#Social media addiction

[ramblingsfromthytruly]

kinda happy that i'm not as chronically online as i used to be. i've been focusing on my studies, hobbies, etc and it makes me feel so much better. ofc i still have a long way to go but a phrase that is constantly running in my mind is one day or day one... like if i wanna be a certain kind of person and become better i should actually DO stuff that makes me better instead of thinking about that one day where i will magically get everything i want. that doesn't happen, i have to work for it. believing in myself is the first half which i have accomplished, the other half is working hard (with balance ofc). i doomscroll much less, and if i do i gain awareness of it very quickly and it doesn't surpass an hour. i don't turn on my laptop first thing after waking, i only turn it on when i i actually have some work or i want to listen to music. sometimes i relapse. but the point is that i've never tried more harder than i am rn and i am proud of myself for it. i am feeling seeing my progress. i intend to constantly heal and succeed and make mistakes and learn from them and never ever stop trying.

if i can do it you can too <3

[cybergrapeuk]

I would like to thank Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg and everyone else in Silicon Valley for managing all the major social media services.

Without them, I would have never rediscovered the joy and whimsy of going to the library and reading physical books.

[dreamydespair]

What Was

I was all about her

She was all about the glory

I was for the happy ending

She was all about the story

[shroomsnsuch]

I think my favourite thing about web revival is that is also coincides with social media addiction and the core web, like yea we all are so viscerally intertwined with this thing that we've labelled as 'social media,' instead being addicted to surfing the web or getting lost in web rings or rabbit holes, to accessing this virtual realm, we are addicted to these corporations that have monopolized the web! We are, and spending more time in the real world is so, so important. The small web, the peripheral web, honestly encourages a distance from the digital space as a whole. (at least for me)

I have to put effort in engaging in these sites people create. Despite being so excited for educating myself on the digital space and tech in general, in the process I'm being educated on the ways these corporations exploit and get us addicted to mentioned monopolies. Not like I didn't know, of course I was aware, but it's this vague knowing and not much motivation or ability to overcome the reality. Engaging in the core web because that's where everybody is, that's what it felt like. Being there because that was the reality of the situation. Being there because that's where the wealth of media and people are, but with web revival and the small web there is a sense of hope.

Spacehey running slower due to an influx of users, people posting everyday on forums, portfolios and blogs on neocities, it's amazing. I hope personal websites spread like fire, I hope the core internet loses some of its consistency and spreads out. That videos are posted on websites, that one day YouTube is met with a competitor. That we have to put effort in curating who we interact with. I want to put aside the fear that with popularity that somehow this amazing revolution is tainted in someway. I'd rather the size of the movement grow instead of holding onto this fake concept of small web 'purity,' which I've seen a bit. I'd rather the world have a sense of choice from the core web, personal freedom over monopoly, rather than keep this culture isolated and grassroots.

[manytoonepoet13]

"Tick tock", reminded the clock.

"How long are you planning on wasting time?

Your entire range of movements a thumb flick and a digital click.

All your emotions shown by tears and a frown.

Words coming out in a tantrum.

Entire being full of selfish desires."

But how long must I wait?

All the plans being laid yet not once have been done.

Whenever desperation becomes too much it comes out as selfishness.

When is later?

When is tomorrow?

When is next week?

Why has it been months yet every word felt like a timeloop of a response.

A mere "no" would've been better than have me expect.

All excited for a promise not and never fulfilled.

Maybe I am selfish.

Perhaps I am merely thinking of me, myself.

But how can you blame the selfish beggar who only wanted to be spared time?

A sign to live your life outside of the glowing screen glued to the palm of your hand. From: Ms. Manny Tuhan.

[theereina]

"Digital Self-Care: Setting Boundaries Online"

In our increasingly interconnected and digital world, setting boundaries online has become an essential aspect of overall well-being. The omnipresence of smartphones, social media platforms, and constant connectivity can lead to information overload, digital fatigue, and potential negative impacts on mental health. Recognizing the importance of establishing and maintaining healthy boundaries in the digital realm is crucial for fostering a balanced and fulfilling life.

The Importance of Setting Boundaries:

Protecting Mental Health:

Constant exposure to digital stimuli can contribute to stress, anxiety, and burnout. Setting boundaries helps in preserving mental well-being by allowing individuals to detach from the digital world and focus on real-world experiences.

Maintaining Healthy Relationships:

Unchecked screen time can interfere with personal relationships. Establishing digital boundaries ensures that quality time is dedicated to offline interactions, fostering stronger connections with family and friends.

