I abandoned Facebook and Instagram for a month
When is the best time to try something new in your life? It’s now! But for me it happened to be precisely a month ago, at the beginning of a new year. I accomplished a dry January challenge without a single sip of my favourite Montepulciano d’Abruzzo wine. After many years of a pescatarian lifestyle, I decided to go full vegetarian. Arrivederci, seafood! Apart from these little changes, I did one more, much more meaningful thing.
Inspired by my girlfriend and motivated by the “Digital Minimalism” by Cal Newport, I decided to quit Facebook and Instagram for an entire month. Literally moment ago I re-visited these two social media platforms for the first time since the end of 2020 to see that I missed absolutely nothing! Fuck all!
I managed to gain a lot, though. The downtime that I use to spend for mindless scrolling social media portals, I replaced with time intensely focused on things that really matter. I had many long conversations with my family, read a few books and learned many new things. I reclaimed the patience to do the time-consuming things that require deep focus.
This month, no one struggled to get in touch with me, and I didn’t need social media to call my best friend. I didn’t need social media to send birthday wishes to Sally. I didn’t need social media to exchange some cool music recommendation with Michal. “I use it to contact my friends” was just a stupid excuse that I used for years to keep access to this brainwashing machines.
Bye bye Facebook and Instagram
Before I ditch Facebook and Instagram from my life for good, I will dedicate a little bit of time to fill the gaps in my contact list. In the meantime, I highly encourage you to give life a go without the social media brainwashers. For now, stay safe, and I will catch you later (not on Facebook or Instagram though) 👊
Nice one Mr Pawel. I took have ditched Instagram, been almost a month now !
Your thoughts encouraged me to do the same. Although I have diactivated my accounts on these two platforms in the past and I didn’t miss them. However after few months I reactivated my accounts promising myself to become a smarter user..... It’s been more than two years now i have been “using” them again or I have been being used by them. Anyways. Let’s quit one more time!