Building Healthy Habits. I Gave Up Facebook

As part of my reflections on my recent sabbatical was to create healthy habits.

I decided to give up Facebook.

I am now at the 90-day mark of stripping Facebook (FB) out of my daily life and guess what? I miss nothing.  Life is less cluttered; I am less distracted by my phone and endless amounts of information. I have a renewed focus on learning new things and quality time with others.

We all know how Facebook and other social media outlets display fictional realities of our lives – our perfect families, our perfect food (is that even a thing?) or our perfect relationships. My intent is not to question or challenge anyone, just creating an intentional pause for each of you to think about your daily choices with social media. Technology is one of the great flatteners in our world today. That includes social media and our desire to stay connected.  The question I would ask to our readers is – as you are each choosing to spend time on social media, what is the personal value of social media to you? What benefits does social media bring to you besides a quick dose of dopamine?

Moving from Facebook Life To My Own Life

In an instant, gone were 000’s of friends, connections, photos and the fear of missing out. Instead of ending my day with endless scrolling, I have shifted my time to more time with family, conversations and most importantly learning new things.  I spend more time reading books and articles, spend less time online (about 20% less) and also, I am less ‘informed’. This is not about what others are doing (or a fictional view of what they are doing) but also about being less politically polarized. I feel an improved sense of well-being which is anchored by my health (including mental health), safety and happiness. All are up!

My Reality

Outside of my family and close friends, previously, I lived in a world of Facebook friend connections, that provided me with a feeling of popularity, social acceptance and what become to competing and keeping up with the ‘digital’ jones.  It became endless updates, photos & posts to create social relevance with my 000’s of friends around the world.  The reality is that I don’t have 000’s of real friends and that I am much happier investing the people close to me. I am much happier investing in those friends that are important to me. It also made me be a better friend. Gone was the day of a ‘like’ or ‘post’ as proxy for a relationship. Today, I pick up the phone, text or email/message them to better understand how they really are.

Building Healthy Habits For My Kids

The other benefit is role modeling for my kids. I am teaching our kids about developing deeper relationships. There are countless articles on the effects of social media. In our household I have quickly realized that kids (our kids) struggle with having relationships that requires face to face interaction.  A recent report (via MediaKix) shows that nearly have of Generation Z spends 10 hours each day on a smart phone and over 90% of this demographic has a smartphone.

In our household, given their digital world, they struggle with phone conversations and face to face confrontation.  The reality is they have grown up in a digital world of ghosting. Ghosting is a proxy for fear, avoiding conflict that with little consequences while protecting their own self-care.  Although this may be the new norm, we expect better as parents. More importantly any amount of socializing is far more fruitful than additional device time.

While I work for one of the largest technology companies in the world. That doesn’t mean I have to digitize my relationships. It doesn’t mean I need to lose my sense of reality. A core part of my purpose is grounded in healthy relationships and my family.  And while I still send personal Christmas cards each year and write hand written notes to my wife this is one more way I choose to live in my analog world. My analog world involves having a conversation face to face vs behind a computer.

It was one of the best decisions I have ever made.

Remember that life is a game never won or lost, only played.