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I'm still on Instagram, but I use it from my desktop, so there is no messaging option. It's just a place to post creative work for me. No interactions with people, except saying "thanks!" if anyone says something sweet or supportive.
I have been considering whether I should quit my usual social media for a while now It started as a way for me to reconnect with my friends. But then I really became more reclusive, and then it became a place to avoid my old friends, but still meet new people from around the world. At some point, when I became active on Twitter more, and left Facebook completely, social media transformed into a place to really say random things, keep up on that never ending river of news and express my opinions, ideally in a manner that doesn't invite negativity. I suffer from a couple of mental conditions, which make me prone to reacting strongly to random negative things. So I tried to keep things positive/humorous.
But for a few weeks now, I have felt that the whole thing is essentially empty. I mean, I always knew it was empty in a 'life and meaning' sense. I mean, I started to feel I was spending a lot of time and effort on them, to get nothing back. Nothing that ultimately was making me any happier. I tried to break down what I get from it.
More friends? Not really. I chit chat on random topics to a few people. It's not friendship, really. It's the equivalent of running into someone in the elevator of the building you live in, and talking about the weather/ news. It would be more accurate to say it was actually about social validation in the most pointless sense. I mean, I stayed anonymous on these platforms. So it's not like any validation from there would ever lead to anything tangible in my life. It's just the dopamine rush of seeing people hit 'likes' and share your random posts.
"YES! People I don't know, said I was 'awesome' without knowing me as a person at all, and agreed I was right on things that weren't really affecting my life or theirs in any meaningful way. And together we all affected very little or nothing in the real world."
I know I sound too cynical. I usually am a positive person, though it doesn't sound like that with this post. It's just where I have been at emotionally, with the whole thing, and so it made sense to quit them all for now. Maybe I will see the positive side of those platforms sometime later.
By the way, yes, I know I am talking about quitting social media ON a social media site. I am talking strictly about the big platforms with hundreds of millions of desperate souls. I only joined this place, because here I mean to share, and help with things that matter to me. Not post memes and short, sharp comments on why a movie I saw ten years ago and don't think about, really sucks.
Nice to meet you all.
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