For a long time, I’ve had a love/hate relationship with social media. I consider myself to be a creative person. However, I find myself consuming other people’s “content” rather than creating my own.
I put “content” in quotes because it’s the buzzword of the digital influencer age - content, content, content. Are you making enough “content”? AKA, are you creating enough posts, reels, stories, etc. on social media to continuously feed the algorithm, get the likes, and be top of mind for your “followers”?
I get it - those likes and followers can equal real dollars $$$ in your bank account. Many of us would like to make our own schedule, work from home, and ditch the 9-5. But the problem I have with “content” is that over time, it becomes filler. People post about the same niche topic five days a week in bite size chunks. It’s fast, it’s fun, it’s addicting to consume.
As a consumer of social media, you realize over time that you’re no longer seeing anything NEW. It’s the same repetitive messaging on various topics that interest you. It all starts to blend together, as humans naturally mimic each other to fit in with the crowd.
Originally, social media (Facebook) was created to view your university friends’ online profiles. I still enjoy my friends social updates. But the FOMO is real. We all share the highlights of our days, weeks, years, and it’s easy to start feeling like your own life is not enough.
Today, I’m setting the intention to make Sunday a social media-free day. This is a challenge for me. It feels like a good first step for someone who’s thought about ditching Instagram entirely. I’m halfway through the day and I’m already fighting the craving to check it.
I went to the beach yesterday and I have cute photos of me living my best beach life with my family. Normally I would share these as an Instagram story - “look at me! I’m spending time with my family! I go to the beach! I’m living my best summer life!”
I share Instagram stories because I enjoy giving my friends/family a glimpse into my life, and I enjoy the artsy aesthetic. I share so people think I have a social life, as a date-able single person. Largely, I share for myself. If the Instagram version of me is happy and smiling, then my actual life must be pretty good too, right? Like I’m proving to myself that I am this online persona, this highlight reel of a person.
News alert - I’m human and so are you. No matter how flashy our social media life is, we still feel down, we still feel single AF, we still feel like we’re not good enough from time to time.
For these reasons - the “content” fluff taking up precious time that could be spent creating, and the FOMO/comparison game, I need this one day a week to reset and just be with myself. I can share photos here, or in the email newsletter I’m working on, so that I’m still accomplishing the share with friends/family part, without all the unwanted parts.
I don’t mean to put any content creators down for the mighty stream of content they put out there. They’re trying to get your time and attention, which is just what these platforms are designed to do. The more they hold your attention on the app, the more money the app makes overall. So, really, their employer is Instagram or TikTok at the end of the day.
I think social media is a great place to share your own projects and creative endeavors as a way to market yourself. But it’s easy to get caught in the consume versus create cycle.
I invite you to join me in this social-media free day and see how it helps you reset your own creativity and mindfulness for the week ahead.