Digital Friend Detox

For some of you, you have made it almost a full month into 2018 with your New Year's resolution in tact. Some of you have lost weight due to exercising. Keep it up! Some of you have continued down the path to healthier eating. Well done! Some of you have tackled that one house project you've been putting off for awhile. Get it finished! Yet, some of you gave your New Year's resolution your best shot but life happened and you didn't accomplish what you set out to do.

Regardless of your resolution and whether or not you are in the process of completing one or simply put one to the side for another year, there is one resolution that you can still do. One that I think would benefit you a great deal. One that I forced myself to do that I called it the Digital Friend Detox. 

What did the Digital Friend Detox entail? I went through all my Facebook friends, Twitter followers and people I followed on Instagram and determined whether or not I wanted to keep following them on the respective platform. 

Now I know for some of you, that may be an easy thing to do but for me, it was somewhat hard - especially on Facebook. I found myself saying, "Well they are nice" or "I have nothing against them" and I often times caught myself having a certain level of guilt before making a decision. Yet, I knew this had to be done. 

So why even do a Digital Friend Detox? For me, I spend a lot of time on social media (it is my full-time profession) and I realized that the content I wanted to see was being drowned out by either 1) crap 2) political stances or 3) memes/things I didn't care about. Furthermore, I was missing the content from people I actually wanted to see because of the junk of others. Thus, one night I said, "no more" and went through each platform and stopped following people.

 Some people were easy to un-follow such as those I haven't talked to in years and had no intention of doing so. Others were more difficult. Yet, I kept asking myself one question throughout the process - "What value do they bring to me if I keep following them?" Again, everyone will have their own process for doing this but for me, I asked myself that one question. Some people who I maybe haven't talked to in awhile but invoked a positive feeling for me I kept following. You make me laugh or smile? I probably kept you. You challenge me to think differently by what you post? I kept you. The list goes on but you get the point. 

The result? I stopped following hundreds of people on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and I couldn't be happier. I'm seeing more content from people I want to see content from and I'm not being bombarded by crap. I find myself engaging more with the content I see and less time asking, "Why am I seeing this crap?" 

I realize some people may struggle with this kind of "detox" but I promise you it will make your social media experience better. On average, most studies state that we spend approximately 2 hours a day on social media platforms. Thus, if you want to get the most of those 2 hours, I'd invite you to do a Digital Friend Detox. Nervous of hurting someone's feelings? Don't be. If they are meant to be in your life or on your Facebook News Feed, your gut will tell you to keep them. Since my Digital Friend Detox, I haven't had one person ask me why I wasn't their friend anymore. Success! 

With that said, I encourage you to do a Digital Friend Detox. Your social media platforms will feel cleansed and I truly believe it will help your mental state.