It seems that nowadays we are a population of technology driven zombies; our faces constantly in our phones, thumbs fervently moving across our shiny smart phone screens. I always told myself "I'm not like that, I don't need my phone all the time. Turns out, no matter how many times I told myself that, it simply wasn't true. I was completely addicted to my Facebook account. Every spare second of the day I found myself with my face in my phone. Every moment I felt awkward walking somewhere, waiting for someone, or just didn't know what to do, I clicked that little blue app on my phone to see what else the world was up to at the moment. It was a constant stream of pictures, status updates, links and videos that numbed me to the real world.
One day while I was at lunch with my boyfriend at a restaurant one of our friends work at, they both started heckling me about using Facebook so much. I had my Facebook open and even though there was someone there for me to talk to, I still felt the need to have it open. Neither of them have a Facebook and I just couldn't believe that they didn't have one. Our friend, Jennifer, told me I didn't need it and that it was a stupid attention hoarding thing that didn't even add anything to our lives. I thought to myself "No, I really NEED my Facebook! How will I talk to people? How will I know what's going on in the world? How will I connect with people"?! When, in reality, Facebook was what was making me unable to connect with anyone in the real world.
So I decided to go far beyond my comfort zone and that day, I deleted my Facebook. For the first few days it was extremely uncomfortable. Being a creature of habit, I noticed that every few minutes my hands would reach for my phone and search for the blue app; but it wasn't there. I was like a heroin addict needing a fix. My fingers itched, I felt anxious and uneasy and I was kept telling myself "what if I just take a little look or just use it 5 minutes a day". It was clear that Facebook was my heroin and I decided to go cold turkey.
Now it's been almost 3 months since I gave up Facebook and after those first few initial days of struggle, I've never looked back. I can't believe how much my life has changed simply by getting rid of an app like that. I no longer feel the need to record every minute detail of my life and find that the things I didn't like about Facebook are no longer on my mind. One of the things I didn't like about Facebook is that it seemed like all I ever saw were people's "perfect" lives; because that's all people share on Facebook. It makes it look like people's lives are so pristine and untouchable: showing vacations, holidays, births, nights out, promotions, new cars, graduation, etc. But it never shows the everyday struggles that people deal with. It never shows the bad days, the tough work days, the depressed sad moods or anything that would tarnish your "perfect" page. To put it in simplistic terms, it shows the kind of life that you want to portray, and not necessarily your real life. For me, that was something that I struggled with. I always saw people's "perfect" lives on there and compared myself to them. Though I know it's a very skewed vision of life, basing it off of what people post online, I still found myself wondering "Why aren't I doing that yet? Why don't I have that?" The negativity that it constantly brought to my life is one of the reasons why I chose to ditch Facebook ultimately.
Another reason I decided to stop using Facebook was because of all the time I wasted on it. Who needs to check an app 20-30 times per day? I noticed that I was sitting on my butt looking at life instead of living life. That's what really got me. Why was I wasting my life looking at other peoples' lives instead of out doing the things I needed and wanted to do? I was looking at my 500+ "friends" lives, when I guarantee I only really would want to keep in contact with possibly 50 people. I decided that if I really wanted to keep in contact with those people, they would have my number and be able to talk to me. Plain and simple.
Now life is a lot easier. I go to bed earlier because I'm not losing track of time on my timeline feed, I wake up feeling more rested because I didn't stay up doing that, I spend more time out of the house versus sitting at home on my phone/computer, smile and talk to strangers and ultimately live a fuller life. Time no longer slips away and I have time to do the things I want to do. It also isn't rare to put my phone down and not even check it all day. 3 months ago that would have been impossible for me. I do still use the applications Twitter and Instagram, but I feel that those social media sites are far less addicting, less frequented and more positive. It seems like Instagram especially brings so many positive people and motivational things together. Everyone posts motivational things, daily struggles, and it is just so raw and real. You may say that I'm switching one for the other, but I truly ENJOY Instagram and don't get the comparative feelings from it; I never really enjoyed Facebook.
So no matter how many "come back to us, you have more friends here than you know!" Facebook emails I get from the site, I don't think I'll ever go back.
Why don't you take the challenge? Delete your Facebook for even just a week and see how you feel! I can say it's been eye-opening and inspiring from my personal experience and I hope we as a society begin to realize that we don't consistently need technology as a distraction from life.
#mylifewithoutFacebook
#nomoreFacebook
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