Social Media Cleanse

Last December, my three-week-long decluttering project encouraged me to also clean up my digital possessions and examine my online presence. Upon tidying up my hard drive, I decided to do a 21-days “social media cleanse.”

When I say social media, it is mainly Instagram in this case. I have accounts with Facebook and Instagram, but I mainly use Facebook for Messenger. I never had a twitter account, nor do I plan to. I used to have Snapchat, but I deleted it at the end of 2017 and never used it ever since. It happened during a moment of crisis when I chose self-care over the need to smile at the camera for other people. The decision felt triumphant. It was probably one of the best decisions that I have ever made.

My main reasoning behind this “cleanse” was to examine how social media (again, mainly Instagram) is changing my behaviors and affecting my life. I have always had an ambiguous feeling about social media. I hate how it sucks my energy but I love how it helps me to connect with my friends all over the world. This led me to think, maybe I could use social media more effectively.

Instagram has become a notable part of my life and I wanted to know, what if I don’t have an Instagram account and if I do have one, how could I use it smarter. The best way to find out was to withdraw from the platform.

My awareness during the process:

During the process, I had moments where I felt uncomfortable. Many times, I had the urge to “share” a moment, whether that be food, reunions, or beautiful landscapes. Then I realized that I didn’t have an Insta account. After a second of panic, I could do nothing but stay present. I realized that despite the brief uncomfortable feeling, I was perfectly fine in my own reality.

At those moments, I reflected on how I would act in the past with social media platforms. I realized that I would “share” something online, and then forget about it — forget to share them in real life. I also realized that I felt less antsy! After a few days, I didn’t feel the need to check my phone every hour or capture every “shareable” moment. Most importantly, I realized that I would be perfectly fine without social media. It is just a source of entertainment, and somewhat unsafe when used carelessly.

Upon completion:

Things cleared up after thinking through my purpose on Instagram: 1. To share my art, observe trends in fashion, and find creatives to follow; 2. Stay connected with my friends through sharing pictures. I realized that with Insta’s current capability, it’s hard for me to do both with one account. At the end of the three-weeks, I created an additional private account and only opened it to the group of people I want to share my pictures with.

I also looked back at what I did these three weeks off Instagram and Facebook (semi-ly). I felt quite peaceful and productive. I caught up with more than a dozen human fellows, either in-person, through phone calls, video chats, or written letters.

Lessons learned:

For all the creatives

Social media is not the main platform which we create. It is a platform to augment and promote our work. Don’t let your creation rely on social media. “Likes” are not accurate metrics. They are inefficient and skewed. They can be metrics on how much effort or time you put into the platform, but they are false metrics for actual impact or greatness of your work.

Likes and followers

A bigger crowd of followers isn’t always better. A smaller social network with high engagement builds stronger relationships is worth more than a bigger dead number.
There is a difference between quality and quantitative. Looking back at those good and bad times, most of my deepest connections don’t even have social media or our interaction on social media is the bare minimum.

They are designed to be addictive

You are the consumer here. If physically we know eating 10 bags of family-sized chips in one sitting is bad for us, why mentally we wouldn’t know that scrolling through your phones for hours is just as horrible?
Because, habit. Every time we choose to look at the phone at random moments throughout the day, we are forming a habit to rely on our phones more and more.

A noisy and distracting place

I learned that for me, disconnecting completely isn’t a realistic option, so knowing my intention will help me stay focused and in control as opposed the other way around.

Social media is superficial. It will always lack depth. People are different on- and off-line. The danger is that if we always focus on the surface with fragmented awareness, we lack the patience, empathy, and ability to pay attention, which, is the beginning of kindness and how we make the world a better place.

You can define how you want to use social media and how to use it most effectively for your purposes. Save yourself stress from the following game, or these social media “norms.” They are the only norms when you conform to them. Don’t feel pressure to “follow” someone just because you have that one mutual friend. Let go of the negative energy and make room for valuable connections.

However, if you really look forward to developing that relationship of minimum real-life interaction due to time, distance, or other circumstances, do it without second thoughts. That’s what technology is supposed to do in the first place.

At the end of the day, social media should be tools to help us enjoy the real world more, not to remove us from it, not to make our life miserable.

Going forward:

Manageable goals: low information diet, more effective time management and deeper concentration. I disabled push notifications and plan to check social media in fewer frequencies (like source 4’s approach to emails and practical tips by source 3) In doing so, I hope to unlearn the bad habit of constantly checking and scrolling.

Resist instant posts. One reason I disliked Snapchat was that it felt so invasive – it sends messages to you as visuals and makes you check it constantly. Anything that’s “instant” has an addictive tendency. It nudges our behaviors and we form a habit without knowing. To combat that, I limited the types of notifications social media apps could send me, and for posting, I will think twice about whether something is worth posting and act after 24 hours. I will avoid creating more digital trash and make valuable posts.

Written messages: Social media platforms are superficial, if the purpose were to communicate, email would be more an effective way. When I started writing long letters to people again, I found so much joy. It was such a sacred moment of concentration: no emojis, ads, or pictures (unless attachments, but that still comes after the message).

Obviously, I’m not an expert by the end of this. It will be a constant battle, just like my relationship with desserts. However, practicing intentions will help. We should remain hopeful as these platforms constantly update and improve.

But for 2019, I will take them less seriously. I will feed less of my energy and personal data into them while remaining hopeful and relevant.

Sources to learn more:

If you would like to learn more about the subject, below are some resources that helped me to find my way.

Social Media Cleanse

vettyyu