I have long wanted to quit social media, and I regularly daydream about this seemingly simple act of freedom.
It’s sadly not that simple though.
Why quit?
Even though I spend way less time on social media these days compared to before, it’s still stealing too much focus away from my life.
On a daily basis, I still find myself visiting social media without even thinking about it. Nowadays, I usually catch myself and close the tab or app again before it even finishes loading, but it’s already too late—my mind lost its focus on whatever I was doing.
It’s a habit that’s incredibly difficult to get rid of, and I know I’m not the only one struggling with this.
We’re so deeply hooked into this world of instant dopamine, it’s really scary.
Boredom is also a great catalyst for creativity, but with social media, no one is bored anymore. And ironically, a world without creativity is very boring.
Next time you’re on public transport, observe how many people are staring into their phones, likely swiping on social media. It’s like a scene straight out of a dystopian movie.
Why not quit?
Despite all the problems with social media, it can still be great if you use it right.
For me, it’s a great way to connect with like-minded people. By publicly sharing my work and thoughts, it opens up the opportunity for me to bond with people curious and excited about the same things as me.
I can share my work and thoughts on this website too, and I do, but the problem is that not nearly as many people will find it here.
As long as I care about ”making it“ (which I someday wish to no longer have to care about), the more people who discover what I share the better, as it leads to both recognition and app revenue.
I owe a lot of Balance’s success to Twitter, for instance. And while Twitter is no longer the place it was, I’m still holding on to it just in case a tweet of mine goes viral again. Same goes for the other social media platforms.
Me caring about making it is directly tied to my need for financial stability, so essentially social media is also a great way for me to make more money, which is not an easy thing to give up as long as I’m not financially independent.
My progress so far
My long-term goal is for this website—my ”digital garden“—to be the home for everything I publish online.
In fact, it already kind of is.
I relatively recently added my notes feed. Here I can share brief thoughts, ideas, and occasional photos—much like a social media feed.
For longer content pieces and bigger life updates, I write articles.
For long-living thoughts and ideas that I update over time, like this one, I can publish projects.
For those who want to get notified once I have something new to share, they can sign up for my newsletter or subscribe via RSS.
To connect, there's email. I love email and hope it never dies. It’s a great way to have a proper one-on-one conversation with someone—something you don’t get with social media.
I’ve added some links to the website (e.g. see ”Email a comment“ at the bottom of this page) to try to encourage people to connect.
However, as I’m still not ready to fully give up social media, I’m planning to keep my accounts around for now.
I will still publish things on this website first, but then cross-post on my various social media accounts—something I will keep a manual process to intentionally introduce some friction to help me easier give this up at some point.
This way, I get the reach of social media, while still owning my content. I also usually link back to this website in the post, in an attempt to get people to find my website instead, as that’s where I prefer people to connect with me.
It’s not ideal as I still have the urge to see if someone liked, shared, or replied to whatever I posted, but it’s a compromise I’m going to have to make.
When it comes to connecting, I will take inspiration from Derek Sivers (opens in new tab) and try to ask people to reach out and say hello over email whenever someone replies to one of my posts.
At the end of the day, I want to focus on what matters the most: living the life and doing the work, not yapping about it.
And I believe that if your work is good enough, people will find it.
This still applies even if everyone would quit social media, because people will stay in touch somehow anyway, and they will keep sharing your work with their friends.
So it’s likely that I’m overthinking this whole thing way too much, but that’s ok—that’s just being human.
I would love to hear what you think about all this. You’ll find me on social media still, but please send me an email instead! (opens in email client)