My X220 does the exact same thing. Usually pretty fine though, but definitely noticeable, multiple times a week. I keep my display timeout pretty low and have a blank screen for the lock screen (slock, i3lock, swaylock).
> 16:9 for a work machine is a bad choice, and the resolution is horrible.
I found a way to turn 16:9 into an advantage: if you go for 70-character columns, you can get a 3-column display in a tiling WM or Emacs if your resolution is 1280 or more pixels horizontally (there are 5-pixel wide fonts out there, but none of them are very legible).
People say this, but it honestly doesn't bother me in a laptop. Longer and thinner is easier to carry in a backpack and if I'm actually working it'll be docked and with external monitors, one of which is rotated to 9:16.
Tell me about it. I still rock my old cracked x220. Most new alternatives (that I'm willing to pay for) would give a much worse keyboard, in exchange for an only slightly better screen.