Last month, I quit social media.
Let me tell you, the thought of leaving had been building up in my heart for a long time, and I had been resisting the Lord’s correction. I’m not proud of my resistance. I know that social media is designed to be addictive, but I really thought I was above it.
Turns out, I wasn’t.
If you’re not aware of the way your brain craves dopamine, let me put it this way: those “harmless” reels and videos you’re watching while waiting in line, sitting on the couch killing time, lying in bed before going to sleep—they’re training your brain to chase dopamine every ten seconds. And the more you give it those little doses, the harder it is to satiate the craving.
What happens with that ten minutes of TikTok scrolling? You give up the use of your prefrontal cortex, you go into “zombie mode,” and you quit making decisions. The apps are designed to keep you there, and the “endless scroll” feature is there to prevent you from clicking away.[1] You’re not even choosing what you watch! One study found that the overuse of reels/videos on social media led to memory loss, depression, and anxiety in adolescents.[2] In case you read that too quickly, I just used “memory loss” and “adolescents” in the same sentence. Evidence is still being gathered since this is still a relatively new problem, but what we’ve learned so far about the effect of short videos and doomscrolling on our brains is terrifying.
If you’ve noticed you feel restless watching a show without your phone in your hand to scrolling or play a game while you watch, that’s your broken concentration. Scriptwriters are dumbing down plot lines and dialogue in television and movies so viewers can follow along while scrolling at the same time.[3] (That’s both insulting and telling.) If you can’t read a book for more than a couple of pages, your brain is looking for that ten second dopamine hit. If you can’t pray, hold conversations, or sit with your thoughts without picking up your phone or iPad, you’ve been affected by your social media habits.
So there’s a brain problem here. And I’ve felt it. In the last year or two, I have struggled with reading and staying focused on slow moving plots in literary fiction which I have generally always loved for its slow building and character development. I’ve found myself playing a game on my phone while watching a movie with my family. I’ve struggled with retention and concentration, especially while writing and studying. I hate that so much. From a purely brain science standpoint, I needed to quit social media a long time ago. I’m a writer. I need to be able to sink into my work without coming up for air every few minutes. Writing long form pieces has felt harder than it ever has for me.
But there’s more than a brain issue at play here. For me, there was an obedience issue. Let me explain.
Ten years ago, I was encouraged by the people telling writers how to get published that I needed to “build a platform” to make myself seen on social media. So I did. And it worked for a while! I would write a blog post, share the link on Facebook, and it would get passed around hundreds of times. But somewhere around 2020, the algorithms changed. Suddenly, the powers that be wanted you to pay to be seen. I wasn’t willing to do that, so I didn’t. My articles got fewer and fewer views. So, I changed my long form writing to blurbs that would fit in an Instagram post. That’s only about 400 words max (if you use short words) and translates to roughly 2,170 characters, including spaces. So, again I changed my approach and reduced my long posts to short ones with sharable graphics. And it worked. For a while. Then the algorithms changed again and videos became the thing. I tried some teaching videos. Some worked, some didn’t. The necessary brevity chafed. I couldn’t condense my work into thirty-second reels and say what I wanted to say with any kind of depth or nuance. But I felt pressure to be present on social media for the sake of my published work.
I wrote about this in my first social media exit blog post, but I should be clear that none of my publishers have ever demanded I be present on social media. They want to know that I’ve got some established readers, but they’re far more interested in the number of you who read this email than the Instagram users who may or may not ever read a full post or give it a tap-to-like. Some of the pressure I felt was self-imposed because I was watching other creatives build large followings, garner attention for their books, and show these very glamorized portraits of their writing and speaking lives. Doing the same work they were doing, I thought I was supposed to follow suit. I felt behind if I didn’t.
But the problem for me? This became an internal competition with my friends and colleagues. And as I tried to maintain presence on the apps, some sinful tendencies in my heart rose to the surface of online popularity. The time I spent building an online presence led me to spend more time on the apps in general. I got sucked in every time I opened the apps.
I was wasting so much time on social media. I was watching videos every time I stood or sat still. I was showcasing way too much of my personal life and way too quickly. I was regurgitating every new thing I learned from Scripture for immediate content. I wasn’t sitting with what God was teaching me. I was spending more money, influenced by the newest products that promised to make my life easier, happier, more satisfied. I was comparing my life to others in my field, reading reviews of my books that either built up my pride or crushed my confidence. I felt FOMO constantly, left out of circles of influence. I felt dissatisfied in my appearance, my home, my car, my kids, my spouse, my work, my church, my goals, my life.
And I couldn’t seem to stop.
I tried the app timers and the downtime features on my iPhone but they are too easy to bypass. I almost bought a Brick, but it doesn’t work for iPads, so it wouldn’t help me in the long run. I knew a long time ago that the only thing that was going to work was a break-up, a true cutting of ties from social media.
And I knew a long time ago that quitting is what the Lord wanted from me.
Every time a pastor talked about confession and repentance, I thought of my social media usage. Every time I read a passage of Scripture that referred to fasting or sacrifices or obedience, I thought of my social media usage. Every time I listened to a podcast or read a book or article that mentioned faithfully living in obedience to the Lord, I thought of my social media usage.