Productivity Enhancement:

Excessive use of digital devices may lead to a decline in productivity. By delineating specific time slots for work, leisure, and rest, individuals can optimize their productivity and maintain a healthy work-life balance.

Preventing Information Overload:

The constant influx of information from various sources can be overwhelming. Setting boundaries on information consumption helps individuals filter and prioritize content, preventing information overload and promoting a more focused and intentional use of online resources.

Tips for Managing Screen Time and Creating Balance:

Define Clear Work and Leisure Hours:

Establish specific time frames for work-related activities and leisure pursuits. This demarcation helps in preventing work from encroaching into personal time, promoting a healthier balance between professional and personal life.

Designate Tech-Free Zones:

Identify areas in your home or specific times of the day where digital devices are off-limits. This could be during meals, in the bedroom before bedtime, or in designated relaxation spaces. This practice encourages more mindful engagement with the physical environment.

Utilize Screen Time Tracking Tools:

Many devices offer screen time tracking features that provide insights into digital habits. Utilize these tools to monitor and manage daily screen time, enabling individuals to make informed decisions about their online activities.

Establish Social Media Boundaries:

Set limits on social media usage to prevent mindless scrolling. Designate specific times for checking social platforms, and consider detox periods where you take a break from social media to recalibrate and refocus.

Prioritize Face-to-Face Interactions:

Actively schedule in-person meetings and activities. Physical interactions contribute significantly to emotional well-being and can provide a necessary break from the digital world.

Learn to Say No:

Be mindful of overcommitting to online engagements. Learn to say no to invitations, notifications, or requests that can contribute to digital overwhelm. Prioritize activities that align with your personal and professional goals.

Practice Mindfulness:

Incorporate mindfulness practices into your routine, such as meditation or deep breathing exercises. These practices can help create a sense of presence and awareness, reducing the stress associated with constant digital connectivity.

By consciously setting boundaries in the digital realm, individuals can enhance their overall well-being, improve personal relationships, and cultivate a healthier balance between the online and offline aspects of their lives. Digital self-care is an evolving practice that requires mindfulness and adaptability, empowering individuals to navigate the digital landscape in a way that promotes their holistic health and happiness.

[party-gilmore]

Also like. It's literally DAY ONE of my new screen-time enforcement. Not even a full twenty four hours yet.

And holy shit.

Literally, all day long, I have been physically itching to pick up my phone and get on here and see what's happening. Not even about specifically bad shit like I've been fixating on I mean for literally ANYTHING. Repeatedly, constantly, through out the day, picking up and flicking over to where the app was on my home page and just. Staring for a minute until I realize what I'm doing. Over and over and over and just seeking and seeking and seeking... i don't know what, but SOMETHING. To make posts, check posts, see what's going on... like physically fucking painful. And then towards the end of the day, the fucking anxiety literally all built around not know exactly what's happening right now what if I miss something. The fucking legit panic. Then the relief right as I sat down at my computer.

Like. I rolled my fucking eyes when people talk about the Youths being Addicted To Their Phones. But holy shit. Holy shit. There was. APPARENTLY. an underlying issue to ALL of this [gestures at self and the various smaller yoyo-ing mental breaks happening lately] that I had no fucking CLUE about.

On the one hand I feel so fucking silly for having such a hard time doing something so simple, just "wait till you get home then limit your time." But on the other hand there's... a bit of a relief element? Like "oh, okay, this was. there was something WRONG wrong here."

[gh0sting-along]

the state of my mental health can be seen by the frequency in which i post on social media.

[prototypesteve]

Instagram started well as an ambient friendship app. People who you knew, sharing glimpses of how their day was going, so you could stay emotionally in touch. The common unspoken caption was, “I wish you could see this.”

Instagram is finishing horribly as a karaoke machine. Everyone living along to one of a handful of templates as they squint out into a world full of strangers waiting for you to step away from the mic. The common unspoken caption is, “You should wish you were me.”

It’s everywhere, not just Instagram, and it’s all of us, not just Instagram’s leadership. We all keep replacing corkboards with stages. We stopped telling our own stories, and started living up to The Influencer’s Journey.

Back in 1996, a roommate brought out a little tin box full of concert ticket stubs, envelopes of photos, airplane boarding passes, coasters, and trinkets. They helped her tell the story of where she’d been, and what she’d done. It was amazing, inspiring, enriching, and one of the nicest hours I’ve ever spent with someone.

There’s still time to build your own little tin box somewhere. I’ve tried to keep my own Instagram feed like that.

(BTW, I’m not linking to it here, because it really is just a feed for people who know me in real life to see what I’m up to in between the times we’re together. You wouldn’t get anything out of it other than a weird number of photos of the UK, the Canadian Rockies, and a makerspace.)

