Social Media

A week ago Sunday I was working the golf tournament for an Ambassadors event. A group of us were sitting at the table together eating lunch, all on our phones. We weren't really paying attention to each other and were all in our own world through our phones. My friend Greg pointed this out and it started a large conversation about social media and how it affects our lives. So many times in our lives, we miss out on the little things and the opportunity to know the people we are surrounded with because we are so caught up in this alternate reality.

After continued discussion on the topic, it began to get personal as we talked about my habits with social media, especially Twitter. I realized how addicted I’ve been and how much it has been affecting my life. I am on it all the time and constantly tweet the latest thing that has happened in my life. It’s to the point where the President of my University calls me out on my tweets all the time. That day he even made a comment to me about how he liked my new avi picture. We talked more and it was brought up that no one thought I could go 24 hours without getting on any form of social media.

As soon as this was said, I immediately knew this was going to be my next challenge. I’m currently going without caffeinated beverages, so I figured why not try to give up something else that I’m addicted to. I knew 24 hours would be no big deal so I wanted to challenge myself even more. Greg and I talked and we ended up making a bet as to who could go longer, me without social media or him without coffee.

So it was set that at noon, I was going to give up all forms of social media. This included Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, Vine, Messenger, and anything else that related to this. I decided to go ahead and just delete the apps off my phone so I wasn’t tempted any more than I already was. We all had a moment where everyone watched me delete the apps and it was quite intense. I definitely felt my heart rate go up and I got all flustered. It was my first step to get over my addiction. This may sound silly, but it was a hard thing to do.

That afternoon, I was out on the golf course for a few hours and found myself wanting to check Twitter or Facebook. Luckily I had things to keep myself busy throughout the day so it wasn’t too bad. That night, however, was the first time that it got really rough. At one point, I subconsciously picked up my phone, swiped my password, and clicked where Twitter should have been. That was when it really hit me how bad everything was. It was just something I did without even thinking about it.

The next day things got better because I had classes to keep me busy, but I definitely made a lot of realizations. One thing that I noticed was when I was waiting on a friend I didn’t really know what to do. Normally, I would be on my phone just reading through Twitter or Facebook, but since I didn’t have that I had to find something else to do. Sitting in the Union, you actually can keep busy. I had a couple friends walk by so I talked to them. Had I been on my phone and not paying attention to those around me, I probably wouldn’t have been able to catch up with those couple of people.

That night, we had an ice cream social with President and Karen Shonrock for Ambassadors. When President saw me, he asked how I was handling without tweeting and if my hands were shaking and going through withdrawals. I joke all the time with President about Twitter and he can’t help but give me a hard time when it comes to my tweeting habits. Because yes, they are pretty bad.

The rest of the week wasn’t too bad. Once I got through that first 48 hours and kept busy, it seemed to not be as bad. One thing that I found really funny was how after just those first days, Twitter and Facebook decided to start sending me emails to come back. I got an email that said “Rachel Marshall has updated her status.” It then had a button where I could click on to see the status update and comment or like it. I found this rather funny because one, I wasn’t tagged in the status or anything, and two, how did it choose my roommate of all people to send me an email about her status update.

Later in the week, Facebook started sending me emails that said I had 2 messages, 1 group invite, 2 photo tags, and my other notifications. It was as if they knew I hadn’t been signed in for a while and wanted me to come back. It definitely was a temptation but I was determined to go the whole time without getting onto social media.

Over this whole week of no social media, I learned quite a few things about myself and about social media and its use in society today. I noticed I was telling the people around me about things that were happening instead of tweeting it to the people of the internet. I was able to actually tell a story to my roommates or friends and they not already know it because I had tweeted the same thing earlier in the day. A lot of times I go to tell them a story and it’s the second time they’ve heard about it and the story loses its value. This is something that I will work on with not always tweeting every single little thing.

Something else that I really thought about with social media is how people are on it and not with the people they are physically with. If you’re going to go to dinner with friends or family, then be with the people you’re with. Talk to them, ask about their day, find out something new. It actually is a lot of fun talking to people in person as opposed to through a phone or computer all the time. Something that I need to start doing more often while out to eat is the phone game, where everyone puts their phones in the middle of the table and keeps off of them the whole time. This will just challenge us all to actually pay attention to the people we are with.

If you were wondering who won the bet, the answer to that would be me! Greg ended up having coffee a few days into it but I decided to still keep off social media for a whole week. Sunday as I was traveling to Austin, I was definitely counting down the hours until noon when I could check all of the piled up Snapchats and Facebook and Twitter notifications. It was fun to catch up on everything that I had missed that week and to fill my roommate’s Twitter with tons of favorites, replies, and retweets. It was quite the adventure and thanks to my awesome Ambassabuddies for putting me up to the challenge. If any of you are up for it, I challenge you to go a week or two without social media and see if it changes your thoughts and habits. Maybe you will make a new friend or learn something new about a friend you already have. Feel free to let me know about any exciting things that happen during this challenge.

Until next time,

The Chronicles of Kirsten Continues