We often neglect our mental health to the point that it is causing many problems worldwide. Suicide rates are at an all-time high, and it is the second biggest cause of death in teenagers. Let me repeat that: the SECOND BIGGEST CAUSE OF DEATH. It's insane that people are killing themselves almost as much as diseases and external factors (car crashes, natural disasters, etc.) are. The main cause? Social media. There's a reason that social media is free: they sell your attention. The overwhelming majority of people are addicted to their phones. Grab your phone right now and check your screen time. You're most likely disappointed by the number. It's very easy to get addicted to the dopamine that these platforms provide; all you need to do is scroll once. In real life, the delayed gratification you get from activities like exercise, meditation, being productive, reading, and making real-life connections becomes even harder as you return to these apps for more dopamine.
No wonder Gen Z is the most depressed generation in history, and suicide is the second biggest cause of death for Gen Z. This is why social media is like a real-life matrix: it puts you in an altered version of reality. It's ironic that we're living in the most connected time in human history, but we've never been lonelier. Social media promised to connect us to our friends and family, but it ended up doing the opposite. It became a different version of reality in itself, where you only see the best of the best, the most successful, the best physiques, and the best lives. Every time you scroll on Instagram, your brain makes a subconscious comparison to the person shown. Even if you're the person who says "I only compare myself to myself," the enemy here isn't our brain's subconscious decision to compare. This is what meant our survival thousands of years ago. If we didn't compare, we wouldn't grow. But our brain's ability to compare is only limited to around 150 people. How many people do you compare yourself to on social media? Tens of thousands, if you've been using the platforms for a few years.
There's a new piece of information thrown at you every second, which trains your brain to only hold its focus for one second. You probably can't focus while watching this video right now. Many people nowadays think that they have ADHD and that's the reason they can't focus, but a lot of that is due to an incredibly low attention span of seconds caused by constant scrolling on social media apps and watching hyperstimulant content. Microsoft says that the average attention span is now 8 seconds, and chances are that if you're watching this video, you don't want to be the average person. The more time you spend on these apps, the worse your life becomes. You get a dopamine rush and instant gratification every time you invest your time in social media. This is why we live in the loneliest generation in human history.
The main selling point is that it lets you connect with others, but the connection isn't even a fraction of the connection you make in real life. There's a level of discomfort in building social connections in real life, and social media gives us the alternative, which is making us lonely. Most people choose social media over real-life interactions.
Short-form videos like reels on Instagram, Tiktok, and Youtube shorts have drastically reduced the attention span of our generation. You can only go on to realize the detrimental effects that social media has on your mental health once you have taken a step back. It will probably be very hard at first, but once you do it, you will see the world in a different light. When you're not scrolling for hours on end, your brain starts to work like it used to. You start to have more productive thoughts, and your attention span increases. You start to have the ability to focus on things for longer periods. These short-form videos are meant to keep you hooked by constantly providing new content. The more you watch, the more you want. The algorithms on these platforms are designed to keep you hooked, and the only way to break free is by taking a step back and realizing the harm that these platforms are causing to your mental health.
The average person will spend five years and four months of their life sucked into social media. You probably think I am not talking about you but even if you spend 2 hours a day on social media. Let's just do some quick maths here 2x365=730 730x72(average life span) =52560 divided by the hours in a year which is 8766 brings us to about 5.98 so almost 6 years of your life wasted on making Mark Zuckerburg rich. for people nowadays 2 hours are not even a lot per day most people are spending way more then that 4 hours that's 10 years of your life 6 hours that 15. And the mental health aspect we haven't even touched on yet. Kids are handed a phone by the age of 10 nowadays and start building up an addiction from an early age. Suicide is the second leading cause of death in young people aged 10–24 years, globally. And this happened right after social media became mainstream. Your attention is the single most valuable thing that you have control over in your life and the average person gives away their attention like it is worthless. And quitting social media can be a life-changing decision for you so. I am not going to go into depth about the side effects of social media you have clicked on this video so you already know let's get straight into the steps. In this video, I will give you the step-by-step framework for quitting social media for good.
So I want to quickly address something before we get started. When setting a goal of quitting bad habits like video games, social media, junk food, and porn. Most people fall victim to this trap.
First, they set an unreasonable goal that is too big Second, they don't achieve the goal, but they fail The third thing they do is do the habit even more A lot of people fall for this endless cycle of unreasonable goals, failure, and bad habits even more after failing. I fell for this trap as well during my early stages of trying to quit social media 4 months ago and I would feel terrible. I don't want you to fall victim to this endless cycle so In this video, I will give you a framework that will help you quit long-term.
