How I Outsource My Self-Control

And how you can too!

Published on • 8 min read

TL;DR

Commitment devices (using app blockers, not having your phone with you while you work) are underrated. People fairly critique poor commitment device use. That said, skilled usage has made me more productive. Productivity is an ill-structured domain, which means learning happens through reading and building upon case studies. I provide my n=1 for how I use commitment devices below.

For brief prescriptions, don’t sleep with your phone by your bed, try ColdTurkey for a couple of websites using the “character block”, use Focusmate for those admin tasks you've been meaning to do after your workday ends.

Three Types of Productivity Interventions

Maybe you procrastinate. Possibly you'd like to be more productive, allowing you to allocate more time to your friends, family, or hobbies. Perhaps you just want a raise. 

The following schema captures all of the possible types of productivity habits and interventions:

  • Commitment devices
  • Internal regulation
  • Identity anchoring

Commitment devices involve manipulating one's environment to prevent taking distractions that they would consider unwise. Internal regulation involves controlling your attention or regulating your emotions to prevent distraction. Identity anchoring involves developing personal rules that shape your views about yourself to "be someone who does X".

This post looks solely at commitment devices. Internal regulation techniques, like meditation or Adderall, are not mentioned. I also do not talk about identity anchoring much at all (beyond maybe boundary cards).

Commitment Devices

Commitment devices in my life:

  • I keep my iPhone in a locked box in my garage most the day, with the key for the locked box in my backyard. Only using an Apple Watch for most communication. 
  • I don't even have my Apple Watch in the morning. I instead have an emergency flip phone with only a few contacts.
  • I time-block my entire workday on Focusmate.
  • I use extensive ColdTurkey blocks websites on my computer and Opal to block Twitter on my phone.
  • I use ColdTurkey to have my desktop computer unusable outside of my work-time.
  • I leave social media apps like Instagram and Facebook uninstalled on my phone.
  • I have notecards I call "boundary cards" in my pocket. I'm only allowed to remove cards during my daily journaling time and must donate $15 to charity for breaking a card.
  • I block ~45min in the afternoon off for journaling every day. Obsidian and supplementary apps are allowed; no web browser.

The Internal Regulation Advocate Critique

There’s a certain brand of advice that says that if one’s intentions are aligned enough, they will be productive, and they won’t need commitment devices. 

I think part of this critique comes from the angle of commitment devices often leaning towards moral masochism, and being a way to punish oneself for not living up to an ideal of productivity.

There’s also a certain brand of advice that says willpower, above all things, is the way to being more productive. 

I agree that all these pieces of advice have merits. However, I’ll also quote Zvi in saying, “It is much, much easier to pick out a way in which a system is sub-optimal, than it is to implement or run that system at anything like its current level of optimization.”

My system works for me! It works quite well. I try and lean into the other two types of types of productivity improvement—internal regulation and identity anchoring—at times as well. I think that commitment devices are particularly useful to me, though.

Outputs of my productivity system:

  • I am getting As and Bs in my college CS classes.
  • I maintain a lively, flourishing social life.
  • I generally feel fulfilled.
  • I practice meditation and work on other projects quite conscientiously.
  • I write blog posts like this!

I think there are other valid criticisms against using commitment devices. If one does not have one’s priorities figured out, these devices can become a way to punish or manipulate future versions of oneself. Reminder that this post is also an n=1, and productivity is an ill-structured domain. Take this as a case study rather than a statement of advice.

Balanced Commitment Devices

I do resonate with the internal regulation advocate critiques that I've shared above. I think they are valid in many ways. That said, skilled usage of commitment devices has been incredibly valuable for my life and productivity.

Skilled commitment device usage takes something like the following principles and intuitions into consideration:

  • It solves the problem of communicating with future parts of yourself.
  • You've reflected deeply over a period of time to determine that the commitment device is in your best interest.
  • You have recurrent loops to re-evaluate the commitment device.
  • You have a positive emotional relationship with the commitment device.
  • You've developed the commitment device through iteration over time.

Additionally, I do not think you should just copy-paste other people's productivity interventions (unless it's using Getting Things Done; I think ~all knowledge workers should use GTD). I think you should read productivity case studies and iterate based on what seems to work for you. Below are brief case studies for each of my commitment devices.

