The Addiction is Real (Social Media & News)

It’s day two of my self imposed social media and news information ban…and I gotta say, the addiction is real.

You would have surprised me if you had told me just a couple of days ago that symptoms of the addiction included physical symptoms such as bouts of anxiety and actual physically felt cravings…but here we are.

Initially, it’s just a thought to pick up the phone and log into instagram or fire up Youtube to get the latest news and happenings, something I usually do without much thought in itself.

However, resisting the urge to do so results in unwanted and unexpected cravings which are marked by slight waves light headedness at times, I’m guessing that one is the expectation of a dopamine hit that’s not coming.

Other symptoms include fully flung chest activated anxiety and of course the almost unconscious act of reaching for and unlocking the phone.

The withdrawal symptoms are akin to quitting nicotine cold turkey and for anybody who has ever done that, this would be the most accurate description of social media and news withdrawal.

I would recommend everyone try a self imposed media ban…that is socials, news, podcasts, I guess you could call it an information ban, for 3 days and see how social media and news information is affecting you. You may be surprised.

On a positive note, I have more expendable energy, both mental and physical. My expectations of myself have been raised i.e I’m not simply settling for the status quo. I’m also getting a lot more things done in general.

And that last point may seem obvious however a lot of my information intake was putting a Youtube video on and just listening to the information whilst carrying out other activities…multitasking if you will. However without such outside information streaming in, I’m just motivated to do more tasks or things…such as writing this.

Give it a try, give up social media and news media for three days, you may learn something about yourself or at least find out what type of pull social media and news information has on you.