Social media has undoubtedly become a really huge part of almost everybody’s life, so much to the extent people equate zero social media presence to being uncool or outdated. Admittedly, social media is a very important tool if not essential, to bridge the time and space gap, networking and so on.
Drawing the line between where we benefit from it and when it begins to have a negative impact becomes the challenge. Often times, even groups of friends sitting together or people at a “social” gathering, can be caught starting at their phones, so much for “social” huh? Being careful and setting limits to social media usage can make all the difference you need. Here are 4 reasons why you should limit social media consumption.
-
ANXIETY
As much as we might not like to admit it, social media is full of things that we might not possess, lifestyles we can’t afford to live, people we can’t look like and as much fun as it might be looking at those things, anxiety has a huge door to walk into our lives when we don’t limit our social media consumption. We begin to unnecessarily push ourselves to try to tailor our lives to the glamorous ones we’ve filled our heads with. Limiting social media usage helps to take a break and get a solid grip of ourselves.
-
BUILDING QUALITY RELATIONSHIPS
Social media has made people forget about the simple comfort of talking to someone face to face. Yes, some might argue video calling and the other whatnots are a solid replacement, but in reality they’re not. Social media has also made friendships to be tailored to what it is not supposed to look like, i.e it indirectly encourages superficial relationships. If social media consumption is not limited, you’ll find that most of your relationships are either feeling unreal or are just for the camera.
-
TIME WASTER
You’d be amazed at how much time has passed when you are just scrolling through your timeline or feed from whatever social media platform for supposedly few minutes. Not putting limit on social media consumption can make you lose valuable time that could have been channeled into something far more productive than keeping abreast of all the outfits artistes wore to the Grammys and all the awards won. As fun as it might be, without a limit to it, you’ll find that you are less and less productive every day.
-
HEALTH
This is perhaps the most important. Even if your job entails you working on a screen, not checking the limit to social media consumption increases, by not just a little measure, your screen time. It can be bad for your eyes and surprise, even your brain. You are exposed to these screens now almost 24/7, as a result of this you can’t move around much, so exercise is out of the question. You are not even exposed to sunlight or fresh air as much as you are supposed to and you might even be missing out on quality sleep. So, in the long run, uncensored social media consumption does more to your health than you think.
A great tip to manage this issue is to schedule your time and have rigid frames for the amount of time you allow yourself to use social media.