[moiled-spilk]

idk who needs to hear this but if you’re feeling bored and lethargic all the time, can’t draw, can’t game, can’t hyperfixate for longer than like a day, you are experiencing dopamine and/or high cortisol addiction and you need to heavily restrict your social media access and detox for like 2 months minimum. you will be okay. text your friends on discord or something. they won’t forget about you.

[ramblingsfromthytruly]

i know this is hypocritical of me to say since this is tumblr, land of the chronically online, but social media is really rotting my mind. i'm saying this as someone who only has youtube, pinterest & tumblr. i just can't seem to focus and always reach to my laptop or phone the instant i get slightly bored or unoccupied. so, baby steps of control, i'm gonna close everything except my tab for music and i'm going to study now :)

[alwaysbewoke]

[mt-monologue02]

Yet again I’ve deleted my social media apps to explore my environment. To exist and become.

Now this is not my first rodeo. Just last week I achieved 5 days offline. But I ultimately got back online because I didn’t know what the reason for deleting all my apps was, other than the fact that my phone is a great distraction.

But as I have been reflecting, on the day and setting out goals for my days I’ve come to realise that I have no real identity outside of the media I am always consuming. No real interests, relationships or self-concept that is not informed by my FYP or Pinterest feed.

I’ve become a billboard, constantly taking shape to what is trending. I have no real personality, just an angry media feminist, fashion hoe who acts uninfluenced by trends but simultaneously likes everything that is trendy. Believes in individuality but is simultaneously the same as everyone else.

And because of that I need a break. To wake up and smell the coffee. To not take a picture of the coffee first for the grid.

I do not know how long I will or can go without my social media. But I am looking forward to talking walks which are not disturbed by needing to #selfie and #doitforthegram. Or to wear what feels comfortable and good without thinking about how well it will snap.

Let’s see how IRL can take over URL.

[rewcana]

do you spend many of your waking hours on social media? do you feel like it's a problem? in this world of late stage capitalism, your time and attention is actively being harvested by big corporations. it's.. not good. it also just makes you feel bad!

here are some tips that have really helped me reduce the amount of time i give to these apps & get in control of my social media addiction:

1. IDENTIFY PROBLEM APPS

you probably know which apps you spend the most time on. however, looking at real data about usage is very helpful because time spent on social media is very deceiving. keep in mind which apps you spend the most time looking at and interacting with for the rest of this list.

2. TURN OFF NOTIFICATIONS

this is probably the easiest thing to do and it makes an immense difference. it's up to your discretion which notifications you want to keep on (turning on messaging notifications but turning off algorithm and interaction notifs for example) but, the most effective way to stay off problem apps is to turn off ALL notifications.

3. TURN OFF NOTIFICATION SOUNDS

i always keep my phone on silent. i understand that not all people have that privilege but, if you're able to i would highly highly recommend. it has helped me a lot with anxieties regarding waiting for notifications. i used to experienced the phantom vibrate and check my phone obsessively when nothing would happen. you can also just turn off notification sounds and vibrations for any non necessity apps if you don't want to jump to turning off all notifications.

4. CHANGE THE PLACEMENT OF PROBLEM APPS

i actually learned this trick from facebook when they changed the UI slightly so you had to be more intentional in interacting with the app. changing the layout of the apps on your phone really helps you catch yourself when you are automatically opening up apps that cost you time and attention. instead of keeping social media apps on the homescreen, keep it on a different screen, in a folder, & if possible out of the preview window for the folder.

if you want to expand on this more, you could keep a log in a notes app of every time you reached for an app that has since moved. you can even put the notes app in its place!

5. UTILIZE APP TIMERS

my experience is based on samsung app timers so i'm not sure how it differs in different makes. i really dont like my phone telling me i can't do something so i've set my tumblr timer to the highest end of my usage data (2hrs 10 minutes). another mindfulness thing that i like about using the timers is that when i'm switching between apps, my phone tells me how much time left i have (it's currently 1 hour 21 minutes, most of the 49 minutes i've spent writing this lol). i'm just a slut for data so i really like this aspect of the samsung app timer function and it's very useful besides this point.

