How to take back CONTROL of your PHONE (3 Tricks)

At this point, it's no secret that your

phone is stealing your time, your focus,

and honestly, majority of your life.

What was designed to be a tool at first

to make your life better has quietly

turned into an algorithm scientifically

engineered to rob you of every [music]

waking second of your life. On average,

people spend 5 hours a day staring

mindlessly into their phone. And if you

keep that up, by the time you're 60, you

will have given up 12 and 1/2 years of

your life to brain rot. That's

terrifying. And over the last year, I

realized that I was about as good as an

ape at stopping myself from picking up

my phone, staring at it, and scrolling

Instagram reels. And this year, I

decided I had [music] enough. Your phone

was designed to be a tool. You pick it

up, you use it, and you set it back

down. [music] But that's not how I was

using it. I'd pick up my phone to send a

text, and 30 minutes later, I would find

myself on the couch waking up from an

Instagram trance, wondering what just

happened. To really drive this point

home, you know what else is designed to

be a tool? A bicycle. You get on it, you

ride it to your destination, and you get

off it. You don't walk up to it, end up

getting confused, wonder why you just

deleted an hour of your life, and end up

doing something that you didn't mean to

do. So, in this video, I'm going to

share with you three ways I've

intentionally designed my phone to take

[music] back control. That way, I can

still enjoy my phone and watch content,

but I get to decide when that [music]

happens. So, the first way I took back

control of my phone was using grayscale.

It basically turns your phone into black

and white. And that sounds simple, but

for me, it works. It removes the visual

dopamine that makes scrolling so

addictive. It instantly reminds you that

this is a tool and I catch myself way

earlier than I used to. So whenever I go

on to my phone to use it as a tool to

send a [music] text, to ask CHP a

question, to take a photo, whatever it

is, I open up my phone if I get

distracted, I find that I catch myself

way earlier when it's on grayscale cuz

it's just not as [music] interesting. So

if you want to turn on grayscale, which

I highly recommend you at least try out,

you can turn it on by going to filters

and then selecting grayscale. And if you

want a shortcut like this where you can

triple click and turn your phone from

color to black and white back and forth,

you can go to accessibility shortcut and

then select color filters. Now you can

do that triple click and it will turn on

and off your black and white. The thing

with grayscale is the goal isn't to

never enjoy your phone. It's just

[clears throat] to control it and not

the other way around. Don't let it

control you. The only real issue I ran

into with grayscale was that I would

turn it off and then I would kind of

forget to turn it back on and the day

would go by and then I would just be

using my phone in normal color and

getting distracted like I had before. So

what I did is I actually went into the

shortcut app [music] on iPhone and made

an automation that basically turns back

on grayscale once an hour. So if I do go

and want to use my phone for color, I

can do that and then if I forget, it

will automatically every single hour

turn it back to black and white. So most

of the time when I open up my phone,

it's black and white. I found that every

single hour is enough to control myself

and stop mindlessly scrolling, but it's

also not so annoying that every single

time I open up my phone, like I have to

turn back on the color mode. So if I

want to use it for a little bit and

watch some videos or do something that

involves me actually wanting color, I

can do that without it auto turning off

all the time, but once an hour, even if

I'm using my phone actively and it

switches over, it's just a triple click

and I can go back to using it normally.

The second thing I did was control what

apps I use at certain times of the day.

Now I use this device called Brick. And

basically what you do is you can go and

tap your phone to this device and you

can choose what apps get blocked from

it. So for example now if I want to

quickly check my messages on my phone. I

literally can't unless I open up the

Brick app and then tap it to the device.

So, what I do is I'll keep this in my

kitchen downstairs. And when I'm in my

office trying to get work done to check

my messages or to check Instagram, I

will literally have to walk down to the

fridge in my kitchen, open up the app,

tap it to the app, then check Instagram.

So, I'm a lot more intentional with what

I do on my phone. It's basically like

the do not disturb setting on your

phone, but kind of like on steroids

because you physically cannot even if

you get a text message, I won't get it

[music] during this period. like there's

no notification that pops up because

like the app's completely blocked. Now,

this video isn't sponsored. I just

genuinely started using it and I think

it's one of the greatest productivity

tools that I've bought in a long time.

And if you don't want to buy something

like Brick, you can use do not disturb

or turn your phone on airplane mode. But

personally for me, I'd always just

bypass it by turning it off and then end

up getting distracted again. It was a

lot harder to remember to turn back on

do not disturb and then not turn it off

versus this. I have to very

intentionally be like, I need to go

downstairs and use my phone for this

reason and then I'll walk down the

stairs. One of my favorite things about

this device is that you can just control

what apps get turned on and off. And you

can make different modes. So, there's

modes that I'll do while I'm working

which basically don't allow me to get a

phone call or even a text messages. And

then there's modes where I want to be

able to use my phone like a phone like

text messages, calls, and a lot more of

the other apps, but just limit the

social media apps. And I'll have that

mode able. and you can just select that

in the app before you tap. Now the third

and final thing I did was remove

everything except the essentials on my

home screen. So I have my calendar, I

have a notes app, chatbt, phone,

WhatsApp and camera. Everything else I

have to manually go through and search

for. So I don't have any other homepage

I have to pull down and then search for

whatever app I'm looking for. That just

forces me to be a little bit more

intentional with okay, what am I opening

and why? And the apps that I use

consistently that are actually tools

I'll just keep on my home screen. Like

my biggest one is my calendar. It shows

what I have to get done for the day. So

I can see that every single time I open

keeps me more on track. A quick tip with

the search feature if you want to try

that out is beforehand I noticed that my

phone when I'd pull down would give me

like Siri suggestions and oftent times

it would just be the apps that would

distract me like Instagram and YouTube

and all this stuff. But now I turn that

off so it doesn't show me anything when

I'm searching. it only starts showing me

the apps when I start typing them in.

That's somewhere in Siri suggestions. If

you know where it's at, drop it in the

comments below. But this way, I can

choose to use my phone for entertainment

if I want. But the default way I use it

is a tool. So, in combination with

Grayscale, using my brick device, and

then only having the essential apps on

my home screen, I no longer default to

trying [music] to do something with my

phone and then getting distracted. I'm

using it a lot more like that bike

example we talked about. I walk up to my

phone with a clear mission. I open it, I

execute that mission, and I set it back

down a lot more often. Now, I I'm not

gonna lie, I still make mistakes, and I

think that the single greatest thing

with smartphones is that they have so

many features and functionality, but I

also [music] do sometimes think that is

one of the biggest drawbacks and and

with all these apps [music] and

everything emerging so quickly, we just

haven't been able to catch up to how to

properly use it. And these three tips

are just my way of trying to take back

control because I'm by no means

antisocial media or scrolling or having

a good time on your phone. But I am a

little upset when I open my phone with a

clear mission. And because these apps

are so addictive [music] that I get

tricked into doing something I didn't

even want to do. So this is just my way

of kind [music] of taking back a little

bit of control and trying to use my

phone more of the way it was intended

and make my smartphone one of the best

inventions in my [music] lifetime. So,

if I missed any useful tricks or tips

that you use, I'd love to hear them.

Drop them down in the comments. That

way, we can all learn from each other.

But that's really all I got for you guys

in this one. Go ahead and try out some

of these features, and I'll see you in

the next one. Peace.