Written by : Giada Combusti
On the 4th of May 2018 I left instagram and Facebook and since then I never got back.
I thought I couldn’t live without it, but I did.
I lived, and since then, to be more precise, I lived in a more profound and meaningful way.
My mind was over loaded with thoughts that shouldn’t have been there.
I knew it wasn’t right to think about the argument I had with that stranger ( that I will probably never meet )
I knew that having my mind constantly fed with random stuff wasn’t right and most importantly I knew well, I was addicted to those platforms, I would check my phone often, too often and I had the urge to keep update my status, I knew I wasn’t getting anything good from it but stress and constant distraction from my present life, I knew it was time to live.
This process hasn’t been straight forwards as I thought it would be. I took me months, before I was ready, I was concerned on how I would keep in touch with those far away from me but at the same time I was starting to be aware on how social media was keeping me away from my present life and the people around me. Now it is as clear as water.
Do you want to be more present ? Leave social media.
Do you want to read more ? Leave social media.
Do you want to be more creative? Leave social media.
Do you want to have a life with less stress? Leave social media.
Do you want to have less worry ? Leave social media.
Do you want to have more free time ? Leave social media.
Do you want to have more time to dedicate to your dears one? Leave social media.
Do you want to find yourself? Leave social media and the list goes on and on.
Most people; don’t realise how addicted they are to social media, so many hours looking at a tiny little screen, while walking, eating, driving and probably WHILE talking with others, ( which I find extremely disrespectful ) perhaps your own kids and family members, how sad is that? Look at these pictures: https://www.removed.social/united-states can they resonate with you? How do they make you feel? Americans spend more than 10 hours in front of their screen as this article says: https://www.apa.org/monitor/2020/04/nurtured-nature
On average people spend way over two hours of their time on social media every single day and as this is not bad enough, the statistic shows the number is increasing https://www.statista.com/statistics/433871/daily-social-media-usage-worldwide/
We are on this planet to do more than constantly checking our social media feeds, do you agree with that? If so, this article is definitely for you.
A STEP TOWARDS FREEDOM
When I left at first I had a sense of discomfort I was feeling something was missing, I felt lost, empty and scared of my deepest side of myself; I had the thought of wanting to check but I resisted and sooner than expected I was over it but the most astonishing thing was that all of a sudden I FELT FREE.
I urgently encourage people to check out on themselves.
How many hours are on your weekly screen time?
How long can you stay without your phone?
Can you picture your life without social media?
How do those questions make you feel?
Take an action upon it. I don’t need social media to live my life and neither do you.
Removing my social media apps had a surprising impact on my mental health and actually general well being.
BENEFITS OF A LIFE WITHOUT SOCIAL MEDIA
HOW MY LIFE CHANGED
- Feeling more present and aware of my surrounding
That’s right, I have learned to see the world with different eyes, no more through the eyes of others but mine, I feel I’M HERE, I’m in the now. Many people are preaching about living in the present to feel content, to feel good and within yourself you know that too, the only thing that we have is this very moment is our present life; however very few people take the step to move towards it. Perhaps it is scary to deep dive inside ourselves but as far as I understood that’s the way to understand who we are and where we should move too.
Being fully present is necessary to get on the right path.
Our phone can’t help us to be present, it can actually make us feel anxious, stressed, incompetent, loser, incomplete and it built a strong sense of fear towards others. I believe those things dehumanise us.
- relationship with others will grow
Although I built the habit of not using my phone in front of people ever before, the moment I left social media, I have consciously made a decision to be more social, for real. Instead of texting people, I either call them or if I have to say something nice I wait to see them next and trust me this is so amazing, seeing the faces of people smiling when you say something nice. Also, I would say I am more friendly than I used to be, I built skills on to make new friends wherever I go and most importantly, whenever I hang around with friends and family I make extra effort to talk and listen and it is truly enjoyable to do so, and to be quite honest if I don’t have a conversation in real life I don’t have any social platform to back up my needs to talk and listen. LOL
We all are Human and we have built inside ourselves the need to communicate with others, I prefer to do it in real life and not behind electronic devices.
