Addicted to YouTube
"“I’ve got this,” we tell ourselves. But they’ve got us."
Hello fellow human,
I don’t want to write this because then it will be real.
It’s a lot easier living in this bubble of denial.
I keep kidding myself that if I ignore that sick feeling I have after binging back-to-back videos, one day the impulse will magically disappear. I’ll find the right ratio of watch time versus living in reality and won’t feel like I’ve wasted a day consuming content I can’t even remember.
But I know, from a lot of experience, that I am deluding myself - whether I set screen time limits or log myself out or use Chrome extensions to block certain parts of the website, YouTube always manages to suck me back in.
““I’ve got this,” we tell ourselves. But they’ve got us.” - Domingo Cullen
My turning point, or you could say rock-bottom, was last week. Over the course of the week I spent an entire day watching YouTube videos. I was already struggling with a bout of depression and, whilst it felt like opportune escape in the moment, afterwards I was a total wreck - first it’s the information and sensory overload that numbs me out, then the overwhelming guilt and confusion about day turning to night without me noticing.
My total watch time for the week? 13 hours. The graph below is from the week after, when I started to own up to the issue and thought to screen shot my ‘time watched’. Honestly, I expect I was spending a lot more time than 13 hours on YouTube when I was in the midst of autistic burnout. But for me now, at this stage in recovery, 13 hours is a lot - it’s a whole day of waking hours.1
But I didn’t stop there. I clearly really wanted to shock myself out of denial. I went through my ‘watched’ history.
It turns out I had gone through hundreds of videos that week. Some I could remember, most I could not. I cycled through content about autism, ADHD, self-development, deep-sea diving, dog training, van-life, boat-life, island-life, a LOT of personal vlogs in various world cities, and even more thought-pieces and social commentary videos.
Most of these I probably watched less than a third of before finding them too under-stimulating and clicking onto the next video that popped up. This is the irony of YouTube - I tell myself that it allows me access to my interests, but it actually traps me in a shallow cycle of content consumption that requires little thinking power and never gets me into the nitty gritty. Those hour-long documentaries I found on various creatives’ channels through time have been sat in my ‘to be watched’ playlist for months if not years because they’re simply too long and relatively slow and under-stimulating.
If I could keep this compulsive YouTube use in check, I would - because there are aspects of YouTube that I love. There are vloggers I watch who I find inspiring, a couple of dog-training channels I value for their awesome free advice, and the plethora of documentaries is truly awesome. As someone with ADHD, YouTube can be a fantastic source of connection to community, information, and body-doubling resources. But these examples are a drop in the vast sea of content that, however hard I resist, I frequently drown in.
“To be addicted is to be completely at the whim of your impulses. Tick. To realize you are no longer in control of your decisions. Tick. To be aware that the behaviors you are undergoing are harmful to you, tick, are making you unhappy, tick, and in spite of this, you are repeating them nonetheless. Tick.” - Domingo Cullen
My denial bubble has been burst.
If I carry on like this, I am certain I will waste many hours of my life consuming content I don’t actually care about.
And that’s not what I want.
I feel as though I am reliving the same process of realisation I had with Instagram and TikTok. Since quitting both of these three months ago as part of a six month digital detox experiment I haven’t looked back once. I know that sounds flippant, and maybe even a little unbelievable (?!) - I wouldn’t have believed you if you’d told me this three months ago. But I can confidently say, unless I purposefully sit down and think about all the things I’m ‘missing out on’ on social media, I don’t think about or yearn for the apps in day-to-day life2.
I shared my initial insights from this digital detox, and I guess I’m returning to you with another confession…
That is, I wonder if I knew when I was setting the boundaries of this six month digital detox (the process of which I discuss in detail in these essays) that I was kidding myself that the rules need not apply to YouTube? I told myself that because I only consume long-form content on YouTube, it doesn’t pose the same issues as short-form social media like Instagram and TikTok. But was I lying to myself?
Granting myself the benefit of the doubt, maybe I genuinely didn’t realise at the time but with distance from short-form content it’s like the addiction has shifted. When I was using Instagram and TikTok regularly, YouTube wasn’t so appealing to me. But not having access to any other short-form content meant I quickly filled the void with YouTube videos.
It’s worth clarifying here that I have never fallen into the hell hole that are YouTube shorts. I feel short-form content is better done by TikTok and Instagram, so it never occurred to me to get lost in YouTube shorts. Plus I had a blocker called Unhook that allowed me to hide shorts and recommendations from my homepage.
Yesterday I received the following comment on one of my YouTube videos about how the internet is built to make us angry.
They’re not wrong. But the last bit stung.
