If you’ve read my last post, you already know how my mornings used to look. Alarm goes off, phone in hand, scrolling before I’m even fully awake. But when I decided to change my relationship with my phone, I realised the mornings were the first place to start. So here’s what I’ve been working towards: my ideal morning routine, no scroll included.

Wake up. Turn off the alarm. Open Instagram. Check messages. Scroll for a few minutes… okay, maybe more than a few. Then breakfast, probably with a YouTube video or reading the news. Skincare, getting dressed, packing my bag, and out the door. I was beginning every single day by handing my attention over to a screen before I’d even had a chance to be awake. And it showed — in my mood, in my focus, in how rushed everything felt.

I realised I was less focused in the mornings, often already in a bad mood before the day had properly started. The thing is, I’ve done this before. I used to have a morning routine I loved, and it didn’t involve my phone. I felt so much better then. So this isn’t about starting something new. It’s about finding my way back.

When the alarm goes off, I turn it off and put the phone back down. That’s it. That’s the whole move. It sounds almost too simple, but for a while it was the hardest part.

Then comes the first hour. Here’s what it looks like:

1. Getting my eyes open. I head straight to the bathroom to put in my contact lenses (because without them, the morning is just a blur :)). It gets me out of bed with an actual purpose, and somehow that small physical action helps me leave the phone behind without thinking too much about it.
2. Skincare routine. I take my time here. This used to be something I’d rush through while half-watching a video, now it’s just a quiet few minutes for me. It sounds small, but there’s something grounding about starting the day by actually taking care of yourself without any background noise.
3. Breakfast and tea, screen-free. I make something small to eat and a cup of tea, and I just sit with it. No phone on the table, no laptop, no podcast. Just the morning light and something warm. It’s one of my favourite parts of the day now, which I never would have said when I was scrolling through it.
4. Tidy up, make my bed, pack my bag. These are small, physical tasks that give the morning a sense of order. Making my bed especially. It takes two minutes and somehow makes everything else feel more manageable. I pack my bag the evening before when I can, but if not, I do it now. No excuses to wander back to my phone.
5. A few stretching exercises. Nothing intense. Just a few minutes of movement to wake my body up properly. I started doing this almost by accident, just to fill the time I used to spend on my phone, and now I genuinely miss it on the days I skip it.
6. Getting ready. Back to the bathroom to do my hair and finish getting ready. By this point I’ve been awake for a while, moved around, eaten something, and done a few things I enjoy. So I’m actually in a decent mood before the day has even properly started.
7. If there’s time left — a book. Not my phone. This is the goal. Even five or ten minutes of reading before I leave the house feels completely different to five minutes of scrolling. It’s the kind of thing I used to say I never had time for. Turns out I had the time – it was just going somewhere else.

Of course, the urge to check is still there. The hand moves towards the phone almost automatically, especially in the quiet moments: waiting for the kettle, standing in front of the wardrobe. My trick is keeping it in flight mode until I leave the house. No notifications means no temptation. Out of sight, out of mind — mostly.

And when I start the day like this, I notice a real difference. I’m more focused, calmer, and somehow just less on my phone for the rest of the day too. There’s something about those first hours that sets the tone for everything that follows. Spending that time on things that actually feel good carries forward in a way that scrolling never does.

This is actually the relationship I want to have with my phone. Using it for the things it’s genuinely useful for, like the alarm, but not letting it become the first thing my brain processes every morning. The doomscroll spiral starts somewhere, and for me it was always after the alarm.

You don’t have to overhaul your whole morning. Start with one thing: put your phone in flight mode tonight. See how it feels to wake up tomorrow without the notifications. That’s it. Just one small step.

Want to see what this actually looks like in real life? I put together a short reel showing my morning routine: no phone, no rush, just the quiet stuff. Click here to watch.

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Curious about how this journey started? Check out my first post: “My phone and I needed to break up”.

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