3 insights from week 1 of my social media detox

(with a 73k+ cross-platform following)

Dear fellow human,

There was a time when social media didn’t play a big role in my life. I was so busy with work (another problem in and of itself) that I barely posted on my private Instagram account, let alone on public accounts across multiple platforms. That version of me would have been shocked to find that in years to come I would amass 73,000+ followers across platforms. She would also be surprised to hear that I would ultimately decide to take a 6-month break (and, depending on the findings of that experiment, possibly leave social media for good).

When I started creating content I was responding to the urge to create, express myself, and connect with likeminded people on a similar journey. I had spent years de-prioritising these things, and social media was a useful tool to explore them again. I had fun testing out different types of content, getting creative with storytelling, and talking at length with the people who would find me through my posts. Without wishing to sound too cliche, it played a roll in my re-discovering who I am outside of work and life commitments.

After a couple of viral videos on Instagram and TikTok my following started to increase rapidly. In the space of a couple of months I went from posting content to a couple of hundred people to sharing my world with tens of thousands. I started to get approached by agents who wanted to represent me, companies who wanted to work with me, and people who wanted to collaborate with me.

For so many people, this is the dream. I thought maybe it could be my dream too. I wondered what I could make of this, what the opportunities could afford me, and how validated I could feel in the process. Except, in practice, I rarely called agents back, accepted opportunities with companies, or collaborated with fellow creators. If this was the dream, what was holding me back?

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Initially, I thought it was just because I was still coming out of burnout. But I realised over the last few weeks that, burnout or not, social media gives me “the ick”. Through therapy I’ve been learning to feel my feelings and read my body’s signals. In the process, I’ve been tuning in to how the habits I have developed over time make me feel. One of these habits is social media. And, to be blunt, I’ve discovered that it makes me feel like a nervous wreck! Even so, I have tried for months to persuade myself that I am just being “over-sensitive” (a classic shitty committee phrase), that I couldn’t possibly walk away from something like this, and that if I just adapted my way of ‘being’ online I would eventually find the recipe that felt sustainable.

But every attempt at re-thinking my use of social media led me back to the same ending: feeling the ick. I describe the icky feeling I get after going on social media like the very early stages of getting the flu. When you’re feeling irritable but you’re not sure why, you feel a bit queasy, and your whole body is tense. Yep, that’ll be the anxiety! I had thought that scrolling on social media was a way to ‘tune out’, but in fact when I really paid attention to how it made me feel I saw that it made me ‘tune in’ to so much information all at once that it made me more anxious, self-critical, and obsessive than usual. Ick.

But boy-oh-boy was I persuasive. Every time I resolved to make a change and decide how to limit my social media usage, I found a reason to resume full-time usage. I set time limits, I blocked apps, I restricted comments. At one point I was logging on in the afternoon, posting my content, strategically answering a few comments, and then immediately logging off. That worked the best out of all of my strategies, for a few weeks at least. Until the habit crept back in and one evening I ‘woke up’ to find myself in the same position on the sofa 2 hours later scrolling, scrolling, scrolling.

I had noticed how bad social media was making me feel but every time I tried to change my habits, I failed. I decided that the only way I would be able to steer clear of social media was if I made a strict rule for myself and planned how I would stick to it.

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The rule: no creating content for or consuming content on social media (Instagram and TikTok) for 6 months.

The plan: remove the social media apps from my phone and have my husband add a passcode that I do not know to the Play Store app so I can’t re-download them, and block the social media websites on my other devices.

At this point, I hadn’t read Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport but it just so happens I accidentally aligned myself with his approach to digital minimalism. He says:

“…as is becoming increasingly clear to those who have attempted… minor corrections, willpower, tips, and vague resolutions are not sufficient by themselves to tame the ability of new technologies to invade your cognitive landscape - the addictiveness of their design and the strength of the cultural pressures supporting them are too strong for an ad hoc approach to succeed… I’ve become convinced that what you need instead is a full-fledged philosophy of technology use rooted in your deep values, that provides clear answers to the questions of what tools you should use and how you should use them and, equally important, enables you to confidently ignore everything else.”

This paragraph opened my eyes to the importance of setting rules and plans based on and from my values. I can’t say I’ve been too familiar with my values up until now. I’m starting to I see that for me having the time to have a rich, creative, and grounded life offline is of immense importance. The little voice in my head instilling fear in me about ‘what could be’ if I carried on trying to build a following online suddenly sounded so weak in this context. Why would I choose to prioritise something that directly opposes my values?