6. DELETE APPS

okay, i know this seems drastic. but it doesn't NEED to be depending on your habitual problem apps. apps like youtube, instagram, facebook, and tumblr (to a lesser extent ime) (and probably others these are just the ones i have experience with) can pretty easily be transferred to being used exclusively on a web browser. if you use firefox it will even get rid of ads which is very important for overall sanity and for safe web browsing. one of the biggest plusses to moving from an app to a web browser is that it won't automatically play your platform's version of tiktoks. it also makes it more difficult to upload items which is a plus because it will hinder you from doing so and cut back on the loop of expecting validation from recently posted content.

opening instagram without immediately being enthralled by their endless stream of reels has made it SO much easier to control my time on the site. there are tons of plusses to transferring from app browsing to web browsing.

so on the more drastic side, if you are addicted to tiktok you maybe should just delete it. tiktok is intentionally designed so you can't use it in a web browser and can only use it in the app. i will talk more about tiktok and how evil it is later in this post.

7. MOVE DMS TO MESSAGING APPS

if a hesitation to turning off notifactions or deleting apps is from not wanting to miss conversations from online friends, i understand your pain. but, if you are serious about cutting down screen time on apps that are absolutely draining your attention, talk to your friends about switching to a different messaging app. i would suggest signal personally.

your friends may be experiencing similar problems with phone addiction and even if they aren't, if they care about you, they will make this accommodation to help you in this process. i get that this is very scary but i believe in you.

8. USE TIME ON YOUR PHONE FOR OTHER THINGS

depending on your goals for how you spend your time, there are plenty of alternatives to social media / other problem apps you may have. personally i have downloaded a bunch of books on my reading list and will divert attention from dopamine pumping social media to reading. you can find tons of free pdfs of books online and if you are used to reading on your phone, it won't be a difficult transition to read longer form narratives from short text posts.

there are free art apps, language learning apps, self care / journaling apps, meditation apps, etc. that you can use when on your phone. this may seem counterintuitive, getting more apps to battle certain app addictions. but, simply weakening the habit that brings you to the apps that you spend so much time on should help. but watch out for apps that claim they are to teach or better you but have social media built into them / other tricks that keep you glued to your screen. everyone is trying to mine your attention so be wary of all apps and the methods they use to keep you engaged.

9. DON’T BE AFRAID TO PUT YOUR PHONE BACK DOWN AFTER PICKING IT UP

idk if this is a weird one or not but, you know the feeling of going into a room to do something but you forget what so you putter around trying to remember? i feel like going on your phone when you have a phone addiction is often a state of that except the majority of the time you DON’T have a purpose to go on it. so even though it may feel silly, opening your phone only to close it right after is PERFECTLY FINE.

IN CONCLUSION, phone usage is pretty inevitable in this day and age. i've considered getting rid of my phone entirely but, between the expectation to be constantly reachable from employers to QR code menus at restaurants, it just doesn't seem reasonable to get rid of my phone completely. and i will readily admit its convenience and functionality is life changing and wonderful.

however in late stage capitalism, technology doesn't only work for you but it harvests you -- your data, your habits, your time, your attention, your wants, your needs, your thoughts. even leftist spaces with good intentions can trap you (doom scrolling). when i was becoming radicalized during the beginning of the pandemic i spent sooo much time online reading about all these horrible truths of imperialism, colonization, and capitalism, and i felt it was my duty to share these horrors with other people to radicalize them. but it was so unhealthy, especially when shit hit the fan (which it was like constantly doing) because everyone was posting about the horrors and it felt utterly inescapable.

after following some of these steps (which i did in stages over the course of a few years), my relationship with social media has improved greatly and my mental health is actually significantly better. all of this is based on personal experience and observation and this post is specifically for people who want to cut down on phone usage, it's not supposed to be a preachy post that's telling people they spend too much time on their phone.

it's also nowhere near complete. it doesn't tackle addictions to games on phones nor the notorious tiktok. i said i would talk about it later and here it is. i have a chalkboard in my kitchen and all it has written on it is "tiktok is the devil". i have never seen such a commonly used app that has such a degrading effect on all of its users. and it set a precedent to all other social media apps for autoplaying videos that demand user engagement. i was on tiktok for a little less than a year and the way that it would sap anywhere from 20 minutes to over 3 hours of my time when i told myself i'd only watch a few videos was insane. as an aspiring creator i felt that i needed to hop on it to get recognition but now, i don't see it as anything more than a tarpit to trap as many people as possible in its dopamine rich algorithm. but whatever, that's just my little rant. as a social experiment i think it's fascinating lol and i for the creators it's benefited im very happy for them.

anywayy, i hope this helps someone if it gets any attention at all lol. remember no one can make the decision of how you spend your time on or offline but you. not some stranger on the internet, not corporations, no one. you are in control of your time (well besides the whole having to work most of your waking hours to survive but that's what communism is for yayy).

[the-healing-mindset]

Don’t let the internet take away your hopes and dreams for a better life.

[justinkonstantin]