Confessions of a Social Mediaholic

When I decided to give up social media for the month, Facebook Messenger is the one thing that I allowed myself to keep. I told myself I was going to allow myself the program so that I could be in touch with the foreign friends that I talked to via Facebook and would otherwise miss.

The truth is that the people I chatted with most are U.S. friends who I could have texted and,

(Confession one) in actuality, I used the program because it allowed me to see when people had read my messages.

One would think that a read receipt could be helpful when sending messages we think are important. But that’s the issue—we should not be sending messages that are important over a social media website’s messenger (or over text, for that matter).

A typed, digital message serves as a mask. No tone can be heard, no face seen to display any emotion. It blocks unfiltered clues as to how a message is received, and therefore is a safe arena to say things we would possibly not have the gall to say in person, or even vocally over a phone call.

When I give up Facebook or social media again in the future, I will not allow myself this vice. Instead, I will strive to be honest and open in one-on-one communication with friends, and will try to communicate by phone call and in-person communication rather than via text.

(Confession two) I am a Facebook “stalker”.

At a particular time of month, I do this more often. It is presently that time, and I am without my little pacifier.

Honestly, Facebook is a tool of self-comparison.

A friend I have had for 23 years surprised me one day with a candid confession. She told me that she compared herself to others on Facebook all the time, and often became aggravated or unhappy doing so. This friend (more like a sister) is someone who I admire greatly and someone I see as one of the most confident, independent, and balanced women that I know. Yet she was telling me that Facebook was a source of insecurity for her to a small degree.

This all makes sense considering that according to a Washington Post article, "Your Facebook friends have more friends than you", “for every status update any given user makes, they contribute about four comments or likes”. Realizing that on average we do more watching than sharing, this data seems to support the use of Facebook as a tool used fairly commonly for social comparison.

The same article states that the average Facebook-er has 245 friends, and that the average Facebook-er’s friend has 359 pals. What this statistic represents is that we view popularity as something that is important. We are more likely to be friends with someone the more popular they are, which suggests that we seek approval and inclusion from Facebook.

I realized that this is perhaps a contributing factor to my number of i-shoulds (you know, you see your peers reaching milestones and think “I should be doing that, now”).

But before social media, we used to have smaller numbers of buddies. We might have had a group of twenty we associated with, and perhaps a handful we were lucky enough to call close friends. That small group of twenty peers was our group of comparison. Now, we have 245 people to compare ourselves to. Or maybe 359. The social pressure to have more (friends, success, adventure, normalcy) is larger, but then so is the reward we reap in the moments we are on top, and have done something we feel proud of.

When that tool of comparison is denied, the immediate pacification in hard times, for me, is gone. So in this weak moment when I want so badly to validate myself by comparing myself to others since I have me here a good case of the girlie blues, I really miss Facebook.

I would rather hide in a bright white and muted blue screen looking into the lives of others than get lost in my own head right now.

(Confession three) Giving up social media is not easy. It is hard.

This is my third round in doing this. To be extremely honest, the usual push for disappearing from the scene is related to confession number two: I begin comparing myself to others so much that it’s time to step back, reflect, and go inward.

This time is no different, except that I deleted every single social networking app. from my phone, which adds a new level of feeling restricted to the whole experience.

At the moment this is being written, I am thinking that this has been the most difficult attempt at giving the beloved website up. My fingers are tapping my phone screen where the little icons for Twitter and Facebook used to be.

I want to check in at my friend’s new restaurant, Carreras, and share the photos of their cemitas that I am so enthusiastic about; I want to leave reviews on their page; I want to spy on people; I want to post poignant song lyrics, and selfies!

At the same time, I’m thinking I want to extend the period of time that I am not involved with social media, because…

(Confession four) I know exactly the things I want to do as soon as I get back on (spy, overshare), and that…

I am a Social-Mediaholic.