Work Focus mode. I realized two things about the visually pleasant list of app names or functions widget homescreen-style: 1. I rarely used the list to launch the app. I’d either pull down and search in Spotlight or I’d swipe left to open it from the App Library. 2. It was minimalism visual porn. For me, so are minimalist Shortcuts icons to launch apps that have better info or actions from the icon or long-press of the icon. A perfect example is Apple’s Calendar app. Having it on the homescreen shows me the current date from the icon alone, then a long-press allows me to go directly to the add event UI. I found that many apps have useful long-press icon actions that get me to a UI without having to open the app, then open those UIs and maybe get caught up in between.
• Grayscale mode all the time (other than when I need to see color to view a photo or other info where color is a necessity). Triple-click of the side button is set to toggle this mode. Super easy flow and while iOS 18 made it easy to have glassy clear icons, I’ve actually gone back to the color versions because grayscale mode solves for the same. Function over fantastic aesthetics fanfare.

Screenshots ignore the grayscale being on, but here’s what my lock and homescreens look like during the first week.

Current lockscreen and homescreen.

Hiding Apps

I’m saving the best for last… Long-pressing on an app’s icon and choosing Require Face ID. That brings you to a menu where you have two options. One is to require Face ID to open the app, the other is to require Face ID and hide the app. If you choose that, you have to press another button to confirm that’s what you want. While some may be using this feature to hide dating apps or things they’re embarrassed to have installed on their phone, I’m using it to remove every app from my view that I don’t want to or need to use regularly, but benefit from not having to reinstall and re-login every time I do need it. What have I hidden, you ask? All finance apps. All food ordering apps. All the apps that do a certain utility that I need every once in a while, but don’t need it cluttering up my App Library all the time. Apps that are hidden appear in a folder in App Library all the way at the bottom, and it doesn’t even show you the icons in the folder preview. It’s like they don’t exist until you tap that folder to go to them. They don’t show in Spotlight searches. They don’t have a presence in the Share Sheet. They don’t even show up in the swipe up or over app-switcher. It’s glorious.

Physical Replacement

I started carrying a small pocket notebook (Field Notes-style), and a Fisher Space Pen I’ve had for well over a decade. I even found a way to keep the pen from sliding out of my pocket using heat-shrink tubing. I wouldn’t say this new alternative has stuck yet. I still dictate reminders to Siri (mostly while using CarPlay), but my hope is that ideas that hit me that aren’t reminders will start going here to process digitally later. I have some other ideas here, but we’ll save those for future weeks.

⭥ Site Index   |   ↻ Random Post