I knew the Lord wanted me to give it up. I knew I’d be happier, freer, and more focused if I just obeyed Him. But I didn’t know how to continue in my work as a writer if I cut ties. In my article, which I encourage you to read, I explained how the real and final push was a chapter of Isaiah that I was studying and teaching in my weekly Bible study group. Obedience was the only way forward, and I had to let the chips fall where they might. Professional collapse or not, I could not keep living with an idol in my hand. In the article, I wrote about the Sunday afternoon walk that changed everything as I imagined where I’d like to be in six months with social media. I deleted the apps from my devices that day. I wrote a plan for cutting social media out of my life while staying connected with readers, and I emailed it to my sister. I told my husband.
And then I cut it out of my life.
I lived with the twitchy tension of reaching for my phone for an app that didn’t exist there anymore. (It took a couple weeks for that phantom feeling to burn off.) But, after the first few days of feeling like I was living under a rock, I felt relief in not knowing everything that was going on in the whole world. I didn’t realize there would be freedom in letting go of an unwitting pursuit of omniscience. (That’s another post for another day that I will most certainly write.)
Gone was the voyeuristic desire to peek through the windows of someone’s life to see what kind of laundry detergent they used and how they disciplined their kids. Gone were the gossipy videos about celebrities I couldn’t even name, the products I “needed” in my life, the constant rotation of recipes written by influencers instead of actual chefs and cooks. Gone were the videos from “professionals” who pontificated on topics they’ve never studied in fields they claim to know so much about. Suddenly, all those voices in my pocket were gone. Poof. Silenced.
It was strange to sit in vacuum of quiet.
If I was going to consume any content, it would have to be long form writing. I made sure to subscribe to blogs and newsletters by writers I enjoyed. The stacks of books sent by publishers beckon. The novels on my nightstand call to be read. My in-person relationships are the sources I can go to for laundry detergent recommendations and recipes. The dusty cookbooks in my kitchen hold a world of things to try. Everything is intentional, and I like it that way. So soon into this big change, I like it that way.
After the initial shock at the deafening silence that accompanies the removal of a steady glut of information, I noticed my concentration began to improve. Within two weeks, I could read for an hour without noticing how much time had passed. I could write without constantly checking notifications on Instagram. I could focus. I could hold a conversation without my phone in my hand. I could take a walk without headphones and just think or pray. (Walking in silence has become a pleasure, actually.)
But even beyond the mental improvements, there was freedom in knowing I had finally taken a sledgehammer to the wall of disobedience I had built between myself and the Lord. My husband always says to our kids, “There is always more blessing in obedience than in disobedience.” And he is absolutely right. The freedom of obedience is just so sweet.
That doesn’t mean it comes without ramifications.
I’m trying to launch a new book while staying off the apps. I’ve experimented with posting book content occasionally from third party apps so that readers can still find me without my actual presence. In other words, I’m treating my accounts like an online business card. It’s fine. It doesn’t provide the dopamine hits of seeing all the likes and follows, so perhaps I’ll abandon them altogether when I do my six month check-in at the end of the year. Can I, though, release a book “successfully” without liking and commenting and reposting all the reviews and photos of said book? Well, we are finding out in real time because that’s exactly what I’ve chosen to do because for me, obedience was more important than success.
It’s worth noting that I met with two of my publishers last week. One sat down me with me to strategize how to market my books without social media. The other told me they will never care whether I utilize social media or not. Three cheers for them, right?!
Should you quit social media?
I’ve gotten so many emails since publishing my article in May. Readers and writers alike who are questioning the effects of the apps on their brains and the habits on their hearts. I can’t answer this question for you. The use of social media is an issue of Christian freedom. It might be totally fine for you if you are able to exercise self-control. If you can walk away from it without a backwards glance, it’s not likely the issue for you that it was for me. The temptation to sin was too great for me. When I was at The Gospel Coalition conference last week, I opened Instagram on my laptop browser to see the conference hashtag. Inside of thirty seconds, I saw photos that made me feel left out. Hear me, I was sitting in my hotel room in Indianapolis and I still felt like I was an outsider. Why do we give time to things that make us feel bad for simply existing as we are? I slammed my laptop shut and said out loud, “There’s nothing there for me anymore.”
I hope creatives will begin to leave the apps in droves. I heard recently that the “tiktokification” of Instagram and Facebook have rendered them useless as social networks. It’s no place for thoughtful art, if you ask me. Sometimes I wish we could go back to the 1990’s and push a button that blocks the invention of social media. That’s not to say I’ve not gained good friends or benefitted from good content on social media—I certainly have. But I can’t keep up with it. Instead of social media serving me, I was serving it.
So I left.
Do I feel completely out of the loop in what’s going on in the world, in theological and literary circles, in the lives of my writer friends? Oh, I one-hundred-percent do. Am I learning to be okay with that? Yes. Slowly.
It’s okay for your world to be a little smaller.
[1] Since the referenced article’s publication, Instagram and Facebook have moved in the direction of TikTok with reels dominating their algorithms. https://socialmediapsychology.eu/2022/08/18/tiktok-is-killing-your-brain-right-now/
[3] Google “Second Screen Viewing” or read this article at the Independent: https://www.the-independent.com/arts-entertainment/tv/features/tv-netflix-stupid-slop-explained-second-screen-b2957124.html
*One little note: as part of a marketing plan that was developed before my social media exit, I agreed to appear on an Instagram live video in July with another writer. I am honoring my agreement so as not to put my publisher in a spot, but that is my only exception.