The first step towards quitting social media is to. Figure out what is causing you to click on Instagram, and what caused you to click on Snapchat. Probably boredom and stress so you go on the app to instantly relive that boredom and indulge in instant gratification. The obese person eats junk food because he wants to feel comfortable, and the smoker smokes to clear his mind. Figure out exactly what is the reason that you click on that app so much. Is it boredom, the fear of missing out on something, or having nothing better to do? Once you have figured out the reason that you click on the app write it down. Just thinking about it is going to help. Write it down on a piece of paper. The reason that clicks on social media is ………………
Let me tell you something that no YouTuber will ever tell you. All these guys will tell you to delete the app from your phone. They will tell the alcoholic to throw away his vodka, they will tell the smoker to throw away his cigarettes. That is not what you do. Deleting the app is not going to do anything, throwing away the vodka and the cigarette won't do anything. You need to have them right in front of you at all times and have the discipline and the identity shift to tell yourself no I am not going to click on Instagram, no I am not going to smoke, no I am not going to drink. But the one thing you should do is disable the notification from social media apps. Keep the app on your phone but delete the app. And the ability to tell yourself not to click when the instant gratification is right there comes from having mindfulness. No one ever brings up mindfulness when they advise on quitting addictions on the internet. But mindfulness is so important and the way to develop mindfulness is through meditation. As you are trying to quit social media practicing meditation will increase your clearheadedness and make you conscious of your thoughts. People are living life on autopilot these days they at brain dead because of their lack of mindfulness. The cycle of mindfulness goes like this. 1st you focus on something like your breath during meditation, focus gets distracted, then you realize that you were not mindful, then you go back to your thought, and when you go back to your thought after getting distracted that is when you get better at the skill of mindfulness. I am not going to go in-depth about meditation in this video but. Try to do at least 5 minutes 10 would be even better, 5 to 10 minutes of meditation using a meditation app like medito So you have done step one, identified the trigger and you know the importance of mindfulness the third step is to replace the habit with productive activity. A delayed gratification activity. Most people wake up and the first thing they do is check their phone. So replace checking your phone with a good morning routine that will set you up for a productive day. You cannot quit one habit without replacing it with another. Instead of waking up and immediately checking social media. Wake up do your morning routine and meditate. Have a structured routine for your day. This is very important because you will find yourself slipping back into the bad habit if you don't have anything better.
Accountability So on your journey of quitting social media, you are going to slip back into scrolling. You are going to fail. And admitting failure is an incredibly valuable skill. Every time you go back to scrolling on social media be accountable for it. Let's say you used to scroll for 2 hours a day but you reduced that to 1 hour that's progress. Now get that down to 30 minutes and 15 and so on and so on. Progressively overload. Use it less and less every day until you get to the point where you no longer use it. When you have really reduced it to change your lifestyle. That brings us to the last step.
And the last step is to delete the app. There is a reason this is the last step because this is the most drastic change. It may take you 1 month, or 2 months for you to go get to thing point. But it is word it because trust me your mental health will get so much better when you have quit social media. Personally, I got to this point after 2 weeks. And I have been off for 4 months. So the last thing that I want to mention is the fear of missing out. You are going to fear missing out on what everyone is up to. And that is normal because these apps have convinced your brain that if you stop using them that everyone will forget about you and you will suddenly become a nobody. That is the reason why only very few people actually manage to quit they think that they are missing out on life. While you are not. It will take some time to get over the fear of missing out but after you get over it then you will not have a single urge to scroll through social media.
The most important step of self-improvement is improving our mental health, we have to fix our mental health as we cannot improve ourselves if we are in a position of messed up mental health. What can you do to improve your mental health? The number one thing you can do for your mental health is meditation. Chances are that you have not meditated before so let me tell you how to start.
Incorporate meditation into your daily routine by starting small like all new habits and progressively overloading. The concept of progressively overloading originated in the gym, each time you do an exercise you increase the intensity by increasing the reps, weights, etc. This can also be applied to meditation. If you are new to meditation try doing 5 minutes of guided meditation. In guided meditation, there is an instructor guiding you through each breath and I recommend that for people new to this practice. You can find guided meditations on youtube or countless meditation apps. The one that I use is called Medio.
Try to do this habit consistently, the results will not be apparent at first you will probably feel like it's not doing anything but like any new skill, it will take some time. In a week or two, you should see the results of meditation. One other tip which I will point out is that during meditation you will get some random thoughts in your mind but don’t feel discouraged by this simply go back to the breath and every time you go back after a random thought, think of it as one rep for your brain. When we go to the gym and exercise, every rep counts toward strengthening the specific muscle the same way every time your mind wanders and you come back to your breath. That's one rep for your brain.
Another crucial habit that you should incorporate into your routine is journaling. Gratitude Journaling is another habit that will help improve your mental health. Typically the best time to journal is in the morning right after you wake up or before you go to bed or even both times both. If you have never journaled before, start by grabbing a diary, notebook, or any piece of paper, and list down a few things that you are genuinely grateful for in your day-to-day life. This practice is probably the shortest mindfulness practice but it automatically puts you in a good mood.