I thought ahead five years and asked myself: if I am still showing up in the same way as I am now on social media but I am also benefitting from the potential opportunities I see on the horizon would I have the rich, creative, and grounded life offline that I want? The answer, for me, is clearly no. The potential benefits (that aren’t even guaranteed) do not outweigh the costs, the costs being “…the amount of what I [Henry David Thoreau] will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run”.

It hit me that (i) I see no value in running in the direction of shiny things just because they seem impressive if the cost of those shiny things is not actually worth it when I envisage my actual life, and (ii) to remove myself from social media I needed to break the habit.

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Cue the experiment. One week in, I am already feeling more centred and grounded without exposure to social media. For the first few days I found myself grabbing my phone and only realising what I was doing when I couldn’t find the Instagram app. Spooky, but predictable. But after the first few days my brain started to cotton on. My phone would go untouched for an entire day, quite easily, without a second thought. Not only did my screen time decrease dramatically (we’re talking cut in half, at least), but I also increased the amount of time I was spending on other hobbies that were intentional and fulfilling. Somewhat surprisingly, it’s been easy this time around (at least, so far).

For me, a key part of this success has been shifting my perspective in three ways. First, by focusing on creating a “full-fledged philosophy of technology” as Cal recommends and I’ve discussed above.

Second, by consciously thinking about how to replace the time I was spending on social media. It so happens that this time around I am on the journey to creating that rich, creative, and grounded offline life that I dream of; unlike historic attempts I already have other things I know I want to do. I journal, I read, I make art, I research, I walk, I swim. When I have the opportunity to engage with these activities free of distraction they are hugely satisfying. The guilt and shame I felt when I would let social media get in the way of these more intentional activities is gone, and it’s a relief.

Third, I quit shaming myself for struggling to control myself around social media. It was not me letting social media get in the way. It is not because I’m lazy that I habitualised using social media. As Cal Newport succinctly says:

“… these technologies are in many cases specifically designed to trigger this addictive behaviour. Compulsive use… is not the result of a character flaw, but instead the realisation of a massively profitable business plan”.

Tristan Harris, a former start-up founder and Google engineer who is one of the few whistleblowers in the tech industry said:

“There’s always this narrative that technology’s neutral. And it’s up to us to choose how we use it. This is just not true - it’s not neutral. They want you to use it in particular ways for long periods of time. Because that’s how they make their money”.

Educating myself about how social media is built to keep me hooked has helped me get angry at the right people - tech companies, not myself.

I wasn’t naive to what the likes of Facebook were doing before. But reading in depth about it in black and white made me realise that however hard I try to change my habits around social media I am more likely than not to relapse unless I make a value-driven change. My addiction to social media was so strong that it eclipsed everything else regardless of the tips and tricks I tried to employ to limit my exposure.

I knew the only option I had left was to experiment and see what life is like entirely without it.

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I don’t use the word ‘addiction’¹ lightly. Having a social media addiction seems to be something people talk about a lot, often in a flippant way. I don’t tend to see other behavioural addictions like gambling or porn addiction discussed so casually. I wonder if this will change over time as behavioural addictions, like social media addiction, become ‘medicalised’. After all, it was only in 2013 that behavioural addictions were included as a condition in the fifth edition of the Diagnostic Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) by the American Psychiatric Association. Is it a coincidence that behaviour addictions like social media, porn, and gambling addictions have proliferated and been medicalised during a timespan that has seen the boom of the internet and access to technology? I, personally, don’t think so.

Cal Newport researches how tech companies encourage behavioural addiction after previous research by Adam Alter concluded that “new technologies are particularly well suited to foster behavioural addictions” and that “in many cases these addictive properties of new technologies are not accidents, but instead carefully engineered design features”. Cal’s research examines how tech companies do this through intermittent positive reinforcement and the drive for social approval. He writes:

‘Our brains are highly susceptible to these forces. This matters because many of the apps and sites that keep people compulsively checking their smartphones and opening browser tabs often leverage these hooks to make themselves nearly impossible to resist.”²

It’s clear to me that I am addicted. So, this 6-month experiment is my way of seeing what life is like without a social media addiction.

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Before closing this essay I want to make it crystal clear that this is just where I am at with social media at this juncture in my life. I have used social media a lot over the last year. Over the next six months I am choosing not to. And my values may well change again in the future. Your timeline and values may be entirely different. And that’s okay.