- Sleep will improve
In our home, we have the general rule not to bring our phones into the bedroom and nevertheless, we are allowed to use them while in bed and this affected our sleep too.
No more checking one last time FB or IG ( and keep on scrolling endlessly till you realised you wasted hours looking at funny videos )
No more disturbing flashing lights
No more “ I wish I was there” and blah blah blah
- creativity will improve
This is so important for me.
I always looked up to people who had a passion, who had something that kept them awake at night that make them forget about the world around them.
I ALWAYS wanted to find “ my thing” and only when I left the main distraction ( social media ) from my life I have found mine; overall this is one of the most important aspects of my life.
My passions are my Peaceful Space, where I feel secure and in full control. Now instead of scrolling down to endless feeds on IG and FB I just pick up my sketchbook and I draw, I get my camera and I shoot, I get a pen and I write. I feel extremely grateful that I allowed myself to discover the real things that make me feel grounded, content, satisfied and complete!
If I had to choose one thing that makes me revalue my life since I’m OFFLINE would definitely be this.
- Focus skills will improve
I feel more focused when I do things, I don’t have the urge to check out the online world because I am fully immersed in my present. I have been reading more books and articles because of this, and this all thing went beyond my imagination. I literally immerse myself in whatever I read because that’s the only thing I am doing in that moment (!!) and especially when I read books, I have to stop because my eyes hurt. Everything is a full HD experience! LOL
- Fewer distractions
I know the world is packed with problems and those problems are not there only because people are glued to social media, we know that; but we must start somewhere and I think the main and the most important thing we can do is to work on ourselves, trying every day to be the better version of ourselves, try to find solutions, create new opportunities, build a better sense of who we are and this will definitely allow us to be a better human and therefore a better citizen of this world to do more good stuff for us and most importantly for others.
Distractions are just not the best way to get to where you are meant to be, because they won’t allow you to see. Less distraction = more freedom.
- No more comparison thinking
Social media grow into something where people most of the time share their successes, their best selfies and the nicest thing that happened during the day and unconsciously we tend to compare ourselves with their lives and this sooner or later will make us feel depressed, inferior and miserable because EVERYONE else got it right but me. This is so unhealthy, why keep it in our lives ? ! I’m done with that, the only person I compare to myself is the self I was yesterday.
- a sense of freedom will embrace you
This is something I kind of found difficult to express at first, as I was starting to feel free. Someone could easily say, were you not free before? The answer is no. I had my mind locked into a small tiny world limited to my perception of infinite numbers of lives held on my hand on the screen on my phone, now everything is happening through my head and I feel my soul is flourishing. I have plenty of space in my mind to think, rethink and act upon MY VISION, my values and my beliefs.
I mean life really got to another level and I believe is essential to remove ourselves from social media or at least to have long good periods of detoxification to discover ourselves.
HOW TO LIVE A LIFE WITHOUT SOCIAL MEDIA
After checking :
– how many hours are you on your phone
- how is your mental health, do you feel strong? Balanced? Connected? Or do you feel depressed, lost and hopeless?
- how many times during the day do you find yourself with your phone scrolling – scrolling and scrolling
- how are your relationships affected, do you use your phone while talking with others?
- How are your sleep patterns. Do you sleep well?
- how your thoughts are in general about this subject
You can slowly start to detach from your phone and keep a journal to reframe how your thoughts change. Either first thing in the morning or last thing of the day write something about how are you feeling in relation to your phone and how your mind is affected.
Switch off the notifications, keep your phone away from you, and set a time ( that you must respect ) of 30 minutes on social media a day. Try for a week and see how you feel. After that try a 30-day challenge offline and see how you feel. I guarantee you, that you will be astonished on how life will feel and LOOK different. The thing is you don’t need to be on social media, you don’t have to share every bit of your life on social media!
Recently I stopped using WhatsApp and I still find it difficult to express how GREAT I feel about not wanting to check, check and check. I feel as FREE as I ever felt before and I am extremely grateful for this.
TRY IT OUT and tell us how it goes, here in the comment section!!!!
I hope this article will help someone to try a new way to have a more meaningful life.
With sincere Love
Giada
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