After watching this Ted Talk, I was suddenly convinced that social media was ruining my life and I needed to get rid of it. Therefore a social media detox seemed like the answer.
At first, I had some internal back-and-forth, trying to convince myself I didn’t neeeeed Instagram and that my friends wouldn’t forget about me if I stopped posting. However, the logical side of me eventually won and all my apps were gone. Before going to bed that night, I checked my phone. While my instinct usually would be to scroll through social media until my eyes were tired, I just went to sleep instead.
Here’s how the rest of this life experiment went:
The first few days of my detox I found myself checking my phone and clicking the weather app more than I needed to. I just wanted something to check and would quickly realize I had no source of notifications. No Snapchats to answer, no Instagram posts to see, no Tweets to tweet and no posts to scroll through. Prior to this I was a big Snapchatter; I had some pretty long streaks and endless stories of SLO sunsets, but without it I found myself reaching for my phone less. Instead of posting a picture of the sunset, I would take a real picture or just enjoy it for myself.
Originally I was only planning on doing my social media cleanse for a week, but after the first week I was almost scared to go back. I didn’t want to think about all of the Instagram posts, Snapchats and tweets I had missed. It was easier to avoid it for a while longer.
There were definitely some positives of not being on social media. I managed to finish a book I had been reading, I was getting better sleep, and I was actually getting more work done since I had no distractions. However, I did feel pretty disconnected from a lot of things. For example, I couldn’t keep up with any Facebook events happening. I couldn’t send or receive Snapchats from my sister back home. I couldn’t laugh at any memes.
I also didn’t realize how much I depended on social media for news; I felt like I knew nothing about what was happening outside of my own life and those directly around me. It was kind of nice not being concerned with larger national or international happenings, but I felt like I was living ignorantly by avoiding it.
After two weeks, I slowly started incorporating social media back into my life. I first checked Facebook and realized none of the notifications were actually important to me and was bored after two minutes. Then, I checked Instagram and quickly scrolled through the posts, checked a few good friends accounts and came to the conclusion that these posts were not doing anything for me. Soon after opening that app, I was comparing myself to these perfected images of my friends and the people I follow that just made me feel bad. I didn’t even try checking Snapchat or Twitter that night. Two days later, I checked Snapchat, and since your Snapchats get deleted if you don’t check them, so I only had a few to check. The Snapchat stories also seemed uninteresting and self-absorbed.
Looking at all of these social media platforms after taking a break made me feel like all the posts were screaming, “Look at me! Look at what awesome thing I’m doing or how good I look!” which didn’t feel good. However, I did like being able to feel a little closer to my friends and family who were far away. This break has changed my social media habits; I care less about what goes on outside of my circle and I check my phone way less. It’s nice to live outside of that tiny screen and enjoy your real-life experiences instead.