Mainly because, well, ADHD = discipline’s worst nightmare.
I can’t tell you the number of methods, plans, strategies, and life hacks I have tried to develop more discipline. In my experience, it is complicated - especially for those of us who struggle with ADHD, but probably for most of us regardless of neurotype when it comes to social media!
Clearly this commenter was projecting, but it’s actually a really important point I want to address.
I take responsibility for myself and my actions, knowing my limitations, and striving to do my best - part of this is reflecting on what actively negatively impacts my ability for self-discipline and control. One of those things, as I mentioned, is the fact I am neurodivergent. Another, I would argue, is social media of any variety - whether short-form, long-form, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, YouTube, or Substack.
But once I have spent my time and energy on trying to minimise my use of social media and it hasn’t worked despite my best efforts and I’m still getting sucked into the vortex, I am unwilling to beat myself up for it. Because it’s not as simple as me choosing to use social media or not. What about the responsibility of the tech corporations who pump millions of dollars into working out how to make social media as irresistible as possible?
These platforms are built to capture our attention and the methods they use to do it use psychology to encourage the user to engage in behaviours that reinforce their use of the product. Over time, their aim is to make it as difficult as possible for people to choose, with ‘discipline and control’, to stop spending their attention on these platforms.
To say that it is as simple as having some self-discipline and control is letting large social media corporations and government regulating such corporations off the hook. I don’t mean to be dramatic, but it’s a little like the focus on guilting individual consumers about the climate crisis without enough focus on the role of multi-national companies.
That is why I feel I have to give YouTube up completely. I don’t feel I have another option. I can’t have my cake and eat it. I know that if I keep a few toes in the content pool soon enough I’ll be fully submerged again. I’ve tried the middle ground where I limit time or exposure. It doesn’t work for me. I need to go cold turkey, just like with Instagram and TikTok.
I have been feeling dread about this decision to stop consuming YouTube videos for a few weeks now.
But in writing this letter to you I have logged out, blocked YouTube on my browser and smart phone, and made a promise to myself to make an honest go of not using YouTube for the rest of this digital detox experiment.
What if a friend sends me a YouTube video to watch? And, what if I need to look up how to do something? These are my main, and only, concerns really. It’s funny how when you boil it down so much of what I thought I needed from YouTube was dispensable noise and distraction.
What about you? What’s your relationship to YouTube? What do you use it for? Do you set parameters around your use? Are you addicted like me?
Thank you so much for reading and extra love to my paid subbies who (literally) help me to keep writing and creating and sharing.
Sending you much love,
Charlie xoxo
P.s. if you enjoyed this letter you might also like:
If your screen time is higher, resist the urge to compare and berate yourself - it’s not a moral competition. ♡
Read 3 insights from week one of my social media detox and 25 learnings: life after short-form social media for more reflections on this.
You know what's wild? I've *almost* given YouTube up after figuring out it was hacking my focus - I still fall into the trap sometimes, I'm getting better at closing the browser - but, the last few days I've found myself on Facebook Marketplace instead, browsing local for sale listings I just don't need, a LOT. I'm starting to get suspicious of anything with a screen in my life!! It's all just too easy. When I'm overstimulated, it seems like a chance to block out the world. When I'm understimulated, it seems like a shiny distraction to pump up my brain. Meanwhile the things my brain actually needs are out here in the real world, like in your illustration, which I love. But I've started to get angry about all of this and am to the point where I'll pull the literal plug on almost anything that's sapping the vitality out of my life. I'm wondering now whether I need to put more guardrails in place around my computer usage; I thought I was okay since it's not a phone, but the simple fact that it isn't as portable is not enough to stop me making the same mistakes with it.
Courage, friends. We're in this together and we can get out of it, together. I'm so encouraged to see discussions around these issues and thank you, Charlie, for sparking this conversation!
I hear you loud & clear this came at the right time, I'm off "social media 8 months (Facebook, Instagram) were the 2 I was on as the wks & months past I felt my addiction veered elsewhere (youtube, reddit,Google, medium, substack, netflix😔) I made excuses that it's not as bad as" social media" but I felt nothing but anxiety & depression creeping in, I realised this wk it's not a social media addiction it's a (smart) phone addiction, I feel lost & like you I need to do something before I sink to the techno grasp over my life especially with my obsessive personality trait I need creative art again which I had a big passion for before the smart phone was not so smart 🙈 thank you Charlie your content on youtube has honestly been a balm to my soul if only I stopped there before the endless videos took over my mind, we've got to do what's best for us, as a mum I need to come fully away from my smart phone & figure stuff out "the hard way" aka the right way.... Before life gets away from us, bless you Charlie ❤️