Everyone knows the negative impacts of excessive phone usage, so this is not a new concept by any means. But being reminded of these impacts may just result in at least one person deciding to reduce their screen time in search of a better use of their time. I’ve written before about the divisiveness that social media causes, but the harm it causes doesn’t just end there. I’d like to take this opportunity to remind you that social media does divide us, and now more than ever, we need to be working to understand one another. This goal will never be reached when every individual is locked into an echo chamber of their own thoughts and opinions.
So why is excessive phone usage negative? I’ll focus on excessive phone usage as excessive social media use, as that’s generally why people are on their phones. Social media has been proven to increase symptoms of depression and anxiety. Recently, this has been exacerbated with the creation of numerous social media apps that are updated frequently to be more addictive, mainly through short form content. Almost all social media now has short form content, which is particularly harmful. It became more popular from TikTok, but soon Instagram followed this trend with Reels and YouTube with YouTube shorts. Short-form content is particularly harmful as it reduces attention spans greatly, to the point where I’ve heard many people complain of an inability to pay attention for as long as they used to be able to. In the past year, I’ve heard on multiple occasions of people putting content that’s over a few minutes at double speed or consuming it with another form of content to not get bored and distracted. Essentially, people are only able to tolerate these short forms of media, meaning the information they’re consuming is incredibly surface level, and thus not encouraging in-depth thought. This makes it incredibly easy to spread misinformation while giving people the impression that they know what they’re talking about.
The apps themselves aren’t the only negative impacts. The addiction to these apps also means people aren’t doing anything beneficial with their time. People are wasting away their lives on social media and forming habits that reinforce the belief that the best way to experience life is to distract yourself through it. People aren’t able to make necessary changes in their lives to be happy or work towards making changes in society as a whole in order to make life enjoyable. This is because it’s incredibly easy to distract yourself all day, sleep and then repeat. Wanting a distraction from the current state of the world is completely understandable, but there will be no meaningful change made if we all choose to bury our heads in our phones. While many people open social media with the intention to distract them from the darkness of our world, social media actually pushes these horrible events and ideas. When I finally decided to delete TikTok three years ago, I noticed immediately that all of the negative beliefs and constant feelings that the world would end went away. When you step outside without having used your phone all day, you suddenly realize that the world is okay. It’s far from perfect, but it isn’t ending.
We are deliberately choosing to miss out on the positives of the world by surrounding ourselves with negativity online. Our time is being spent consuming content that we immediately forget as opposed to doing something that we enjoy and spending time with loved ones. It seems daunting to make the decision to delete social media. In many ways it feels like our tether to the world and our friends and family. But it’s not. You will find you are closer to your world when you’re paying full attention to it and allowing yourself to be bored enough in moments between obligations to think about your loved ones.
You have to let yourself be bored in order to find creativity and excitement. We have so much time in each day and there is so much to do and learn. Social media tricks us into thinking we’re relaxing because it’s a mindless activity, but in reality, you are exposing yourself to hundreds or thousands of bits of short form content, many of which is meant to make you feel scared, guilty, angry and just negative in general. Social media is not calming you down; it’s preventing you from creating beneficial ways to reduce stress, such as journaling or meditation. It reached the point where I was disconnected from this world years ago, but it’s never too late to decide to regulate your phone usage and get back to using your time to do things you love.