I am home: some thoughts on facebook, again

Today I missed the chance of getting a 500-pound voucher to shop online at my favorite store. I won't say the name of the brand here, but it's a pretty cool, fair trade one. The thing that called my attention, though, was the fact that, in order for me to apply to it, I would need to first 'like' their facebook page and then follow the instructions from the networking site.

Well, everybody knows I'm on detox. I could very well login quickly and enter it without further ado. I didn't, and I feel proud about that. I want to persist on my goal, and return to the site only when I'm supposed to return. It seems such a short period of time (1 month) but trust me, when you're an addict, it feels like an eternity. Perhaps that's reason enough for me to stay away on a more permanent basis? I think the only thing that prevents me from moving forth with a drastic solution like this is the fact that facebook is a means for me to keep in touch with most of my friends and family members. Other than that, I would be happy to be away forever, I guess.

Now back to the voucher I won't get a chance to run for. It's amazing that everyone seems so hooked on to the social network that it's become normalized as 'part of life', at least for the so-called generation-y, and I kinda get worried about it. Whenever I meet someone who doesn't have a facebook account, I can't hide the shock on my face. I know it's bad. It happened yesterday, as I talked to a very nice girl I met at a development course in NUIG. I asked her if she was in the course's facebook group and she let me know that she did not have a facebook account and as I think my face went 'ohhhhhh really' again, she said "I know, it's strange, but I don't have a facebook account". At that moment, I just wanted to tell her that it's not strange at all, that she is my idol for that. Like, really. I so admire people like that. It's like they're telling me: "see, you silly, I need no artifice to feel cool" and, even though I do feel a bit cautious towards people who are resistant to change, I still admire those who value interpersonal relationships on a more realistic basis. I say 'more realistic' because I do feel those relationships we build online are real, even though they lack in profundity in many cases. 

What is insane, though, is that I'm a person who met a life partner online. I have all reasons to celebrate virtual life as the best thing that could happen in one's existence. Yet, I have reservations about that. Only now that I feel sucked up into a very disorganized lifestyle and that messiness is actually disturbing me, that I realized how much time I wasted online. Which begs the next question: is it the existence of the social network in itself that is the problem, or the fact that so many people, including me, are so addicted to it? Or maybe both?

Well, I vote for both. I totally dislike playing the victim role, as in 'oh, I'm such a poor creature who wanted to socialize a bit and felt that if I didn't have cool posts that conveyed profound messages, people wouldn't like me', but, to some extent, that's how I feel. I also don't like the 'total agency' role, as in 'well, this is what I did to myself, no one was pointing a gun at me and I could very well have managed my time better'. Even though the last argument seems so bullet-point to what has actually happened to me, I really don't feel it answers it all. Because, to some extent, when ALL your friends are available ONLY on facebook, you obviously want to be in touch with them and end up going back to the site again and again. 

There is even a metaphor running on the Brazilian circles of fb. It states that being on facebook is like being part of a Dungeons and Dragons cartoon episode. When you want to get out, something happens that gets you to stick around for a little while more. The most obvious thing one could think while reading that sentence is there's plenty of jobless people on the social networking. But then, when you stop and investigate further, people aren't really jobless. On the contrary, they complain that they've been working too much and have no time for themselves. Yet, we spare our precious free hours trying to keep up with information we haven't even asked for, such as your cousin's lunch or the fact that someone is suffering from constipation (trust me, I've seen that on fb). 

So, I come to the conclusion that facebook is a very bad idea for people who tend to procrastinate. People like me, who absolutely abhor the amount of nonsense posted on the site (including my nonsense, I'm no exception to that rule) and still keep on going back for 'just a quick check'. Like we're stuck in a Dungeons and Dragons episode. Like we've never really asked to be in that magic land and are so tired of the endless adventures that materialize in front of us that all we ask for is to be home again. I am home now, and it feels pretty comfortable in here ;-)

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My facebook detox

This blog is part of my facebook detox. I am not saying I will never go back into fb, but I really want to have a one-month break from it and then limit my participation to once a week, strictly. I realized I'm an addict long ago, and I successfully managed to stay away for a month last year (from June to July, 2013).  What I didn't succeed at, however, was limiting the time I spend online, and facebook remains firmly as the first source of distractions to me. 

So last week I came across this article and it resonated. Although I find the author quite judgmental at times, I cannot say he is entirely wrong. I don't usually feel jealous on fb, although I do admit there have been instances. Anyway, I take being jealous as entirely normal and part of the human experience. Knowing how to manage jealousy is more important than trying to get rid of it completely, I guess. 

But then, he came up with some questions and I was shocked to see that my answer to most of them was a sound YES: 

• Do you use Facebook immediately upon waking?
• Do you use Facebook immediately before going to bed?
• Do you feel irritable if you don't get your precious time with Facebook?
• Do you spend more than an hour at a time on Facebook?
• Do you use Facebook at work or school or any other time when you should be engaged in something else?
• Do you use Facebook while walking outside?
• Does it anger you if others do not have a Facebook account?
• Do you get an update on your phone every time someone updates their Facebook?
• Do you feel the urge to check Facebook while driving?
• Do you feel sick or on edge if you have not checked your Facebook for a certain period of time?
• Does the idea of going a weekend or a week without Facebook make you feel uneasy?
• Do you find it hard to imagine a life without Facebook?
• Do you get irritable when others insinuate that you may be addicted to Facebook?

I think the fact that I responded yes to most of them is really problematic and I want to fix this. I am not saying the idea of being all the time online is harmful to everyone, but I do acknowledge it is harmful to me. I'm well aware that I will be missing interesting posts from part of my family and friends, and even my communication with most of my college mates will be compromised, but I also understand that no choice is consequence-free and I'm fine with that if it means opening space in my life for more productive/creative stuff. 

Although I will miss on getting updates from beloved ones, I am glad I will be a month away from trivialities that make life seem so unappealing to me. This is some sort of paradox, I guess. I spend huge hours happily procrastinating on facebook, yet I can't stand people complaining about the weather, or making generic statements about how corruption is ruining Brazil. Or even frantically posting selfies or pictures of meals I am not at all interested in seeing. Not to mention the huge amount of racist/sexist/transphobic bigotry I encounter while browsing. Whether in the form of religious B.S or openly aggressive, those posts drain all my energies and I end up ruminating on ways to counter them in a polite manner, even though what I really want is to use the f-word and block the person straight away. 

So, I reached a point where even the cute kittens that people post on fb were sort of giving me to the nerves. I don't think it is about kittens, or babies, or meals, or even selfies. It's about ME not knowing to strike a balance. Maybe I am monotonous in what I post, too. Maybe I ALSO post too much on the same topic. I don't think that viciously posting pictures of your baby is inherently wrong. I think this is inherently part of being human, and I'm really understanding towards that. Because I also understand that I am just seeing too much of the same thing because I am spending too much time online. It's time to make a change. It's time to really enjoy my life without wondering how it would look on a facebook album.  

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