In 2018, approximately 2.65 billion people were social media users. As that number increases, so as the number of people with mental health problems. It would make sense for people to leave social media after they’ve found out that their mental health was declining, but that wasn’t the case.
No one has really looked into the numbers to see why this was happening to people. After all, social media is a form of entertainment for people to enjoy, yet so many people are harmed by it.
So many people claim to feel like social media is the root of all evil. That social media does more harm than good. It would make sense for people to leave social media if this was the case. I would be one of those people that believe in this ideology, even though I still use social media quite frequently.
However, I know the unhealthy habits that people adopt when they are engaged in these platforms, and I stay away from them. For those that are unaware of them, let me explain 5 reasons that you need to leave social media right now in order to enjoy life and have better mental health.
You’re On Social Media For Too Long
In 2019, the average projected time spend on social media platforms was 153 minutes per day. That is equivalent to 2 hours and 33 minutes of time wasted! What are you doing on social media that requires you to be on it for that amount of time?
Chances are that you’re not a social media marketer that has to be on it in order to do their job. You are just someone that hops on for entertainment purposes, which is okay to do at times. However, there are many more important things to do in life rather than spending it on a digital device.
Leave social media on hold for a while. You don’t have to consistently go on it every day. Put your phone down and do something more productive. Go out and watch a movie. Hang out with your friends or work on personal development. Your mental health would thank you later.
The reason I say this is because there have been studies that have connected social media use to various mental health problems like depression and anxiety.
Limiting Social Media Use
One study conducted at the University Of Pennsylvania regarding limiting social media use concluded that “limiting social media usage does have a direct and positive impact on subjective well-being over time, especially with respect to decreasing loneliness and depression.”
This study recommended social media users to limit their social media use to 10 minutes a day per platform to have good mental health and well-being. After 10 minutes per platform, it’s time to leave social media and say goodbye until tomorrow.
You Check Your Social Media Way Too Frequently
What’s the first thing you do when you wake up in the morning? For most people, they would get up and go on their phone to look at social media. You always have that fear of missing out even though nothing really happened that was important at all.
Maybe you got a few messages from your friends or a couple of likes on your pictures, but that’s it. No life-changing information gathered from the time you went to sleep to the time you woke up, so why is it so hard for you to get off of your phone and leave social media? Even though it is true that nothing life-changing happens when we wake up, we still have that innate ability to check our phones.
Did you know that people spend around 10-20 minutes on an app just after opening it? That’s a long time when you consider the number of times that people open up those apps in a day. The average American user opens up their apps about 10 times a day. We’re talking 100-200 minutes here!
What is your reason for opening up those apps at least 10 times a day? We all receive notifications to see what exactly is going on, so there’s no need to open it up constantly. I’ve seen teenagers at my job open up their phone every 5-10 minutes because they want to see if they’ve received a notification.
How Often Should You Check Social Media
Again, it’s the fear of missing out. No one likes to be surrounded by a group of friends and you’re the only one that doesn’t know what’s going on. You only really need to check your phone about 3-5 times a day. Try to get over that sense that you have to see if something’s missing.
If you have that feeling then try to leave your phone at home when you’re out with friends or doing other things. If that’s too difficult for you then try to leave your phone off for the entire time you’re out. The last and final thing you can do is to check your phone twice when you’re out. One time when you just leave your house and arrive at wherever you’re going. The other time is when you’re on your way home.
Try those three things and see how far it takes you and how hard it is for you to try those things. If it’s difficult or too hard for you, then you know you’re dealing with a bad habit that needs to be stopped.
You Compare Yourself To Other People
Comparisons, Comparisons. This is honestly the worst habit to have because you immediately feel bad about yourself. Who likes to compare themselves to others? No one! However, we do it anyway because we feel like we have too.
Some people deal with comparison the healthier way, which is to work on themselves. For example, you may see someone on social media with an amazing physique. You feel jealous and compare yourself to them, hoping that you will look like that person someday.
Some people would look at that person as motivation to improve themselves and better their lives. Others would hate themselves for it and get depressed. It doesn’t make sense for someone to continue using social media if it makes you feel that way. If you leave social media for good, your life would be better.
Addicted To Comparison
The reason people remain to continue using social media is that they are addicted to it. They are addicted to seeing what other people are doing and how their lives are. It’s just the norm of society nowadays. For every person, you see that is doing better that you, you will find someone that you’re doing better than. Therefore, you don’t feel as bad when people are in a better position than you.
To be honest, you truly don’t know if they are in fact doing better than you. Posting a picture or making a Facebook post is one thing, but actually living that kind of lifestyle is another thing. People tend to have their page designed for what they want others to perceive them as. Pages are not made to show you who you really are as a person.
That is the sole reason as to why people are never happy with themselves. A study conducted at the University of Michigan compared basic Facebook habits to mental health and self-esteem. The results found the people that engaged in behaviors of social comparison had lower self-esteem and mental health.
If you’re involved with social comparisons on social media, it is best for you to leave social media while you can. It’s not a good look for you.
You’re Bored So You Keep Up With Current Trends
Who doesn’t love a good trend to follow? It’s popular and everyone is talking about it. It’s a way to keep yourself entertained when you’re bored. There’s nothing wrong with that at all. The problem is that you’re always bored.
According to a 2017 survey regarding boredom, 91-98% of young adults report feeling bored throughout their day. That is a lot of people experiencing boredom. It’s crazy to think that technology and social media were made to provide endless entertainment to people, yet so many people remain bored in their lives.
Healthier Habits To Ditch Social Media
We’ve become so assimilated to the fact of having phones to the point where social media remains a staple in our daily habits. Instead of having social media as a daily habit, it’s time to promote healthier habits. Healthy habits include:
- Leaving Social Media
- Focus On Bettering Yourself
- Meditation
- Exercising/Working Out
- Working On Projects That You’ve Set Aside
- Journaling
- Reading A Book
The list goes on and on, but these are just some things to swap in place of social media. If you decide to continue using social media, then try to limit your use.
Trends aren’t that important when you look at the bigger picture in life. You’ll realize that trends come and go. You always have to be on the lookout in order to stay relevant to the news and media. It sounds fun in the short-term because of the entertainment aspect.
When you look at it in the long-term, you realize that you’ve wasted a lot of your time doing this. You find out that it’s not worth your time.
You Post Way Too Many Pictures On Social Media
How many of you are hanging out with your friends and you think to yourself “this would be a good place to take a picture”? You’re planning on taking one picture, but you end up taking multiple. The truth is that you don’t know which picture to post on social media. So what do you do?
You post ALL of the pictures you took on social media. You want to show people just how good of a time you had and that life was good. There’s nothing wrong with doing this, but chances are you are doing this way too much.
The Comparison Game
If you’re someone that constantly checks your social media to see how many likes you got on a picture, you’re in this group. If you’re someone that checks your social media to see how many comments you got, you’re in this group.
The idea of posting too much is in the same vein as comparing yourself to other people; it all has to do with comparison. The people that post too much aren’t doing so just because they want to. There’s a feeling that you get when you’ve felt like you haven’t posted in a while.
You feel like you’re behind on the picture game, so you decide to show up big time with 5+ photos on one post. Want more likes? Just post a bunch of pictures at once, so you don’t have to figure out which one is the best one to post.
It’s so easy to get caught up in the “social media” game because everyone is essentially playing in it. Don’t feel like catching up? Just opt-out and leave social media. It will always be there and you won’t miss anything when you come back.
