Social Media Farewell (is this another detox?)

Feeling overwhelmed with Social Media lately? If you can relate, read on!

I have been playing with the idea of a social media detox for a long time, and have actually done it on and off in the past.  However, it was not permanent and I have slowly come back to my old habits.  And what I mean by “habits”, is the fact that I am mindlessly scrolling through my feeds to check on what everyone else is up to, whenever “boredom” hits, or when I have nothing else to do (who am I kidding, there are always other things to do, just like there always were, throughout eternity).

This time I want to do things differently.  I am mentally preparing myself that this will not just be a regular detox where I go off Social Media for a certain amount of time, only to get back to it.  My idea is to eliminate it from my everyday life, at least the biggest part of it.  Let me clarify that this involves only my personal Social Media accounts.  I am not leaving the digital world entirely (that sounds so intriguing but far-fetched!) I will still use Social Media through my small business.  

This is not a post to advocate that this is the right thing for everyone to do.  This is me sharing how I feel at this moment in time, in my journey through life; how it affects me in ways which are definitely not right for my wellbeing.   It is neither a declaration of me being a Social Media “addict” because I am far from it and can honestly manage how I use it at most. However, I believe that some part in all of us who use Social Media everyday, does resemble a type of addiction. Although real addictions are of course much more serious and dangerous, the main traits are quite similar.  This is such a strong habit that when you actually decide to completely remove it from your life, it starts to reveal itself as a dependency you didn’t fully realise you had.  All the tags, the comments, picking up the phone to check your feed and see what is going on in the world every single day.  All the followups from friends who ask you if you have seen that photo they posted, or the video that went completely viral.  Even people who don’t really post or comment on an every day basis, will most probably pick up their phone to check what’s up.  This is such an ingrained habit in our every day lives.  It has become second nature to have our phone at hand and “connect” with the outside world.  

What really makes me struggle personally before pulling the plug, is going through all my memories, photos with friends, and all the things I have done over the past years which I felt like sharing.  Since I have started downloading all my photos (to save for offline use), I started feeling that I will be missing out on all of this.  I will be left out of the fun conversations and the sharing we did with all my friends.  All those moments engraved and gathered together so we can look back on them collectively.  Yes this is FOMO and it is real. But this is also a stage that I will have to go through.  On the other hand, this will also push me to connect through more authentic ways with my friends. I will pursue to have more real life conversations, and actually feel more motivated to do so now that I don’t have the “easy” solution in my hands.  I will actually make a phone call to say happy birthday, and video chat with my friends and family abroad.  There are so many ways to connect.  You definitely don’t have to lose touch with those who matter in your life. 

How about those acquaintances? You know who they are; all those people you actually only connect through Social Media? They are after all, also part of your extended “community” of people you know, or had the opportunity to meet because of Social Media.   Well, this comes down to working within myself and putting this into perspective, and how much it actually weighs in my life.  Firstly I feel like those who truly matter will find a way back into my life.  All the rest are just an extended reach to the outside world (which is a beautiful thing and partly what this whole social online world is all about).  However, this is something you can actually experience when you also walk outside of your home, in the real, physical world. 

In addition, how about sharing what we feel like sharing? Just for the sake of it, or because we want tor each out? I already have an outlet to share my thoughts and feelings with the world, and this is through this blog, which I am so happy to have. I have always loved writing down my thoughts and ideas.  Having this blog not only allows me to do that, but also meet like-minded people, perhaps more selectively and qualitatively.  We can connect here because we choose to do so, without the distractions and the noise.

There have been so many studies on how Social Media affects not just our everyday decisions, our purchasing habits and our general mental state of mind, but our actual psyche.  I am not here to say Social Media is the evil that came to destroy us (although some may argue this to be the case).  I am fully aware of the benefits and how this new reality shaped our world in beneficial ways.   Social Media can be a million wonderful things.  It can help businesses grow and get noticed, it can help spread important messages, reach loved ones all across the world, to educate ourselves, to entertain ourselves (because yes, we do need that as well).  There is absolute nothing wrong with using Social Media as long as we use it for the right reasons. 

But we also know the dark side of it.   The toxic environment and the people manipulating it. How addicting it becomes and how we subconsciously (or consciously) seek external validation for our greatest moments in life, our triumphs, or even our failures and struggles.  How posting something and receiving a bunch of likes or comments will somehow make us more “noticeable”, more “accepted”. That’s why it’s important to sometimes take a pause and ask ourselves: Is this taking time from my life where I would be doing something more worthwhile or important?  Is this making me calm or causing me anxiety? Is it bringing me joy or making me feel depressed?

We are all humans and vulnerable to our external environment. Although I can usually tell when something  becomes “too much” (i.e. Social media usage), I also started feeling that even a little bit of time every day, is time which could have been spent otherwise.  Time (and of course health) is the most precious commodity we have, in the grand scheme of things.  Every minute, every hour, can be used to do something really worthy.  And by worthy this can mean a million different things to each individual.   Just thirty minutes a day spent on Social Media just to entertain ourselves, totals up to a whopping 180+ hours per year.  Think about all those things you could actually do during those 180 hours.  When you look at it from this perspective, it takes a whole new meaning.   

I want to be spending those minutes, those hours, being present in the moment.  With my loved ones, or by myself, to enjoy life as is.  Not worrying about who said what, and why they said it.  Not being bombarded by the well-staged personas, or the lifestyles I wish I had because someone else is exposing it to the world.  Instead, I want to go out and live it myself.  I also want to develop new skills and learn more, so that I can grow as a person.  Now I will have those 180 hours to do that, what a great privilege (I will actually have more than 180 hours, if I want to get real with myself).

If Instagram is an outlet for someone to express themselves, then do it! If you are feeling lonely and you feel this is a beautiful way to connect with like-minded people from all over the world, then go for it! And enjoy it fully.  This is not a post about guilting anyone who uses Social Media.  This is just my personal journey, and how I see it evolving into the future, for me.  With the opportunity of big changes coming ahead in the world of Facebook and the Internet in general (see the evolution from “Facebook” to “Meta” as Mark Zuckerberg recently announced), something sparked in me and pushed me even more to make this decision definite.  One of my closest friends is actually doing the same thing, so we have each other to stay accountable for.  We are in fact deleting our personal profiles within this week together! 

When I shared this idea with other friends, some said that they don’t mind using Social Media at all.  Some others said it’s a great idea to take this step, and some cannot imagine their life without at least some part of it.   These are all justifiable. We are all different and unique, and this includes our ways of viewing and using everything around us.  But I can definitely tell you this: even taking small breaks and doing mini social media detoxes every now and then, will help clear your head and gain a new perspective. It will give you time to do things you actually thought you didn’t have time for.  Bill Gates said that 

“Most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years.”

If we just allow ourselves to have that extra time in our hands, what would we do in those next ten years? It’s time to think about that 🙂