I deleted my social media sites for two weeks, and what happened changed my life! I spent so much time online, scrolling from app to app without necessarily doing anything productive. My days looked like waking up, going online, watching people’s lives, comparing myself to them, and repeating the same cycle the following day. I must say, it sucked. I was in a constant loop of needing to be like others but at the same time wanting to be myself, but that was difficult with the constant online input. As an unemployed content creator who wants to earn income from my content, I felt stuck, maybe even stagnant. It always felt as if I was fighting a losing battle. And the worst thing to happen to you is to lose sight of who you are and who you want to be.
Background
I love social media, don’t get me wrong. But I realized that it consumed me so much, and I lost my sense of self while at it. I am an addict. I am addicted to my phone, to the algorithm. I love how it knows what to show me and when to do it. I could stare at my screen for hours upon hours and still feel like I need to be online every second of my day. It’s crazy to think that one tiny device has the ability to capture my full attention for many hours, yet it does not keep me productive. Do you know I always check my phone every few minutes without even hearing a notification coming in? It’s like the developers of these apps have put crack in them. The average human being checks their phone every five to ten minutes. Diabolical if you ask me. This means that you might be spending roughly 4 to 5 hours staring at your screen all day. Which brings me to the question, when you look at your daily average screen time, are you proud of yourself?
The realization
I can boldly say I was so embarrassed when this one time I looked at my screentime and saw it was 6 hours. Six hours of screen time excluding the time I also spend on my laptop! Truly it was a wakeup call. That was literally a quarter of my day spent staring at my screen endlessly scrolling and scrolling. I felt as if I had been doing myself a disservice. So I did the unexpected: I deleted my two favourite forms of digital addiction, Instagram and Tiktok. It felt liberating. Like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. Now all of a sudden I had all this time in my hands, but I didn’t really know what to do with it. So I went back to the drawing board and asked myself a simple question: What should I do now that I am not aimlessly scrolling on my phone anymore?
The Reality of Post-Digital Detox: Facing the Silence
The first few minutes I sat with myself and my brain was blank. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t even know who I was at core, what defined me. I got lost in other people’s lives for so long that finding my own identity felt like looking for a needle in a hay stack. So I decided to start small, thinking of things that I enjoyed doing and building on from there, I loved bingeing on shows, I loved going on walks, reading, writing, researching and cooking. So I set time aside and began doing just that. I put my phone aside and I didn’t even listen to podcasts while I did all these things. I just wanted some silence and I had that.
The first day, during the first few hours,I was tempted to pick my phone up, but I reminded myself that there was nothing to see on there. That helped get back on track whenever it felt as if I was backsliding. My brain felt lighter, as if it was new. You know that feeling when you just bought a new computer and your desktop is clean and empty? Yeah, that was me. I went for my morning walks without listening to anything but the birds chirping and cars passing by. It was beautiful. It made me fall in love with life again. I began to appreciate the little things. Being grateful for every moment and counting myself lucky to be living in an environment where birds reside literally next to me without the constant noise of the city.
Why the Best Feed is No Feed at All
Going offline definitely rewired me. It is beautiful and I would recommend it to everyone. I wishI could completely go off the grid but at times my line of work requires me to be in the loop. My goal is that some day I’ll be in a position where I can make money without necessarily being online and I’ll delete all my social media handles and never look back. But until that day comes, I’m choosing to limit my online presence just for my sanity and well-being.
XO, Shisoka.
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