| Today’s letter |
| Move the phone to the hallway, and sleep may come easier |
| Jennifer Aniston keeps her phone at least five feet from her bed. She has talked about her sleep for years, the same way someone might talk about a scar. It started in her thirties, she has said, maybe even earlier. On a television show in 2014 she described waking at three in the morning with what she called the committee in her head, conversations that would not stop. Later, for a campaign about insomnia, she said a day after a bad night is a walking punishment, that everything is an effort and her thoughts are not very clear. |
| In February the American Academy of Sleep Medicine put out a poll of 2,007 adults. Thirty-eight percent said reading the news on a phone or tablet before bed makes their sleep worse. The story has been going around again this month, and the advice attached to it is always the same: have more discipline. Meanwhile she is lying in bed with the thing six inches from her face… |
| “Why can’t I just put it down?” |
| This was a woman who got up at five, packed lunches, managed the whole day without asking anyone for help. She could handle anything the morning threw at her. But at eleven at night, phone in hand, the feed kept going and so did she, and two hours later the alarm was that much closer. |
| They told her it was a discipline problem: get a bedtime routine, try the lavender spray, download a sleep app. She did all of it, and the phone sat on the nightstand anyway, glowing every time a notification came in. Every morning she blamed herself for reaching for it. |
| Here’s what gets me. |
| The phone was built to hold her attention past the point of sleep. None of this was her fault. |
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Do This 30-Second Cherry Trick For Deep, Restful Sleep Every Night
I couldn’t believe this is 10 TIMES more effective than melatonin pills…
According to a top sleep expert from the University of Washington…
Studies show it releases a powerful “sleep-regulating” hormone, which helps you:
✅ Fall asleep faster AND stay asleep
✅ Increases your total sleep time by 84 minutes (science confirms that’s 10X better than melatonin!)
✅ RESET your sleep-wake cycle
✅ Wake up feeling refreshed and energetic
It’s working like crazy for 36,498 people…
Susan R., from Denver, said: “I finally started sleeping straight through. No more tossing and turning, no more groggy mornings. For the first time in years, I wake up feeling truly rested."
Can you imagine how your nights would change once you start doing this simple cherry trick every night?
| Let me show you how I know. Not with my opinion, but with a study. |
| In 2025, researchers at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health surveyed 45,202 university students about their screen habits in bed: what device they used, how long they stayed on it, and what they were doing. |
| Then they matched those answers against each student’s sleep: how long it took to fall asleep, how many hours they got, and whether they met the clinical criteria for insomnia. |
| What they found |
| Norwegian Institute of Public Health, 2025. Hjetland et al., Frontiers in Psychiatry. |
| The phone in bed (59% more insomnia per hour) |
| Each additional hour of screen time after getting into bed was linked to 59 percent higher odds of insomnia symptoms and about 24 fewer minutes of total sleep. |
| Less time on the screen (less insomnia, more sleep) |
| The link ran the other way too. Every hour less on the screen after getting into bed went with lower odds of insomnia and more sleep, hour for hour. |
| It did not matter what they were scrolling. Social media, streaming, browsing: the sleep loss was the same. |
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| In other words… the phone was not winding them down. It was linked to them staying up, minute by minute, until the alarm went off. |
| Her discipline was never the problem. Yours is not either. |
| So what is the phone actually taking from her? |
| Two things happen, and the first one is simple. The time on the screen is time that would have been sleep. Minutes she would have spent asleep go to the next video instead, so bedtime lands later while the alarm stays where it is, and the window for sleep gets smaller. The light from a screen held close to her face may also hold off melatonin, the hormone that tells the brain it is nighttime.The type of activity made no difference in the data, which is what points at the time rather than the content. The phone is not a wind-down tool. It is the opposite of one. |
| She never stood a chance against that screen. Neither did you, I’d bet. |
| That’s the part no one says out loud… |
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| Try this today |
| Tonight, thirty minutes before your usual bedtime, plug your phone into a charger outside the bedroom: the hallway, the kitchen counter, anywhere out of arm’s reach from the pillow. Set your alarm before you put it there. Then get into bed without it. Do this every night for four weeks. Nothing else changes: same bedtime, same pillow, same routine. If you cannot hear it from there, a five dollar alarm clock on the nightstand does the job. |
| There is nothing to buy. The thing keeping you up was on your nightstand the whole time. |
| Promise me you’ll try it today? Saying it out loud is half of what makes it stick. |
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| This is not magic, and it will not treat a sleep disorder. If you cannot fall asleep or stay asleep three or more nights a week for months, see a doctor, because apnea, restless legs, and chronic insomnia need treatment this trick cannot give. |
| In a separate randomized trial, 38 students were split in two. The 19 told to keep the phone off for the last 30 minutes before bed fell asleep faster and slept longer than the 19 who were given no instruction, and after four weeks their mood and their working memory were both better. |
| Aniston moved the phone eventually. Five feet from the bed, out of reach, and she has said it helped her tremendously. There is still time for you. |
| And if no one ever told you the phone was the problem… |
| It was never your fault. |
| — Cole |
| P.S. How many minutes do you usually scroll in bed before you fall asleep? Just the number, hit reply. I’ll tell you Monday where most women land. |
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