My phone has been on permanent do not disturb for quite some time and it is fantastic. Basically there are four conditions under which my phone will try to get my attention:

• One of my contacts is calling
• One of my contacts is texting
• The same unknown number tries to call twice within 15 minutes
• An alarm or reminder that I set

I’ve never thought of using a smart watch, but I might take you up on your suggestion. Like you I’m skeptical of using more technology to reduce our reliance on technology, but I’ll admit that it hypothetically can work.

One thing that I’ve found useful in this regard is anything that lets me add an interesting piece of content to a queue to consume later. I use an app called pocket to save any article that I think is worth reading. The app gives a clean reading experience and takes away all adds and distractions. This also helps me manage my time, since it used to be that if I ran across something I wanted to read online, I felt like I had to read it right then even if I should have been doing something else. In a similar way I use an app called pocket casts that lets me add podcast episodes that I want to listen to to a playlist.