You have to be nicer/kinded to yourself. Life is hard/stressful enough as is.

When you start feeling bad about yourself, as GP said, "I'm so terrible I can't stop checking my phone", you take away hope and you start living only in the "now". "I'm so terrible" is a gross overgeneralization that puts your mood and increases your need to feel good via the addictive behaviors. Compare that to thinking: "I know I'm having a hard time stopping checking my phone, but maybe today I can do a little less of it."

The thing that keeps addiction going is hopelessness.

Treating addiction as disease (like AA does) is simply WRONG. It is actively harmful to recovery. It renders you hopeless ("I have no control over my disease").