What is social media, and is it good or bad?

Everyday lives of people consist of mysteries, who knows what everyone else is doing, and only you know what happens in your life. People typically suffer from personal issues and use technology to escape from reality, but what are these issues? When you think of society now, you think of technology, social media, and talking through online apps, but what if the root of society’s problems is actually social media itself?

-What if having a lack of self-discipline, being unfocused, and procrastinating is all because of social media?

-Is society slowly breaking apart with technology, or is it benefiting us?

Teens often spend most of their time on their phones, entertaining themselves, talking to friends, or doing things to keep them distracted from the present, but the important question is;

-Is this really the most productive way to spend your time?

“It is okay to own a technology, what is not okay is to be owned by technology.”

-Abhijit Naskar

What are productive ways to spend time?

-What if there was a better way to spend your time, what if the solution to all problems is sitting right in front of you?

As corrupted and tempting as social media is, we always want to watch a video or entertain ourselves to restrain our boredom. What if living a normal life would actually be the most productive way to spend time? Humans once lived a life without technology and social media, what makes people think they can’t do the same now? Being productive consists of understanding goals, knowing what to do and when to do it, and most importantly, setting priorities. The biggest problem that we all have is getting distracted by things, but the biggest distraction of all is social media.

-If being productive means staying focused, then what are some things you can do to stay productive?

What if the solution to becoming more productive was right in front of you, what if it was “coming back to reality”? There are many ways to stay productive, and productivity does not just mean getting work done. Productivity also resembles learning new things, trying something new, limiting social media time, or even doing things to help self-improve. All of these are great ideas that you can learn and experience when “coming back to reality”. I say “coming back to reality”, because what I actually mean is that people are so caught up in social media, they depend on it too much and aren’t facing reality. This leads to people becoming oblivious and unwitting of their surroundings.

“Productivity is never an accident. It is always the result of a commitment to excellence, intelligent planning, and focused effort.” 

– Paul J.Meyer

Some things I do to stay productive

Although staying productive can be hard, there are ways to still enjoy yourself while being productive. The first step that I take to stay productive is to stay off social media. Personally, I don’t own any social media anymore and that is because I have decided to delete it. Deleting social media ensures that I work towards my goals and stay focused while doing so. The longer I don’t have social media, the more I realize that my life doesn’t depend on it. This leads to the next vital step, trying new things. I often had trouble trying new things such as something like deleting social media. I would expect social media to influence my life heavily, but after a certain amount of time, I realized that it wasn’t necessary and that I was better off without it. I’m not necessarily saying that everyone should delete social media, but the main idea is that limiting your social media is extremely beneficial.

–Now what’s next after I deleted social media?

Now that I don’t have social media, I implement other activities in place of it. Some of these activities that I do would be sports and self-improving. Swimming is a huge part of my life currently. I spend around 2 hours every day at swim practice, and this is where I have lots of fun. Social media isn’t the only way to have fun, talking to people in person and doing something like swimming with other people can be extremely fun as well. In addition, I try to go to the gym at least 5-6 days a week. This way I spend an extra hour-hour and a half with my day. Essentially, these activities are ways that I spend my time productively so that I don’t waste time.

Besides working out and staying off social media, there are other things I do to enjoy my life. I enjoy listening to music throughout the day, and listening to music can really set the mood. If you are feeling sad, you can listen to your favorite song in order to cheer yourself up. This is why I really love music, the versatility of it allows me to never become bored of it. I can listen to hip hop one day, then R&B the next. Music even applies to trying new things. As I said, music is versatile and there are lots of genres, you can try different genres of music to try something new.

Overall, I would say that my life has drastically changed ever since I came back to reality and took a step away from social media. I feel that there is less worry in my life, and I have been able to focus a lot easier. Although it is still hard for me to sit down and do my work within one seating, I feel that everyone is this way. I will say that doing the things I love certainly helps me strive and succeed in life, however, I wouldn’t say that staying focused is the easiest thing to do…