Guides › Why it's hard to stop

On your phone all day and calling yourself lazy? It's not a willpower problem

6 min read

"I'm so lazy." "I have no self-control." "Someone take my phone away." If that's what you tell yourself after another afternoon on your phone, you're in very good company, and you're being harder on yourself than the facts allow. You're up against apps that take no effort to start, never come to an end, and sit in your hand all day. People who look disciplined mostly aren't resisting harder. They run into fewer temptations to begin with. Here's why your phone feels like laziness, and what works better than trying harder.

What people with "good self-control" actually do

In a 2012 study, psychologist Wilhelm Hofmann and colleagues gave 205 adults beepers for a week. Several times a day, people noted whether they wanted something right then, and whether they were trying to resist it. Nearly 8,000 reports came back. The surprise: people who scored high on self-control didn't win more battles. They reported fewer temptations in the first place. Their days were set up so that they had fewer battles to fight.

Other researchers have reached the same conclusion from another angle. Angela Duckworth, James Gross and Tamar Gendler argue that changing your situation (where you are, what's within reach) usually beats willpower in the moment, because it acts before the urge has a chance to build. Gritting your teeth is the last line of defence, and the weakest.

Why it feels like laziness

The phone is the easiest thing in the room

Most things worth doing have a hard first step: open the laptop, find the page, put on your shoes. A feed has none. It's already open, already playing, and it never ends. If you compare "start the essay" with "keep scrolling", scrolling wins on effort every time. That isn't a character flaw. It's what happens when one option is made almost effortless.

Much of it runs on autopilot

Habit researchers find that a familiar situation can set off an action before you've decided anything: you're bored or waiting, and your thumb is already on the app. Wendy Wood and colleagues also found that when people are tired or stressed, they fall back on their habits even more, good or bad. So the evening, when you most want to rest, is exactly when the phone habit takes over. "I'll just stop" asks a tired brain to do the hardest thing at its weakest moment.

It's the exit from anything uncomfortable

Many people say they reach for the phone when a task feels boring, hard, or a bit scary. Scrolling makes the bad feeling go away right then, which teaches you to do it again next time. What looks like laziness is often avoidance, and avoidance makes sense when the way out is one tap away.

Calling yourself lazy makes it worse

It feels as if being hard on yourself should help. In four experiments, psychologists Juliana Breines and Serena Chen found the opposite. After failing a test, people who were encouraged to treat the failure kindly spent more time studying for a retest than people who were simply encouraged to feel good about themselves. Harshness tends to make people avoid the problem. And avoiding is exactly what the phone is for.

What to do instead of trying harder

Change the situation before the moment comes. Lock the apps you lose hours to, at least during the hours you lose them. On iPhone: a Custom category in Settings › Screen Time › Time Allowances set to 0 min, and a Screen Time passcode that someone else types, so you can't undo it at 11 PM. The 3-step plan →
Put distance between you and the phone when you work. Another room is best. Distance does the job willpower is bad at. For studying →
Make the first step of the real task tiny. "Open the document and write one sentence." "Put on my running shoes." The hard part is starting; once you've begun, carrying on is easier.
Decide now what you'll do when you reach for it. An if–then plan: "If I pick up my phone during work time, I put it in the drawer and do one line." Psychologists call this an implementation intention, and a review of 94 tests found it helps people reach their goals.
When you slip, describe the situation, not yourself. "I was exhausted and the phone was on the desk", not "I'm lazy." The first one points to something you can change. What to do after a slip →

If it's more than the phone: if you feel flat, tired or unmotivated most days, for weeks, and it's hard to do anything at all, that's worth taking seriously. Talk to a doctor or someone you trust.

Fewer battles, not more willpower

Pactroll changes the situation for you. Pick the apps you lose hours to and they lock, using iOS Screen Time, without the fiddly setup. They stay locked until you decide otherwise, even when Pactroll is closed. When you reach for one, "I feel the urge" walks you through naming what's going on and five minutes of something else. If you still want in after two rounds, the apps open for 15 minutes, then lock again on their own. And a slip doesn't reset your day count.

Get Pactroll on the App Store

FAQ

Why am I so lazy and always on my phone?

Often it isn't laziness. The phone is always within reach, the apps take no effort to start and never come to an end, and they're right there whenever a task feels hard or boring. That makes scrolling the easiest thing to do at almost any moment. Changing that situation works better than blaming yourself.

How do I stop being lazy and on my phone all day?

Don't try to resist harder in the moment. Change the situation ahead of time: lock the apps you lose hours to (on iPhone, a Screen Time allowance of 0 minutes with a passcode someone else holds), keep the phone in another room while you work, and decide in advance what you'll do when you reach for it.

Is it normal to have no self-control with my phone?

Yes, it's very common, and it says more about the apps than about you. In a study that tracked people's desires through the day, people with high self-control didn't resist temptation more often. They ran into it less, because they set up their days to avoid it.

Does being hard on myself help me stop?

Usually not. In experiments by Breines and Chen (2012), people who were encouraged to treat a failure kindly spent more time studying for a retest than people who weren't. Treat a lost afternoon as information about the situation, then change one thing.