I’ve quit. Gone cold turkey. I’m doing without social media for the month of November. It won’t kill me but it should break the habit.
The modern world is designed to capture your attention using all the latest in research and the science of manipulation. Games are designed to reward you and challenge you just enough that you keep playing to get the reward. There is another reward you get outside the game and inside your brain. It is a hit of the pleasure drug dopamine. A natural occurring reward system in the brain that gives you a jolt of pleasure. It is not just limited to games but also to almost any modern visual. From TV shows to movies to one of the most addictive forms social media. Social Media is designed so that every interaction hooks you in a little more your brain starts to crave that hit of dopamine.
I was working on a project for a client and doing a bit of research and I noticed that I didn’t have my phone. The phone wasn’t needed to do the research and I didn’t need the internet. What I should have been doing was to concentrate on what I was reading but a part of my brain was searching for that hit. I noticed it at other times that my focus wasn’t as strong as it used to be on the task at hand. I started monitoring my behaviour at work and elsewhere and I noticed a need to check my News Feed in Facebook or my Twitter stream on Twitter or check Instagram and see this beautiful food by some chef’s I liked. Waiting in line, while at home, or waiting on an appointment I was on the internet. I stopped checking email frequently at work years ago and it seemed like checking the market or the news frequently replaced it. I was ignoring the advice I had given our clients over the years to not pay attention to the markets every day or even to watch the news so frequently. Social Media, News Media, and Apps had replaced email as my main distraction from my work and my family. Something needed to be done.
I can’t give up the internet as it has become essential to my job. I could give up Social Media for a month as an experiment. So that is what I have done. I will also be testing various website blockers and internet blockers at work to see what works best for me to limit distractions. In addition to deleting the Social Media apps from my phone I deleted another eight I wasn’t using. I moved only the essentials to the main screen and everything else is buried in folders on another screen. Anything I don’t use by the end of the month will be deleted from the iPhone.
Social Media companies give you tools and toys to play with. Make no mistake though you are their product and they sell the information they glean from your habits and likes to others. This month I issued a voluntary recall of the product till it can be improved.