My Break From Social Media

[This is what I posted on instagram right before my 2 month hiatus]

Holy cow… my last post about me selling my camera got over 300 views.  My average blog post gets like 30.  Interesting… I have a theory why… do you? haha

Anyway… recently I spent about 60 days without social media.  No facebook, no instagram, no twitter.  And while it was hard at first… it was really glorious by the end.  I got quite the welcome back when I returned, which was nice.

Not being on facebook is something that I’ve wanted to do for a while.  I’ve gone short periods of times before with out it, but I had never actually deactivated my account.  While I was in the Philippines, 2 of our team mates had made the plunge and gotten off of facebook completely.  And that inspired me to do it as well.

Gosh, the first few days I was so bored.  I didn’t realize how incessantly I checked facebook.  It’s a reflex, I can open my browser and type in facebook without even thinking… yuck.

I set out to disconnect because I wanted to do other things.  Facebook and social media were/are such a crutch.  The second I get bored… I can be inundated with new information.  Not always good or useful information… but new information.

As the time went on, and my social media detox period ended, I started to get into a groove, reading books, and I wrote more. Honestly… I think I enjoyed life more.

It was funny though, at least daily… someone would ask me if I saw something on facebook, or reference something that they saw on facebook.  Facebook has so integrated into our daily lives, that I felt like a strange foreigner not partaking.

One of the things that I didn’t like about facebook was, it felt overwhelming.  I’m an introvert.  (I realized that with all of the information out there about introversion today, it still has a bad stigma.  I’ll have to write a blog post about introversion soon)  Social media felt like one more thing I had to do, one more external stimulant that I felt I had no control over.

I talked with our friend Colleen, who is a social media and etiquette guru about my issues with facebook.  I explained my feelings about social media to her and asked her some questions.  What we realized is that I was trying to interact to much.  One of my top 5 strengths is individualization.  Meaning I value individuals.  I also highly value responsiveness.  So I was trying to make sure that I was liking and commenting back to every comment that came in.  To which Colleen said isn’t necessary, or expected.

So since I’ve been back, I haven’t been trying to break my neck responding and liking every comment.  But it feels weird.  If someone takes the time to write a comment on something I’ve posted… sometimes a long comment… I want to acknowledge that I’ve seen it, and take the time to respond.  But, are you expecting a response?  And if you don’t, then what’s the reason behind commenting?

If social media isn’t really for interaction, than what’s it for?  It’s like me standing in the middle of a room, shouting something and people hear it, but never respond.  That’s bizarre to me.

I remember when AIM (Aol instant messaging) was all the rage.  And I remember being so shocked when you’d be chatting with someone, and they wouldn’t say goodbye, they would just disappear.  Sometimes they would be courteous enough to throw up an away message.

So how is social media in the long term going to affect how we live out our lives in REAL life.  Our friend Hannah has made the observation that she thinks it’s already caused a serious decline in empathy.

I came back to Hawaii and realized there was no real way to operate in the job I’m in without facebook.  I’m in charge of social media and marketing here.  And just for networking purposes and communicating… facebook is a must.  So I re-activated my account.

For the first few days, I only logged in to see if I had a notification or a message, to which I would respond, without looking at my newsfeed.  But as time has gone, I’ve slipped back into scrolling through my newsfeed and losing track of how much time I’m spending there.  And now I’m pulling up facebook out of habit, instead of intentionality. Doing it because I need some new stimuli to tickle my impatient “boredom.”

Gross.

I’ve realized something very imperative about myself in the past year.  I feel better emotionally if I’m being productive.  Maybe that’s common knowledge for others, but it’s a good realization for me that I’ve come to recently.  Spending a lot of time on facebook isn’t productive.  It actually sucks the motivation out of me.  Which means my mood starts dipping if I’m spending to much time on facebook.

I’m also trying to implement NOT checking e-mail first thing when I wake up.  To complete my morning routine, and do things that require actual focus before I touch e-mail or social media.  I’ve been trying to write this post since I’ve returned to Hawaii, and this morning I haven’t checked my e-mail or facebook… and look it’s getting written.

So anyway, I’m not demonizing social media.  But for me, I really need to MANAGE my social media use and make sure that I’m in control of how much time and when I spend on it, for the betterment of own my life.

Facebook is a great way to connect with people IF actual interaction is going on.

Engage:  What do you think?  What’s your relationship with social media?