Personal Commitment Device Case Studies

iPhone in lockbox in garage

I keep my iPhone in a locked box in my garage most of the day, with the key for the locked box in my backyard. Only using an Apple Watch for most communication. I've always had a troubled relationship with my phone. Since high school, I've avoided having it by me while I sleep. In years past, I deleted social media and attempted to keep my distance from it, though this was difficult considering I worked in social media marketing. After a meditation retreat at the beginning of 2024, I bought a flip phone and a lock box for my phone. These were excellent purchases. I've since iterated on this workflow to keep an Apple Watch on me, which allows me to keep in contact with my email and phone with quick response times while also disallowing me access from more distracting mediums like blogs or social media. With curiosity and experimentation, I've found an imperfect but good solution for cutting down unproductive iPhone screen time.

Protected mornings

I don't even have my Apple Watch with me in the morning. I instead have an emergency flip phone with only a few contacts. I practice meditation until noon-ish most mornings. Most inbounds will not be useful for me, as I'll only want to act on them once I get to my computer around noon.

Focusmate timeblocking!

I time-block my entire workday on Focusmate. Focusmate changed my life in many ways. See this blog post for how Focusmate changed my social life. In terms of productivity, Focusmate helped me actually implement time blocking. Before Focusmate, I time-blocked my Google Calendar, but my time blocks were aspirational at best. Especially after having many close friends on Focusmate, I feel socially compelled to commit to my Focusmate sessions. I don't feel socially compelled in a manipulated way; rather, I feel Focusmate aligns my social nature as a human being with my long-term productivity goals.

ColdTurkey for websites

I use extensive ColdTurkey blocks websites on my computer and Opal to block Twitter on my phone. I've used ColdTurkey since high school. I've had mixed feelings about its usage. I don't think completely blocking sites permanently is the optimal use of ColdTurkey, though it might be for some people. I've personally found benefit from using ColdTurkey's feature that allows you to type in words to unblock webpages. This creates some natural friction to make it take a minute or two to open up an exciting web page, rather than <1 second.

Frozen Turkey for off-hours

I use ColdTurkey to make my desktop computer unusable outside of my work time. There's a feature on ColdTurkey called "Frozen Turkey" which prevents you from accessing your computer under any circumstances. I have time blocks throughout my day with this feature enabled. Of course, it's risky. There have been one or two inconvenient moments during a meeting or my work day where I didn't have the schedule correct. However, thus far, using the feature has been a major net-positive. It saves me late nights of low willpower spent browsing my computer mindlessly.

Uninstalling social media by default

I leave social media apps like Instagram and Facebook uninstalled on my phone. This increases the friction to accessing social media. I started doing this to completely stay away from social media, but the habit has since evolved to be a way to simply keep distance (after getting in the habit of downloading the apps from the app store).

Boundary Cards

Have notecards I call "boundary cards" in my pocket. I'm only allowed to remove cards during my daily journaling time and must donate $15 to charity for breaking a card.

"Boundary Cards"
"Boundary Cards"

Afternoon journaling time

I block ~45 minutes in the afternoon off for journaling every day. Obsidian and supplementary apps are allowed; no web browser. Journaling is up there among mindfulness meditation and the Getting Things Done weekly review, and one of my most important habits. Putting words to ink significantly increases how reflective and intentional I am. I consider having a recurring time every day where I journal to be instrumental to who I am as a person. I usually just write and reflect on various things I feel are of importance or are especially present in my mind on a given day.

Conclusion

Productivity is an ill-structured domain. Productivity advice instantiates inconsistently. There is no one rule for productivity (beyond, maybe, using Getting Things Done). Per cognitive flexibility theory, learning in ill-structured domains is better done through learning about case studies and extrapolating from there, rather than learning abstract principles. While the principle of “outsourcing my self-control” resonates for me, it may not work for you. I would advise you to take my experience as an n=1 as something that works for me. A case study. Possibly experiment with some of the interventions I’ve tried. If any of them work, or don’t work for you, please feel free to share with me!

If you want to try the bare minimum of what I’ve recommended here, try the following interventions:

  • Don’t sleep with your phone next to you at night; put it in another room. If you really need to be available for urgent messages, you can leave your Apple Watch or equivalent on.
  • Download ColdTurkey. Set up a blocker for some of the websites you wish you would spend a little less time on. Specifically, I recommend using the blocker, which makes you type words for a chosen amount of time. Set it for 90 characters (10–30ish seconds). This will provide some delay between stimulus and response for checking a website.
  • Try doing a Focusmate session after your work day to do those admin tasks you’ve been meaning to do.

Seriously, by the way. Set a 5-minute timer right now and try one of these things! Find a place to put your phone tonight besides your bed and set a reminder on your phone at bedtime; download ColdTurkey and enable a quick block; make a Focusmate account and book a session for this evening. I believe with high likelihood that your future self will thank you for it.

See also

Comments? Ideas? Want to discuss further?

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