NOTE: This post was originally posted on So’s substack — The Moon is Reaching For You.

For the past few years, I decided to go on a social media break every January to start anew for the new year. Since the age of 10, I’ve been consistently and chronically online and always had multiple accounts on various social media platforms from Xanga to Live Journal to Blogspot to Facebook to Tumblr to Instagram to everything in between. Now that I think about it, that’s 25+ years of being online without a single break for more than a month. No wonder I am suffering from severe brain rot. When it comes to social media, our attention is the currency now and we’re all paying a hefty price.

In order to regain back my attention, I decided to get off the two biggest platforms that suck my energy and attention: Instagram and TikTok. For some reason, if I’m on Instagram for too long, my anxiety skyrockets, and with TikTok, their algorithm is so good, I am simply too addicted and cannot stop doomscrolling.

It’s already been close to a month and what I realized from being off social media is this—

PROS:

Less stress and more emotional regulation! It’s been nice to not need to perform or upload stories and posts no matter how much I love it and am good at it. No matter if it’s posting or reading comments, I get filled with so much anxiety from checking social media. I’ve been on a journey to get emotionally and physically more regulated and aligned, and being offline definitely helps.
SO MUCH TIME. I have so much extra time now to do other things. I knew being on social media was robbing me of my time, I didn’t realize just how much. I can say, I was dedicating at least several hours every single day, doomscrolling into the wee hours of the night for absolutely no reason. So now, I’m reading a lot more, getting better sleep, still consuming some content but better content (questionable but baby steps) and simply enjoying life.
Coming back to myself. Maybe it’s the combination of the detox and me going through some personal growing pains of life but I’ve been journaling like a mad women these days. Naturally without the distraction of consuming everyone’s highlight reel, all I am left with are my own thoughts and feelings. And even though that can be scary, it shines a much needed light on my emotional state and shortcomings. By journaling, meditating, or working out, I’ve been able to focus on gaining more clarity on myself and filling my own cup. And let me tell you, it feels so damn good to be full.

CONS:

My attention is still getting robbed. This is my fault, I should’ve gone fully cold turkey because I’ve now been channeling my attention to other platforms like Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest, even Linkedin (I know, diabolical!). What’s the point of a detox if I’m still on other platforms? I try not to count Substack as social media but if we’re being real, it’s still social media.
I feel so disconnected to everyone. Or at least my acquaintances. I’m in constant communication with all my close friends and constantly emailing people but I’m still wondering what other people are also up to. You miss the day to day moments and even the big ones like an acquaintance announcing a new job, traveling to japan, or someone getting engaged. And that unfortunately includes celebrities that I love. That sounds so pathetic but it does bring me joy to see the cast of K-pop Demon Hunters on their awards campaign or seeing the cast of Heated Rivalry getting the Hollywood treatment, etc. But most of all, it’s where people go to communicate and politically organize when shit happens and if you didn’t notice, our world has consistently been on fire for a while. I know people have been talking about getting off of instagram and facebook but our lives are so integrated at this point, we MUST find other alternatives!
I’m so out of the loop when it comes to current events. I know there’s a lot of ICE raids happening and I hate to admit it but I get most of my news from social media. Without it, I don’t tend to go search for news these days and if I do, I’m met with a paywall. I’ve resorted to following independent news sources because the big outlets cannot be trusted. Regardless it’s hard to keep up when there’s not a consolidate place where you can see everything.
How to promote or find work without social media? I’m battling an internal battle trying to reconcile how to promote upcoming work without social media. Sure there’s email and substack now but I feel like I’ve already built a solid audience and network through instagram and TikTok, it makes me feel like I have to do twice the amount of work to get the same results. Can independent filmmakers like me succeed without the powerful tool of social media? I don’t know. And then when it comes to finding work, it’s so much easier when you’re on the top of people’s minds because you are posting or you’ll see an ad for job listing or a new grant.

Even though my cons list is longer than my pros, I know this is simply the initial process of a detox. It’s hard till it becomes easy. My ultimate goal is to find a good balance where I don’t need to rely on solely social media in order to do the work that I want to do, stay connected, or be “relevant.” It’s going to take a lot of trial and errors to figure out how to create the right balance because I don’t think getting off social completely is an option for me right now, especially when I have upcoming work to promote. But then again, isn’t that always going to be the excuse I’ll resort to? That there’s never a good time?

Truth be told, social media is now so integrated in our lives, I do feel we need it in order to succeed in our careers, at least in the beginning. I would like to think that when I’m so successful, I won’t need to rely on it at all but realistically, the film industry is in shambles and even the biggest stars are now being forced to make tiktoks in order to promote their films. It’s all so depressing.

The biggest takeaway I’m learning is that staying informed and connected with my community is going to take lot more work because I can’t solely rely on one app to do everything. It’s going to take more effort, multiple streams of communication, and an uncomfortable adjustment period but the peace and time I reap is well worth the painstaking trouble. Or at least I hope so.

So's Digital Diaries

I'm on a Social Media Break and It Sucks.