Digital Detox Challenge: No Social Media for One Month
Throughout September, I took part in my first digital detox focusing specifically on social media. This meant 30 days of not checking or posting on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube or Pinterest.
“Media rearranges your values more than you think. The only way to realise its influence on your life is to take a break.”
Why did I do it?
Firstly, something you may not know about me was that I was pretty much hooked on Facebook in my 20s. I’d go on nights out, take a tonne of photos before posting and tagging on Facebook, whilst awaiting my friends to ‘tag me in’ to their albums. To think of the hours I wasted scanning through ‘friend’ profiles in an effort to stay ‘connected’, commenting, liking, and trawling back through endless photo albums to discover more about the people I called ‘friends’. Thinking back, all I was doing was comparing my life with theirs. I was also highlighting the best bits of my life to show how happy I was. Was I really happy at that time? I was so busy with ‘life’ that I don’t think I knew what happiness actually was.
I woke up to the reality that Facebook was, in my opinion, a dangerous dark hole of comparison in my 30s when I had children. I changed my relationship with social media at that time. I completed a digital declutter following completion of my KonMari tidying journey. I deleted over 400 ‘friends’ and although I still have about 130 friends, I only follow 30 people (those I would actually text, call or see in real life). I follow about 100 people on Instagram (although most I have on ‘mute’ so I have a beautifully curated experience in line with who I want to talk to in real life and the accounts I’m inspired by).
90% of my time spent on social media is for work. The other 10% is scrolling for inspiration. And I want to be honest here, I LOVE using social media for my work. Connecting with people all over the world and spreading the joy of KonMari and organising is something I’m truly passionate about. I value and appreciate my social media platforms. Switching off for a whole month felt scary – what would I miss out on?
I’m not someone who ‘mindlessly scrolls’ very often now, although I certainly used to be. I have good boundaries already in place so I’m aware that I may have been in a completely different starting point to you if you’re considering trying out a social media detox for yourself. That said I still feel an strong desire to learn more about digital wellbeing. And if I were going to promote the benefits of taking a break from social media to my clients and followers, surely I’d have to try it out myself to see how it went? And for those of you who know me well, it will come as no surprise to hear that I’m a big fan of a one-month challenge! So this blog post is about everything I learnt during my detox, in the hope that it may give you some tips and inspiration too. As you will see, it was a very informative month.
Starting Tips:
1. Share your intention to complete a digital detox with anyone who will listen. Not only will this inform the people in your life that you won’t be available digitally (you may want to add that you’ll still be available in person!), the fact that people know what you are doing will hold you accountable to see it through.
2. Get a head start before your social media detox starts. I started to set time limits and set times for my social media use in the run up to my month off. This helped me to adopt the correct mindset for staying off my channels altogether. For me, I made sure I was only spending 30 minutes on social media per day and I had avoided access following 8pm during the week before my detox began. I was also on holiday with my family at the time, which was very helpful because it allowed me to adopt new habits away from home. I always find it easier to establish new habits in a different location, because I’m away from all my regular triggers that lead to behaviour I’d like to avoid.
3. Rearrange your social media apps on to a separate page, away from your home screen. This is something I did before my detox began and it was extremely helpful not seeing these apps front and centre every time I used my phone.
4. Create your vision – write down a few things that will measure your success in completing a social media detox. How will you know if you’ve completed a detox successfully? My criterion was quite simple: I’ll be successful in this detox if I’d had no access to any of my platforms for 30 days. I will have reduced my screen time on my phone each day. I will have engaged in ‘analogue’ activities more often that bring me joy like reading, going for walks and meditating, to replace the time I would have spent on social media.
5. Make sure you have a toolkit of joyful activities up your sleeve that you will do to replace the time you would normally spend on social media. Don’t be alarmed if you’ve forgotten what these activities might be! I struggled at first too. It just goes to show how tempting it is and how normal it has become to open up social media in times of boredom, stress or when we want to take a ‘break’. I came up with reading, going for walks, listening to music and meditating. Having a good list of things you want to do instead of scrolling social media will set you up for success.
6. If you want to research your detox more deeply before you start, I’d highly recommend reading Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport. He has written a whole section of his book about how to complete a 30-day ‘digital declutter’ (he’s actually referring to a detox). This book inspired me to complete my own detox.
My Social Media Detox Takeaways: What I Learnt
· Although I was scared to start my detox at first, it was actually much easier to switch off than I’d anticipated. After Detox Day 5, I was surprised that it felt normal to have my evenings to myself again. My phone lived in a different room during this time, which made it easier to resist temptation. I spend the majority of my evening in my living room, so I left my phone in the bedroom.
