As 2016 was nearing its end, so was (coincidentally) my desire for Twitter. As a Twitter user for five years managing multiple accounts, it was a fabulous way to share information, make announcements, contact people, spread ideas, share a few jokes, and follow friends and local happenings. Nowadays, those purposes no longer apply much. My following list depleted in the last six months, I don't have the desire to keep up with all the people I graduated high school with, I don't have the urge to start preaching more of my radical, progressive ideas to say defunding Planned Parenthood is not nice to the millions of Americans who genuinely need it, and I'm still the only one who laughs at my jokes, but that never changed.
Anyway, it's appropriate that as the new year was starting, my time on Twitter was ending. Thus, a resolution was made: to give up Twitter. I did not put more thought into it so I can't say this is something I would sacrifice for the year or forever, but the goal is to go four months. I deactivated my account and deleted the app on the second day of 2017. Simply I did it for two reasons: there was no benefit for Twitter anymore, and it wasted too much time in my day.
I was at the point where I would go on Twitter, scroll through and read tweets, and close the app either sad, mad, uninspired, or a combination of any. Sad because of the constant breaking news of death, violence in war inflicted theaters, and someone's depressingly cold 140 character poetry.
Mad because of the constant reminder of society's most controversial issues and exposure to the sadness of my own friends, and uninspired because of scrolling through nonsense only to be left no more enlightened than going in except for the occasional preaching by Bernie Sanders or Cory Booker.
With Twitter leaving me mad, sad, and uninspired, it became a waste of time. Not that I timed it myself, but I guess I would spend at least 45 minutes a day just scrolling through Twitter and 90% of the time there was no benefit. That time is equivalent to about how long it took me to write this article. In that time I could've read a chapter or two in Cory Booker's United or Sanders' Our Revolution instead of hoping I can retweet something they posted.
It's been about a week since I gave up Twitter and I feel much happier already. Twitter is a wonderful tool for anyone to use to be more productive, but without a purpose, Twitter is a just an unhealthy burden.