I am also no longer fighting to get out of the pits of burnout, so I have the energy to make these changes (and it certainly helps that it’s a current hyperfocus of mine!). When I was stuck in bed, and in my house, for months on end I barely had the energy or mental capacity to get through the day let alone reflect on and consider the depths of my relationship with social media and technology. At that time, my values around social media were different. It felt like a lifeline to me during a period of intense isolation. It connected me to a community of people who were going through the same thing, but couldn’t physically meet up in person. It connected you and I! I wouldn’t change that. The benefits outweighed the costs at that time. What I mean to say is, our timelines and values may change over time. And that’s okay too.

So I guess we will find out: will I, or won’t I go back to social media? I’ll let you know in six months!

Sending you my love,

Charlie

1. Les Agendas De L’Annee - I am shifting away from my Hobinichi Weeks in 2024 and have opted for this planner instead. It will house my daily habit tracking, monthly and weekly planning, and to-do lists. It’s A6 and slim enough to carry around in my bag. It has the bare minimum of what I need: a monthly overview and a weekly overview - no distractions or pressure to fill tonnes of pages, perfect! The paper is thick and soft, and it comes with a protective plastic cover that includes a pocket at the back into which I slip my Fieldnotes pocket notebook for jotting down thoughts and ideas throughout the day. So far, I’m very happy with the move.

2. Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport - I’ve been inhaling Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport. Stay tuned for a separate post on my main takeaways from this book, but so far one of my favourite quotes in the book is from Andrew Sullivan: “I used to be a human being.”

3. Habit tracker - I made this habit tracker to stick into the weekly spread of my Les Agendas De L’Annee 2024. It’s a relatively new practice for me, but is already helping me in a couple of ways. First, it does the obvious - it helps me keep track of my habits which help me with self-care. But, perhaps less obviously, it is also helping me understand how I am feeling. If I’m feeling ‘off’ but I’m not sure quite how or why, I look at my habit tracker and see which habits I might have missed the preceding days. You can download a copy of this habit tracker for your journal from footnote 1 of this post.

1. Maestro - I watch anything that Carey Mulligan stars in. It really is as simple as that. I think she is a wonderful actor. But I admit that when Andrew and I were buying our snacks for this showing, I wasn’t thrilled by the prospect of the story. Maestro is “a towering and fearless love story chronicling the lifelong relationship between Leonard Bernstein and Felicia Montealegre Cohn Bernstein. A love letter to life and art, Maestro at its core is an emotionally epic portrayal of family and love.” I suspect because I have only recently seen Tar, the idea of another intense movie about a fiercely creative and dedicated composer seemed rather draining. But I am so glad I honoured my love of Carey because I left feeling so inspired by Maestro. It made me think about love, partnership, loss, and what it is to be a creative human.

2. All The Little Bird Hearts by Viktoria Lloyd Barlow - After therapy a few weeks ago I popped into Waterstones on Piccadilly in central London. Out of the thousands of books in that shop, I picked up this one. What are the chances that the main character, Sunday Forrester, is autistic? “Sunday Forrester lives with her sixteen-year-old daughter, Dolly, in the house she grew up in. She does things more carefully than most people. On quiet days, she must eat only white foods. Her etiquette handbook guides her through confusing social situations, and to escape, she turns to her treasury of Sicilian folklore. The one thing very much out of her control is Dolly – her clever, headstrong daughter, now on the cusp of leaving home.” This is the first fiction book I’ve read with an autistic main character and has opened my eyes to a new way of consuming autism-related media in my life other than specialised non-fiction books.

3. No Spectacle on Monday Monday by

   Marlee Grace
   - A beautiful read reminding me of what I so frequently lose sight of (albeit, in my case it is not God who plays this role): “What oftentimes comes out of a season of thinking I know is a season of not knowing. As soon as I hit a tipping point of being so sure of myself, god will bring me a new person or set of ideas that will bring everything crashing to a halt. It isn’t to say what I thought before is no longer true, if anything it invites in two truths to exist simultaneously.”

‘She Let Go’ by Safire Rose - a poem I came across in this beautiful video made by Reflections Of Life

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P.s. I was inspired to make the media assets in this post by

Leslie Stephens

and her wonderful Substack Morning Person.

1. Addiction is defined by Cal Newport in Digital Minimalism as: “Addiction is a condition in which a person engaged in use of a substance or in a behaviour for which the rewarding effects provide a compelling incentive to repeatedly pursue the behaviour despite detrimental consequences.”

2. I want to go into this in more detail in a subsequent essay so stay tuned.