I READ Dave Fredericks’ letter titled “Facebook” (TC, 3/12) and it got me thinking about my own experiences with it and how I ultimately quit Facebook. I first joined Facebook in 2010. The sole reason was my high school reunion was coming up in 2011 and I, (now living in Qld) was looking to reconnect with everyone I graduated with in NSW in 2001.
Facebook was an extremely efficient platform for this purpose and I’d quickly, with minimal effort reconnected with pretty much all of my 60 odd classmates. The reunion never went ahead though as my classmates had all dispersed too far and wide nationally and internationally and out of the 60 odd, something like seven said they’d be able to attend a reunion held on the mid north coast.
In the following months which turned into years (up until 2014) it would be fair to say I’d become com pletely obsessed and addicted to Facebook and would spend copious amounts of time just checking my news feed, commenting on status updates and “liking” posts and it really does become obsessive.
It got to the point where pretty much all I’d do before work, during my lunch breaks at work, after work and all weekend was be glued to my phone, checking Facebook. I stopped my daily 90 minute exercise routine (which I was fanatical about), I stopped doing a lot of little basic things around the house, gardening, etc, I stopped reading novels. The old me I just didn’t have the time for any more because Facebook consumed every waking minute of my life.
Then one day I woke up and realised I had a serious problem. I picked up my phone and said to myself “I’m not going to go on Facebook at all today” and left my phone off. It was the most alive I’d felt in four years. I took a run with the dogs, called my parents, picked a novel out of my extensive Clive Cussler and Andy McDermott collection, walked to the park and to read again.
One day without Facebook turned into a week, then a month and this year will be five years without Facebook and today I don’t even think about it at all and I look back now and can’t believe how addicted I got to it. I can laugh about it now but in hindsight it really was destroying my life.
I was never bullied or experienced anything negative on Facebook; I just got consumed by it which is probably worse. The best part is I am still in contact with all my friends from school that Facebook allowed me to reconnect with, we all traded email addresses, addresses and phone numbers and we keep in contact now via letters and the occasional text, email or phonecall.
For anyone out there who’s looking for a new year’s resolution for 2019, I highly recommend making yours to delete your account and quit Facebook. I did it and I’m far happier in life without it.
Make time for yourself, for your friends and for your family because Facebook, (inappropriately named “social media”) ultimately takes you away from them all.
KEV McKAY, Harristown