Take control of your screen time

Can't stop doom scrolling or rushing to check every notification buzz? If your New Year's resolutions include better boundaries with your phone, then you've come to the right place.

SET DIGITAL BOUNDARIES: According to Reviews.org, Americans checked their phones 205 times a day in 2024, up from 144 times in 2023. Calm 's new series, "Build Healthier Phone Habits," walks listeners through ending their dependence on smartphones and creating digital boundaries. While breaking years-long ingrained phone habits may seem like an exercise in futility, Dr. Aditi Nerurkar, MD, MPH encourages workers at all levels to consider adding a few of her techniques to their routines as part of working towards a healthier year. 

"Pause, take a deep breath and ground yourself in the present moment," she says. "After this, if you still want to scroll, set an intention for why you're scrolling and a time limit to create boundaries for yourself." 

Read on for more tips to curb your phone use: Done doom scrolling? Dump your bad phone habits in 2025

GET OUTSIDE: Employers can help their workforce achieve a healthier lifestyle by promoting "movement as medicine" — a widely embraced idea that increased movement in general leads to better holistic health — and offering benefits that provide foundational fitness support.

"There's a real opportunity to facilitate access to physical activity, both in the workplace and beyond. The benefits of that are enormous, both from a clinical chronic condition outcome standpoint, as well as just general well-being, recruitment and retention, employee satisfaction and organizational culture," says Zack Papalia, PhD, MPH , senior population health and well-being consultant at insurance brokerage Brown & Brown . 

Get inspired with these easy ways to work movement into your day: Let's move: How to make fitness a part of the workday

CONTROL YOUR STRESS: Functional freeze, otherwise known as the the third "F" in the fight, flight, freeze and fawn list, is a stress response defined as a feeling of numbness or paralysis when faced with a threat. This may look like an inability to respond in a verbal confrontation, or the body's refusal to take action upon receiving a request or demand. 

"Some people will use a physical trigger, like cold water or grabbing an ice cube, to take themselves out of the [freeze] and refocus their thoughts on what's going on presently," says Sean Leonard, board-certified psychiatric nurse practitioner. "Some people will do breathing exercises or certain phrases they can say to themselves as well.''

Here's how to work through stress more effectively: Fight, flight, freeze: Navigating stress in the workplace