The one change that worked: I started sketching

The Guardian

12-05-2025

I've always battled with phone use. I resent how much my sense of being alive in the world – feeling it, doing things, making stuff happen – is affected by my screen time. So a few years ago, I decided to do a sketch every day.
I had always wanted to draw, but I was embarrassed about starting out because I was so bad at it. Then I bought a few black notebooks: a small one for my jacket pocket, and larger ones for my bedside and for the kitchen table. As no one would ever see my drawings, I decided I didn't need to care about what anyone thought.
One day I grabbed one of the notebooks and a pencil and went out to the Cornish cliffs. I spent 10 minutes hastily drawing some cows and wild ponies. Standing on a cliff, pencil in hand, I felt like an idiot and an impostor, but I had started. It was a happy moment.
I had never drawn a pony before but, to my delight, one quick, simple sketch seemed not bad for a beginner. Next, I drew our cat snoozing. Then our dog, Foxy, staking out a mouse in our kitchen. Beside each sketch, I wrote the date and little notes. Having the pencils and sketchbooks within easy reach – in my car or lying around the house – meant these small moments built up. Within weeks what might otherwise have been buried in photos on my mobile phone became a tender profile of my life unfolding on pages.
My favourite drawings are often of people. Our daughter, Elizabeth, is usually furious when she realises I'm surreptitiously drawing her. Drawing strangers at airports, in cafes or on the tube is fun. I enjoy the element of danger. Will I get caught? Can I finish the drawing before that person moves on? It helps to pass the time on long journeys instead of spending it on screen.
Lots of my sketches are dreadful, but the quickest ones – of people or animals – can have good results because drawing at speed makes my self-consciousness fall away.
One unexpected benefit of doing a sketch a day is I spend less time doomscrolling on my phone. Like most people, I am anxious about the state of the world, but drawing slows things down, makes me pay attention to the moment. I lose myself in the act of drawing, and I'm using my hands, which is soothing in itself. Drawing also brings me back to the analogue world. It makes me happier and more patient. Art is known for being therapeutic and transformative, and I've definitely felt the benefits.
In two years our daughter will be leaving home. In the future I'll be able to look at those drawing diaries and think, yes, we were together when I did those.