– Just over a year ago, I’d say my social media
use was pretty typical. Up until that point, I AI StoriMate OTO
didn’t place any limitations or boundaries on how I used it. I’d wake up looking at Instagram, spend much of the day posting to Twitter, and I used Facebook to see
my high school classmates fight over politics. You know, how it was intended to be used. (Matt laughing hard) Then, I saw my friend Jason
Zook make a post on Instagram saying that he was taking the month off. He was deleting social AI StoriMate OTO
media from his phone and logging out of all accounts
on his computer for 30 days.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/ai-storimate-oto-1-7-otos-links-here-hot-bonuses
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/ai-storimate-oto-1-7-otos-links-here-hot-bonuses-upsell
– [Jason] My identity entire identity
was tied to who I was online and I felt like if I didn’t
post or I wasn’t there, it was like, I wasn’t even
doing anything interesting. I wasn’t an interesting person. It’s like, that is such
a messed up thought. When you get to that
place, you’re no longer in control of how you’re
using that platform, that platform’s controlling you. And I was like, I have
to take the power back.
– [Matt] Jason’s post piqued my
interest but I couldn’t help but think that he was
making a huge mistake. You see, Jason like myself,
runs his business online and relies on social media
to keep that engine running. I looked at what he was doing and thought, oh my god, all your
followers, all these people that have been waiting to
hear from you year after year are gonna forget that you existed. And I also thought, oh my god,
you’re also gonna miss out on all these inspiration
and value and connections that you get through social media. My reaction was similar to the first time I heard about minimalism. That’s great for him but I
would never be able to do it because of, fill in the blank. The excuses and rationalizations
worked for a bit.
It would put my life’s work
in jeopardy, I told myself. I’d stop making money. I’d digitally fall off
the face of the earth. But then Jason quit social
media, came back and well, the world kept turning
and his business was fine. As it turns out, he’s
been doing it for years. Twice a year, in fact. – It is the most clarity of
thought during those times. It’s like everything re-calibrates for me. I get this whole refreshed creativity. It’s like, I was talking about
re-charging those batteries. I’m itching to get back to
stuff by the end of 30 days but I’m also really
excited because it’s like, I’ve taken control of these platforms. And then I can go back and
go, yeah, I didn’t, it’s fine.
I did, I missed some
stuff, I didn’t post things and guess what, everybody’s still here. You know, nothing really changed. – It’s one of those
things that’s so simple yet we often never think about it. It’s like switching up a gym routine that we’ve grown bored of or ending a relationship
that’s toxic and negative or maybe even quitting a job that you’ve been dragging your feet to. A lot of times we do things
because that’s the way that they’ve always been
done but the truth is that is a horrible reason to do anything. So, I begin to think about it some more. I mean, really, how bad could it be? What could really go wrong
by committing to 30 days? And come to think of it, Instagram had really been
stressing me out lately. And as much as I enjoy the
drama every once in a while, Facebook seemed like a
complete waste of time. And I keep accidentally
offending people on Twitter. Okay, maybe intentionally. I wondered how my days
would change without it.
How much more productive I would become? How much more peaceful my
mornings and nights would be? And then, I did it. I quit social media for 30 days
and I made a video about it. (keyboard typing) (mouse clicking) There’s a sense of clarity that you get when you take a step away
from the compulsive checking. It’s really hard to explain. It’s really impossible to quantify. But I can tell you that
I simply felt better by being away from it (mouse clicking). So, I saw a ton of benefits
in that 30 day period that small window when I
did the social media detox.
But what was most surprising
to me were the changes that occurred after, that
would be the 400 days since I went on that detox until today. And some of those changes still
stick with me to this day. To begin with, it was the
first 30 day challenge I completed on this
channel which led me to do another 11 in the year that followed. As I experimented with
everything from cold showers to counting calories and quitting coffee, that alone was a great take away. To feed my curiosity for
experimenting with new things and pushing myself further
out of my comfort zone and leaning more into
my own self-development that had in years but
I didn’t realize just how impactful it would be
on how I used social media.
A lot of times we try
experiments and challenges and we attempt to build habits
only to inevitably fall back into our old patterns and routines. This is probably the
most frustrating thing about trying to build a habit yet something about quitting
social media for 30 days just clicked something in my head. It woke me up to the
problem that social media had become in my own life. And I realize just how much
of a distraction it was, how little I needed it
and how little I missed it once I left. And so, there were changes
that stuck beyond that 30 days that I have continued
to uphold since then. First, I haven’t kept
any social media apps on my phone consistently. Instead, I install them
when I wanna use them. Sometimes for an hour, sometimes for a day and then I delete them.
These days the only app that
I do that with is Instagram. Your self-restraint might be
a little bit better than mine but I personally find that I quickly and compulsively default
to checking Instagram when it’s installed on my phone. The challenge you’ll likely find is that once you delete social
media from your phone you’ll immediately replace
it with something else. Whether it’s reddit,
the news, a video game, another distracting app, it’s
like whack-a-mole for apps. And so, to prevent this from happening, the best thing that I found to do is to actually increase your
distance from your phone. Leave your phone in your bedroom. Leave it in your car. Leave it at home. Whatever you do, just
don’t leave it on you. After my social media detox, I also decided to stop using Facebook. I deleted my public Facebook account and only use my private
account for Facebook messenger which I rarely use at that. As much as I love sitting back and watching the high school drama unfold, it just wasn’t worth holding onto. My favorite change since I
slowed down my time on social, I compare myself to
others much less often.
I’m reminded every time
I login to Instagram just how much that little
voice in the back of my head starts to talk shit. That person’s a better filmmaker than you. Wow, they’re much further
along in their career than you. And hey, that guy’s got
bigger biceps than you. No matter where you’re at in life, it’s difficult not to have
these kind of thoughts. And I find that that constant scrolling only helped to support them. On and on the voice goes. Making comparisons and
accusations against my worth. Yes, there are ways to this
voice like through meditation but I find that not feeding it
to begin with helps the most. So, I don’t. And hey, side note, I think that sometimes distractions are actually a good thing. Sometimes we have bad days. We’re frustrated. We just wanna go browse
Netflix, click on something that’s gonna allow us
to turn our brains off. We wanna scroll through social media and see what our friends are up to. We just want a distraction
from a shitty day and I think that’s completely okay.
I think what I’m talking
about here is more so when these problems become so big that we start to overlook
other areas of our life. We’re not going to the gym as much. We’re maybe feeling like
we’re in a negative spiral because we keep comparing
ourselves to others. Now, that’s where I think the
changes really need to happen. – [Jason] When I come back to it, I then get super intentional
about how I use it. So, then I go, okay, I
check Instagram twice a day. Cause man, I would love to
scroll through Instagram all day long, cause it’s great! It’s a curated feed of beautiful things. It’s really awesome. It’s really interesting. But I don’t want it to control my life. I want the time that that’s taking up to be creating things of my own, to be exploring,
experimenting other things. And so, you really do
just become intentional. You take that break and then
you’d come back and you go, I don’t want that stuff
anymore to happen in my life.
I don’t wanna feel like I’m not in control of my usage of these things. And so, that’s why these
social media detoxes, man, they’re just been so helpful for me. – Now, here’s the part where
I throw it back to you. What if you quit social media for 30 days. Don’t worry the world’s gonna keep turning and we’ll be here when you get back. Thanks for watching and
I’ll see you next time..
Leave a Reply