The Struggle against Social Media: My Life without Facebook

I have wasted around 1000 precious hours of my small life looking at the blue-white pages of Facebook. But the sad truth is that there is essentially nothing to watch. 

I used to wake up everyday with a new resolve, that I would only check my notifications today, and would spend the rest of the time on more productive things, such as working online or reading or writing review of the book I had just finished. Except that never happened. I logged in to Facebook, checked my notifications, and something on the homepage would catch my eyes. I would look at that, like a few posts by my friends, and then click on a few links. Doing a bit of all these, I would look at my clock to find that two hours had gone by, and all I had done was look at others people's posts and read about how to paint your nail or who is dating whom.

There have been times when I had important assignments to work on, and I wasted that time stalking my favorite author on their Facebook page. Looking at all their posts on their pages suddenly seemed more important that fighting with balance sheets and income statements.

I have never been much of a social person. I have the lowest number of notifications on Facebook than that of an average person, and I barely have plenty of things to share online. I have seen people who get as many as fifty notifications per day, and I understand how they get strangled into the never-ending saga of virtual communication. But what about me? Why did I waste so much time on that time-eating website?

I guess I am one of those people who, a) just loves looking at pretty stuff, and b) needs the slightest of excuse for procrastinating. Facebook helped me to achieve both of these.

But this month, I had had enough. I challenged myself to embrace the unthinkable. I challenged myself to deactivate my Facebook for a while.

I knew very well that I would fail, because I had tried to perform a similar stunt a few months back. I had to give in to my impulses and my Facebook was back in only two hours.

I am not sure if I ate something different in the morning this time, because my Facebook has been deactivated for five straight days now. *does a happy dance*

I know many of you who do not have Facebook are rolling your eyes now, but trust me, Facebook is the demon that brutally slaughters the regular pace of your life. It is the quicksand that slowly pulls you under without you getting a hint about it.

I can totally understand that Facebook is the biggest referral website out there, and if you are the sort who cannot live without knowing what's happening around the world, then you might need to stick to it a bit longer; because, let's face the truth, you cannot subscribe to a million portals. Your inbox would cry and curse at you, and you would likely get your brain damaged from checking so many newsletters. With Facebook, you have most-if not all-links in the same page, and you can choose which to visit and which not.

Still, I decided that time spent after productive work was better than to know the headlines and juicy bits of Hollywood gossips, and so I grew balls, and clicked on 'Deactivate my account' button, holding my breath all the while.

I am happier ever since, and I feel lighter. This could all be a trick of my mind, but trust me, I do feel lighter.

I still haven't stopped using other social networking websites though, but they do not have as much impact on my life as Facebook used to. I woke up this morning, and watched a couple of videos on YoutTube from my subscribed option, and it was still under one hour. I knew I was done with Internet for the day. I checked tweets and found some headlines right there. And then I went offline and back to reading and finished the book that I started the day before yesterday.

What do I do when I need to contact my friends you ask? I have Whatsapp, Viber and Google Hangouts for that. I am making myself believe that Facebook is not the only option. I am making myself believe that I can enslave my addiction to Facebook instead of being a slave to it.

I know that I soon have to reactivate my account, because new semester starts in ten days and people form groups on Facebook to chat about term paper, share ideas and works. But I am hoping that I will have developed enough resistance by then. It's like holding your breath underwater to see how long can you survive. But I hope that I will get better at shunning Facebook. I really hope I do, because if I use the time I save off of Facebook to really do something productive, it will dramatically change my life! I am certain of it.

Photo by: Facebook.com