In our 21st century, we are all constantly connected through social media. We can look on any platform, such as Facebook, Instagram or Twitter, to see what others are doing in their daily lives. Even if we don’t post ourselves, for some reason, it is interesting to see what others choose to put up on our feed. For me, I knew this – nonstop checking all platforms of media-was interfering with my life. I could not get any work done. I could not focus. If I had any free time, I decided to go look at the never-ending feed of Instagram or those interesting, yet time consuming snap stories. When I was sitting there for hours staring at the small screen in my hands without a single word written for my essay, I knew I had an issue. This was when I decided to try a little experiment: unplug from all social media for three whole days.

You might be thinking, “Only three days? Three days is not long at all.” However, as someone who was almost always on snapchat, this was a big deal. So the next morning I deleted Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, and VCSO. It was a big step for me and I expected it to be very challenging.

However, I was wrong. It was a lot easier than I thought. Did I miss Facebook? No, not really Did I miss Instagram? Nope, not at all. How about Snapchat? This one was harder because I was always communicating back and forth between my friends. However, with some self-control it was easy to resist. It occurred to me of how insignificant other people’s pictures and thoughts had in my life. I may sound blunt and rude, but I really did not care that much about what other people did the night before at a party or what girl drama they were tweeting about.

I did still procrastinate, but during these three days, I did it by hanging out with friends, laying in my bed, getting food, or just sitting there staring at my work. Procrastination was an issue, but I was doing things that made me feel better about my day than just staring blankly at a screen getting the latest updates on the Kardashians. Proving to myself that I have the self-control to refrain from social media helped me realize I’m stronger than I thought. In addition to that, I saw that social media does not have to consume my life. Technically, they are trivial information that have no impact on how my day unfolds. It is something we like to immerse ourselves in for entertainment and pleasure. Sometimes, the fine line of entertainment versus over-the-top addiction is blurred.

I encourage you to try this for yourself because it brought light to how I was living and how unproductive I was being throughout my day while proving that social media does not have to be the main focal point of our lives. Instead, we should concentrate on actually living our own lives, instead of watching those of other’s through screens.