I’m laughing because minutes after sitting down and thinking I should write about what feels like an impending divorce from social media, I found myself scrolling and liking (or disliking) posts on Facebook… is that her new boyfriend? That’s a cool picture. He must have just started dating her. Uggh, another picture of his kid playing football.
Oh wait, I was going to stop doing this….
I have been meaning to read the testimony (or highlights of the testimony) from the Facebook whistleblower probe. Ever since joining Facebook (many many years ago), I’ve been aware of it’s toxic nature. We all have. It makes us feel terrible and unfulfilled – and worse yet, it’s addictive. The tiny pellets of attention we receive with every like and share give us the illusion that we’re connected… that other people actually give a shit. I know that sounds harsh. I know people give a shit. But liking photos and commenting is a poor substitute for authentic connections, yet it feels like it’s the best we have.
For many of us, social media has become what we do to fill the small and empty spaces in our day – waiting in line, stopped at a traffic light, during the commercials, at the restaurant waiting for our food. For a few months now, I’ve limited my time on FB by using their time monitoring feature. By bedtime, I’ve almost always hit my limit. But I still find myself, absentmindedly, opening and closing the app during the day when I don’t know what else to do with myself. It’s like a nervous fidgeting. And because this happens so frequently but for such short periods of time, I’ve realized the issue is less about the actual time spent on the app and more about the habit of being uncomfortable and unengaged – for any amount of time. It’s the equivalent of saying ummmm during a presentation or trying to fill those uncomfortable silences in a conversation. I’m aware of it. I hate it. To some degree, I feel powerless against it.
Yesterday during lunch (I made a legit cubano sandwich with roast pork and all), I opened up YouTube – another algorithmically-driven time suck (though with slightly better benefits). I watched a TED talk by Joseph Gordon-Levitt, “How Craving Attention Makes You Less Creative.” In his talk, he contrasts our need for attention with our ability to pay attention. For artists (because creation implies and audience), the two are inextricably linked. In my mind, in relationships (which I consider to be a highly creative act) they are also inextricably linked. In Gordon-Levitt’s experience, and intuitively this probably makes sense to most people, he is at his best and most creative when he’s paying attention and not seeking attention. He does his best work, finds his flow, when he is collaborative (as opposed to being focused on his individual accomplishments). If he worries about the audience’s reception, or how he compares to his peers on screen, he feels his work suffers. In his talk, he addresses the dangers of social media. He gives a nod to social media’s potential (there are plenty of benefits) but he cautions against its darker intentions.
For the sake of brevity, I’m oversimplifying his talk… but this has been front of mind for me lately. Flow, creativity, attention (given and paid), and balance seem to be at the heart of human experience and happiness. If I struggle at work, it’s when I have too many demands on my attention. When I’ve had relationships fail, it’s usually because the giving and receiving of attention becomes unbalanced. In both cases, the flow is interrupted, the creativity is stunted or cut short, the collaboration shifts towards individual needs.
More often than not, I am a voyeur on social media. I never fully got into Instagram. I use Twitter to gather news. I share and like on Facebook to feel like I’m a part of something – but I do so with hesitation and limited frequency. I do so without being very deliberate or intentional. For the most part, I don’t want attention. A lot of this blog has been about that uncomfortable space – Dr. Bluespire whispering to the ape, “you look like a god sitting there, why don’t you try writing something?” I have been both happy and terrified when people I know have found my writing. The fact that any of this is public, as opposed to being written in a notebook, is testament to the embarrassingly complicated need for attention.
What I know… or at least think I know… is that I’m happiest when I can pay deep attention to something. I’m happiest when I feel a level of intentionality. I feel renewed when I can stop and observe, when I can luxuriate in small and big moments. Nearly every time I’ve paused to think about the next sentence or paragraph, I’ve checked my phone… sometimes, I’ve opened social media. On some days, I want my attention back. On some days, I want my time back. On some days, I want to stop pushing the levers that release tiny pellets of endorphins. I want to approach something deeper and more substantive.
I don’t know that I can do a full-on divorce. I think I may need to try some trial separations: pause and hide accounts, remove the apps from my phone, practice discipline, grow comfortable with those countless quiet spaces that don’t always need to be filled.
P.S. Having just tried, I can’t deactivate FB because I manage a page for work (unless I create a strictly work account). and Twitter doesn’t seem to have a pause feature. Looks like it’s a combination of removing the apps from my phone and good ol fashion will-power.