I’m a psychologist and set time limits for my social media apps. I, at a full-blown adult age of thirty, still need to restrain myself from instant-unlimited doses of dopamine. Ten, fifteen, thirty minutes–I change the timer every now and then, and the timer on my phone will block my access to TikTok and Instagram. I have set rules that I’m allowed to ignore those limits on weekends. But, sometimes, if not often, I would easily go to settings and delete the time limit I had just set yesterday.
On and on, I let myself get drifted away by whatever content strangers posted online. I let myself laugh at them, cry at them, be proud of them; be anything that the contents want me to. Sometimes, I would drown so deep in the app–TikTok–that I lost hours being in it. But, I would try to always make sure that I only do it once a week–usually on weekends, so I would uninstall the apps once it’s Monday. Of course, I sometimes find myself effortfully resisting the urge to grab my phone, open/reinstall the app, and scroll, and scroll, and scroll. At those times I would just stare at my phone while keeping my hands away from it. After some time, the urge usually tones down, and I would come up with other things to do. The mental training that I have to do over and over again, after being on social media for many years, is no joke. I can’t imagine not being thirty years-old; let’s say five, ten, twelve, seventeen, twenty years-old and having to do the mental training constantly on your own–or worse, not knowing that social media can be a dangerous place for your mind that your entire existence is solely about you mindlessly consuming any content the algorithm provide for you, for hours, days, weeks, years. Imagine being born in this era and being plunged head first in the wild jungle of social media, without anyone telling you about how to use it safely, because everyone apparently–even the children’s parents–are wandering in the same wild jungle themselves.
I’m not saying that social media has no value at all. Of course it does; in fact, I’m writing this article and posting it on socials. But, we have come to an age where social media is not as innocent as it used to be in the past. We have lived so long that overtime it has transformed into a capitalist monster ready to eat us alive–if we’re not being careful. By dangerous, I mean, not only about what is in the content we consume, but also about the duration we spend consuming it. Because of the time we’ve lost from social media, we’ve partially lost our ability to stay focused on important tasks, to wander undisturbed and come up with creative-problem-solving ideas, to be patient with how our mind and feelings work; as they’re sometimes slow; packed; sudden; etc. I, myself, being a psychologist whose main job is to give people advice, struggle with the issues as I constantly navigate my well-being alongside the bombardment of social media. Although, I am glad that many people have started to step back a little from their online presence and curated a more realistic way of approaching social media. Although, I also couldn’t deny that they are mostly adults like myself. I still can’t imagine how our children, teenagers, and young adults are doing.
What I’m trying to say is that as a psychologist, I’m not immune to any seemingly-unhelpful behaviors–like scrolling mindlessly on social media for hours–anyone else is doing; as I was born a human, not a psychologist. I want to portray a realistic image of myself for anyone reading this, that might consider seeing a psychologist or is currently seeing one. Your helper–psychologist, therapist, psychiatrist–is also a human. Providing you psychological care means that we’re professionally trained to give you one, not that we’re saints. We have professional and personal sides just like you and your jobs. Our values are in being able to carefully, collaboratively, analytically, and humanistically do assessments and treatments that are aligned with your needs and goals. Just like you and the values you provide in your jobs.
I’m grateful that you’ve now reached the end of this article. I’m glad that you probably resonate with some of my points and are willing to stick until the end, as it’s hard now to engage anyone with a long-form written content like this–see how articles are now contents, not just articles that they are; I’m too are unavoidably influenced by this content-driven economy language. Anyway, wherever you’re now, however you’re doing, I’m always hoping for the best to come and to stay, always, with you. At the end of the day, all of the internet situations that we’re in now, undeniably come from our very basic desire to connect. The very social nature that we’re all born with, has brought us all to the chaotic online world that we love and hate at the same time. Just remember to always, always, and always, be safe. And be patient; with your thoughts, your feelings, yourself, as the very nature of everything online is to always encourage you to be in a constant rush; that more often than not is not necessary.
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