Break Up With Social Media
This blog is being released as a primer for the fourth workshop in series that Dr. E Curl-Woodruff of Thompson Therapeutics & Mediation is hosting at the DeKalb Public Library on the third Tuesday of each month, from July to October, with Dr. E covering a sub-topic in each. This blog post supports the fourth workshop which will take place on October 20 at 6pm. Participants may attend one, some, or all sessions for FREE. For more information, go to: https://dkpl.org/events/#/events/kAnVdzjAU0/instances/pxjmJC2jCr/
We’ve all been there. We sign onto our favorite social media account, telling ourselves we will check in to see what is happening in a specific friend’s life, verify the date of an event, or message a family member. But then we see a post from a different friend about their horrible experience about a new restaurant in town, a distant relative posts a rant about a political position we vehemently disagree with, or we see that local group feed has turned into an all out brawl over some trivial matter. Our brain gets activated in some way we can’t explain, and we go on automatic. An hour (maybe more) goes by in a flash, and we look up from our account, feeling like we are coming out of a haze. Then we realize we never completed the task we’d originally signed on to accomplish, we managed to watch a bunch of short-form videos, and, possibly days later, we find out we also spent $60 plus shipping for some cure-all supplement.
Social media was originally advertised as a way to keep track of family, share opinions with friends, or find people you knew in your past. But in the last 15 years, it has also significantly changed the quality of our relationships, ways we spend our time, and ways we judge ourselves, others, and events in the world. While we may technically be in contact with a family member or old friend, we may realize we haven’t had a meaningful conversation or even been in the same room with them in years. We may find it odd that we can concisely state where they went on their last vacation and how they feel about the news of the day (only because they posted about it) but realize that this surface information and lack of back and forth has taken all the nuances out of the process. Meanwhile, many of us are finding we are dissatisfied with what we are gaining from social media considering how much time we spend on it.
We may feel like we have no choice about our use of social media since so many social and cultural norms of the 21st century have come to be associated with it. However, more and more research is coming out which supports what many of us already know from personal experience. Social media can cause a lot of unnecessary stress, weaken and even rupture relationships, cause isolation and political division, all while feeling more and more like an addiction. Many teens and adults are now taking stock of how they use social media, what costs them in terms of time and energy, and are making concerted efforts to reduce their use or stop altogether.
Break Up with Social Media
Whether you are simply looking to take stock of your social media use, limit the amount of time you use it, or stop using it altogether, there are some steps you can take that will help you understand your relationship with social media, take inventory of what it is and isn’t bringing to your life, and build motivation to make changes related to your personal goals.
Take inventory. Without changing anything, start taking inventory of what social media apps you use, what purposes they serve for you, and how long you are spending on them each day. It can be helpful to download an app that measures this for you, but writing it out can help you see the big picture all in one place and identify trends. You may realize that you spend time on social media when you are supposed to be working or completing homework assignments. Maybe you notice that checking the news in the morning takes longer than you intend, and that’s why you are consistently late getting out of bed. This is all valuable information.
Rate the utility of time spent. Go back through the list you’ve made, and rate how each app or usage period impacts you and the goals you have for yourself. Are you networking for your new business or trying out new yoga videos from a fitness streaming platform? You may determine that it is time well spent. Maybe you realize you are spending a chunk of time endlessly scrolling through a social media feed, passively noticing what your friends are up to, or reading celebrity gossip. Maybe you decide that activity is neutral. Alternately, you may find that constantly monitoring a news app is raising your anxiety and the advertisements between posts is raising your credit card bill. Only you can determine how to rate these, but identifying consequences – both positive and negative - can be helpful.
Quantify what you aren’t doing. Now that you’ve figured out how much time you are spending on social media and its impact, add the time up. How much time are you spending on social media in a day? A week? A year? A lifetime? How would you rather use that time? Creating new memories with your friends? Learning a new skill? Writing a book, launching a business, or working for a non-profit that’s close to your heart? Let your imagination run for a while; you might be surprised where it sends you.
Listen to your brain. When you are avoiding an important task, what does your brain tell you is true? It’s likely that it comes up with all sorts of excuses to keep you scrolling - like that you’re only going to pop onto social media for one minute; watch just one video; or check the details on just one event. You may know from experience that it’s unlikely to turn out that way, but you find that you believe it in the moment. Maybe you start to think you deserve it after a hard day, and your brain starts to exaggerate just how hard the day really was. Or maybe it tells you that you’ll start your social media diet tomorrow. This is dopamine at work – a neurotransmitter that offers a hit of pleasure anytime you pursue a goal, regardless of whether the goal has long term benefits. Since social media goes by so quickly, your brain gets lots of dopamine hits, and your brain will start to backwork the logic to get what it wants. It doesn’t help that dopamine is often in direct competition with and easier to get quickly than another neurotransmitter serotonin, which will be released if you do the harder, less exciting task, or engage in sustained activities.
Set some parameters for your social media use. Use all of the above information to set some goals for what you want to achieve. Remember that an effective goal should be Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-specific or SMART. If you decide you want to reduce your social media use, decide which apps you will allow yourself to use, for how long, and whether there are parameters around what purposes you can or cannot use them for. Or maybe you want to try going off all social media and/or devices for certain 24 hour periods – sometimes called a media Sabbath. Tools like a timed lock box or a device that locks you out of certain applications can be helpful, especially in the beginning.
Create a community of support. Tell people what you are doing. This can serve two purposes. First, it can communicate what others might expect from you in terms of contact and help bolster your individual resolve. Second, it may give you an opportunity to recruit others to try a similar behavioral experiment. Normalizing social experiences that don’t rely on social media may lead to larger changes in our families, communities, and institutional structures.
Pick a date and keep trying. The last step is to pick a date to implement your plan and then implement it. In doing so, keep your goals front and center by keeping copies of what you’ve written above – your motivation, what you’d rather be doing with your time, and what your brain will try to tell you to get you to cheat – nearby, so you can review them regularly. Know that because of your social media use, your brain is used to passively receiving while social media does the work – even if there’s only a few minutes of idle time and the dopamine pathways may be well worn and therefore more likely to fire, especially under stress. You may not succeed in following it at first, and that’s okay. Be kind with any slip ups and take time to notice the benefits you did receive – no matter how small. Then take time to review what you’ve learned, alter parts of the plan that aren’t working, and try again.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Interested in learning more about what you can do to improve your brain health and your relationship with social media? Please join Dr. “E” Elisa Curl-Woodruff at the DeKalb Public Library on October 20, 2026 at 6pm for a free interactive workshop on this subject.
If you are interested in more individual attention and help creating and implementing your plan, E is now taking new clients. You can set up an appointment by calling 630-297-7559.