· I feel like I gained the gift of time! It’s incredible how much time you have on your hands when the commitment to regularly engaging on social media is temporarily taken away from you. During my month, I read 4 whole books (normally I manage about 1 per month) and started a new course to train to become a Simplicity Parenting Coach.
· I was definitely more productive and present. When we arrived back from our holiday, although I was tired and would have normally checked social media and had a 20-minute ‘break’; I unpacked my suitcase, made a cup tea and played with my children.
· During the month, people constantly asked how my detox was going, which I found very positive because they encouraged me to keep going. I didn’t want to let them or myself down! Actually, a common response from many people was: ‘I really want to do the same!’ My clients were very interested too – one client commented how she recently became conscious of mindlessly scrolling social media past 9pm every evening, and admitted she didn’t know why because it didn’t bring her any joy. Instead, it made her feel sad and lonely.
· I met and had an interesting conversation with a stranger in a café. Stranger sounds scary – she was actually a lovely local mum! One of the reasons why I think we talked was due to the fact that we weren’t staring at our phones whilst sipping our coffees. It also made me realise just how many people in the café were on their phones (no judgement – they’re probably working or intentionally taking a break right?).
· I didn’t experience any FOMO (fear of missing out) because I was already in touch with everyone I truly care about via WhatsApp. When social media was in my life, I feel sad to admit that I’d visit Instagram and Facebook first over texting my friends back. Without it, I made responding to my friends a priority again. Also, I was able to send birthday gifts and cards to my nearest and dearest on time (something I’ve struggled to do in the past). I remember thinking: Does my time on social media distract me from completing tasks like this normally? If so, social media should only be accessed once these important things on my to-do list are done.
· Speaking of to-do lists, I felt like a productivity guru! I ploughed through my to-do lists without social media threatening to distract me. It made me realise just how tempting it is to open Instagram or scroll Facebook as a ‘reward’ for my ‘hard work’ in the middle of an admin session.
· The downside of no social media meant that in the first week I spent MORE time on my email. I also got into a new ‘app loop’: I’d go from opening WhatsApp, then to opening my personal email and end up opening my work email every time I used my phone. The number of times I completed this new app loop increased dramatically at the beginning of my detox and even though I wasn’t aware of it at the time, I was replacing my old ‘app loop’ of Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn. Once I became aware of this, I set a new boundary of only checking my email twice a day at 9am and 7pm. I was less strict with WhatsApp and I was fine with that.
· I set an unrealistic screen time goal at the beginning of my detox. My goal was that I would try to spend less than 1 hour on my phone every day. Within the first few days, I knew that this wasn’t possible. I still use my phone for a lot of other things like navigation, messaging, calls and listening to podcasts. I realised that I’d set myself too many detox goals whereas I should have been focusing solely on avoiding social media use, which was a big enough goal on its own! However, something really interesting happened as my time off social media continued; without noticing, I began to use my phone less. At the start of my detox I was spending 2 hours per day on average on my phone. Towards the end of my detox, this time had reduced to just under an hour per day. For me, I discovered that less time (or in my case no time) on social media meant that I used the other tools on my phone less too.
· I started reading ‘How to Break up with Your Phone’ by Catherine Price. She recommended taking a Digital Sabbath (24 hours without using your phone) as part of her 30-day plan to develop a healthier relationship with her phone. In the final week of September, my husband and I tried our first digital Sabbath and switched off our phones for 24 hours starting at 8pm on Saturday and ending at 8pm on Sunday. I feel that my social media detox laid the foundation for taking further steps to reduce my phone use. Was switching off for 24 hours scary? No, actually. Did we have to be a bit more prepared in advance? Yes. Was it worth it? Absolutely. We loved it so much that we’re planning on making it a regular feature of our weekend every week.
Good habits I learnt throughout September and things I want to continue now my detox is over:
- I will respond to my friend’s messages first over social media use.
- I will have regular social media days (Tuesday, Friday and Saturday) and keep my other days free from going on my platforms.
- I will not use my phone after 9pm.
- When circumstances allow, my husband and I will plan to take part in a digital Sabbath every weekend (24 hours without using our phones) starting at 8pm Saturday night and ending at 8pm Sunday night.
- I will complete a social media detox 3 to 4 times per year. My next detox will be in December.
For the record, I don’t think social media is the enemy. I think that overusing it is. And that’s on us. It’s our responsibility to put good habits in place to ensure social media doesn’t drain our precious time. The detox allowed me to step back and see what was working with my social media use, and what wasn’t. The detox enabled me to set further boundaries to achieve more balance in my life. I’m also aware that these boundaries don’t define me and should not be too rigid – I’m sure there will be times where I spend more time on social media than my new boundaries allow, and that’s ok. The difference is it that it will be an intentional choice.
Do you want to complete your own social media detox? If you have any questions and need more guidance, feel free to write in the comment box below. I’d love to hear from you.