#switchingoff

My blog (tumblr), pinterest and things like email are fine.

I remember when Instagram was becoming popular and people were talking about it and using it.  Being the me that I am, I wasn’t in the loop.  I didn’t know what it was all about, but I wasn’t curious either.

Eventually, one day I found interest and signed up.  I haven’t looked back since and I don’t regret it.  I’m in my own world and naturally do things at my own pace.

But now I find myself opening the app and browsing.  Going to the explore page, that internally annoys me when I see things that are trending and utterly uninteresting to me.  It’s psychological that it’s almost as if I feel something mystical will appear if I keep re-opening the app, but I know that its deeper than that for me.  I’ve never been moved with the herd, I wasn’t made that way.

I was just re-opening the app, as a means to in some way temporarily fill in the gap for something else that I knew wasn’t vacant.

The emotional voidance and company voidance.

It was the same with whatsapp, when it was becoming popular I vaguely remember and I had no idea about what it was.  Again, eventually one day I signed up and found it ok but have never been a fan so I deleted it.

I’ve always appreciated traditional text message.

When netflix was all that people spoke about, I had no idea what it was.

I didn’t think to ask, because of my indifference.  Until one day I went into a store called HMV and asked “excuse me, what’s netflix?” 

He told me and then I one day experienced it for myself.

Things like instagram, facebook and twitter are things that I like.  Some more than the other, but they are also someone’s product and a means for someone to make money off of.

I don’t want to be the result of someone’s product.

Nor do I want to be someone’s Product.  If you don’t realise what these things are capable of doing to you, you become a product and become the gullable muse of systems doing.  My eyes are open and they are staying open.

Shortly after making this decision.. I remembered these cupcakes that I used to make when I was little.  Tom and Jerry cupcakes, I could just smell and taste the icing now.. That’s the sort of thing you could do without the linger of social media there.

You can live.  You can bake.

In today's world, many of us are glued to various devices, from mobile phones to computers. We use various applications like Facebook, WhatsApp, Viber, LinkedIn, Instagram and many others to communicate with our friends, family, and colleagues. Social media is supposed to help us socialize with those around us. Looking at the statistics, overall 77% of Americans go online on a daily basis, including 26% who are online almost constantly, as well as 43% who say they go online several times a day, and only 8% who are online about once a day, as Pew Research Center found. But does social media make us more social or it`s quite the opposite? The Next Web (TNW) has set out to conduct a small study involving 50 people who tried to live without using social media. Here`re some of the benefits they experienced:

1. Being together with others physically

The respondents in the TNW`s survey said that without social media they have experienced a different way of socializing that's focused on expression and physical touches like hugs, kisses, etc that have increased the feeling of bonding and connection. One major difference was that when people are always online, usually communicating with others all the time through social media applications feels like a burden that causes them stress and anxiety. The participants of the TNW`s research reported a sense of calm when being with other people, probably because they could focus on the contact without being distracted by interactions with others.

2. Switching off can feel good

Perhaps, the prospect of going offline is scary for many of us. It's because nowadays everything happens online. Business or pleasure, you may miss out on opportunities if you`re never online. While this may be true sometimes, switching off from time to time may feel good as it allows you to spend time with yourself, disconnecting from the constant and stressful exchange of information that's not always useful for you. The respondents who took part in TNW`s survey said they felt neither sad nor excluded when they chose to go offline.

3. Stop browsing and enjoy the moment