The benefits of staying away from social media includes regaining your privacy, increasing productivity, improving your confidence, improving your mood, rekindling friendship, getting better sleep, appreciating your surrounding, improving your posture, becoming more mindful, increasing creativity, and overcoming fear of missing out.
It seems like there’s a social media platform everywhere you turn today. It’s almost like an addictive drug with over 1 billion people regular consumers of it. And if you look at it by the sheer numbers, it’s actually worse in many regards. On average, a social media user spends about 1 ½ hours per day on their site of choice, usually in ways not productive, and results in an utter waste of time.
If you’ve been on a social media platform for any period of time, chances are you’ve considered stepping back before. Better known as a “social media detox”, there are proven benefits from staying away from social media for an indefinite period of time. Wondering how your life can improve for the better if you take a hiatus from social media? Read on to find out more.
11 Benefits of Staying Away From Social Media
1. Regain Your Privacy
If your personal data isn’t being sold to the highest bidder, becoming subject to business advertising, you may have a stalker or two that monitors your every movement on social media. Social media apps that use location-enabled features make you particularly prone to danger, as strangers are able to see your every movement and where you currently are. The best way to avoid these dangers? Stay away from these platforms that share your location data, or at a minimum disable them.
2. Increases Productivity
Endlessly browsing through newsfeeds is a major time suck, and does nothing for you at the end of the day. This time could be spent better furthering your education or just doing something that adds to your bottom line.
How about getting in some exercise today? Sure beats exercise your thumbs get some scrolling through the newsfeeds endlessly!
3. Improves Your Confidence
There is nothing more demeaning than seeing everyone around you flossing all your achievements, while all you’ve managed to do for the day is eat breakfast. Your confidence can take a real hit along with your motivation as you are likely to feel subpar and insignificant compared to what you see on social media. Stay away from the things that get you down on social media, including the achievements of friends which make you feel worse about yourself.
4. Your Mood Improves
We all have experienced this from time to time. The feeling of sadness or depression that creeps in when you see sensationalized depictions of violence or gore, and the overall poor state of this planet. After repeated exposure to these stimuli, you may become desensitized to them having already developed depressive illness. Sometimes it’s better to not let your mind be clouded by sheer negatives, and do your best to improve your outlook. The world is not perfect, but you can do your best to enjoy what it has to offer, and social media will not help you.
5. Rekindle Friendships
Even though the original intention of social media seems to have been to make connections with friends easier, many people who have hundreds or thousands of friends on their list hardly say a word to them year after year. They become mere monuments and after a while, you despise seeing them coming up on your news feed time and time again. The fix? Get rid of all your friends on social media. We know it sounds harsh, but when you do meet them in public in the real world it will be so much more meaningful.
6. You Sleep Better
How often do you lay in bed scrolling through your phone on your social media site of choice, when you should’ve already been asleep? For most people, this can range from 15 minutes all the way up to two hours, precious time that you could’ve spent asleep recuperating from the tough day you’ve had. Studies have shown that electronics can interrupt sleep significantly, owing partly to the stimulating effects of light exposure on the hormone melatonin, which helps initiate sleep. Do yourself a favor and leave electronics out of bed, as there is no room for social media between the sheets.
7. You Appreciate Your Surroundings
The number of people that you can observe at any one time with their backs hunched over their smartphone is astounding, as they mindlessly browse through social media platforms. Not only are they blissfully unaware of their surroundings, but they miss life as it occurs. You’d be surprised to know just how much more you experience when you’re not staring at your phone all the time and actually look around your surroundings as you move.
8. Your Posture Improves
Sitting in front of a laptop or constantly hunched over your phone will do no favors to your posture, and can set you up for chronic back pain later in life. While working at a desk job carries much of the same risk, it’s better to stay moving as opposed to meaninglessly spending hours upon hours scrolling through a newsfeed. Your back will thank you in years to come.
9. Mindfulness Improves
Mindfulness is the art of appreciating everything that you experience, whether it be for good or bad. Think about it this way, when last did you thoroughly enjoy your browsing session or scrolling through your newsfeed? Chances are it’s not that memorable. In contrast, time spent outdoors experiencing things with people you love create memories that are deeply embedded in your mind. You won’t soon forget that wonderful road trip you had with your significant other, but you will forget the status update you saw two hours ago.
10. Creativity Is Inspired
As previously mentioned, social media is a type of addictive drug to many people, one that impairs creativity and logical thinking for some period of time afterward. Instead of wasting your energy hunting for memes just to get the occasional like or share, your time will be better spent creating something that can last for years.
The high from coming up with a great idea is far greater than the short-term satisfaction of the stupid social media posts that are quickly forgotten. Stay away from social media for a period of time and you will quickly rediscover your creative edge.
11. Helps Overcome FOMO
FOMO, better known as the fear of missing out, is a real time waster as it makes you spend more and more time on social media just hunting for the latest entertainment news or big celebrity gossip, as you fear being out of the know for too long. This is actually a great weakness, as your focus and concentration suffer when doing work since you’re constantly sidetracking yourself with nonproductive tasks. Spending excessive time on social media is said to be equivalent to making yourself functionally retarded from living in the real world.
Conclusion
While at its core social media attempted to solve the problem of poor interpersonal communication, in reality, it ended up creating a society of major narcissists on the one hand, and people who will never feel good enough on the other.
We know that quitting cold turkey can be just as hard as breaking an addiction, to what you need to do is gradually wean yourself off. Start off by limiting the time you spend on social media to probably 15 minutes per day, in five-minute intervals taken three times daily. Only after have you seen the problem it can cause in your life will you be able to make the change and break the cycle of time wasting put into motion via social media.
