Recently, I have decided to go off of social media. The first thing I did was deactivate my Twitter. Then, I went off of Instagram for a few weeks. However, I went back to it. After a little while and some events, I decided that I was officially done. While I did not deactivate my accounts, one night I decided to erase my Instagram and Snapchat apps. The only social media I am on now is Facebook, mostly because I have to have Facebook for classes and for writing here, and it is mostly adults on Facebook. Yes, I did say I have kept Facebook because there are mostly just adults on it. That is because kids my age suck and thrive on drama and social media.

However, I have realized that social media is not good for me.

I used to be a slave to my social media. I would constantly be looking through my Instagram even when I had just checked a minute ago. I would post pictures and be excited to see how many likes I would get. If I didn't get comments on selfies or didn't reach 100 likes on a photo, I would put myself down. I would compare myself to others and say, "How come they get called beautiful when they post a selfie and I don't?" or "How do they get so many likes?". I put my worth in Instagram. I made my self worth be based upon likes and comments, who saw it and who didn't and who liked pictures posted before and after my photo, but did not like mine. I would like a photo and then get asked by people why I liked it. I would see a photo of people hanging out and get sad I wasn't invited.

With Snapchat, I would do a similar thing. I would constantly be looking at everyone's stories and comparing their life to mine. Why were they having so much fun? Why don't I have that many friends? Why do I seem so lame? I would constantly post on my own story to try to put on a show of who I was. I would show a happy face to hide how I was really feeling. I would post things I thought people would like so people thought I was having fun and was okay. I wanted people to see I was different. I wanted people to see what cool things I was doing and be jealous. I would check to see who saw my story and be upset if certain people didn't see it. I do not know why I did that, but I hate how I did that to myself. I hate that it tore me down. When I would personally snapchat people and they wouldn't answer, I felt like I was annoying or no one wanted to talk to me. When I tried to set streaks and people lost them, I felt like no one really wanted to talk to me everyday.

With Twitter, I was done a long time ago. Twitter had always caused problems. I would always scroll through to see what cool or funny things were tweeted. However, I was also one of those people who kind of used Twitter as their diary. If I was thinking something or feeling a certain way, I would tweet it. Then would come the flow of texts asking what was wrong or who my tweet was about. Or if someone else tweeted something, I would ask them the same thing. Often times I would read a tweet and think, "Is that about me?" or would get a text saying, "Did you see so and so's Twitter fight?". The main thing with Twitter was that drama, for some reason, made it fun to people.

I allowed these social media outlets to control me and how I felt about myself. I looked at people's photos and videos and thought poorly of myself because of it. Not only was I bringing myself down, but I was also getting hurt. When I saw certain people together, it hurt me when I wasn't included. I would wonder why I had not been invited or why I was just sitting at home alone. I would wonder why certain people were hanging out saying they were friends, when everyone knew it was a fake relationship. I wondered why people were hanging out with people who hurt their friends. I hated the fake aspect of it all.

I would be also be sent photos of people or get the occasional text of "Did you see so and so's insta post/snap story?". It is as though our lives revolve around what others are doing. And not in a good way. Most of the time, those texts are sent to judge and to talk badly about. Or you are being questioned why you liked something or why you didn't like something.

Since it is over social media and not in person, things also are taken in the wrong way. I was hurt from seeing friends together when I was not invited, but was it really their intention to post it and make me feel horrible? I mean, sure it could, but who knows. But the way I looked at it made me feel bad. Often times, people see a snapchat, Instagram or Twitter post and take it the wrong way. And what does it turn into? Drama.

Are you purposely being excluded from a group/do they want you to see them hanging out because they posted a picture? Did someone purposely post a picture to make you upset? Did someone purposely tell someone to post a picture to make someone mad? Was that tweet about you? What did you do? And the list goes on of questions you probably ask while seeing certain things on social media. If you ask the person about the post, then drama is created whether it was there to begin with or not. If you don't say anything, then you're often in the wrong too. If someone takes something you did wrongly and you apologize, you often get shut down. If you don't say anything, then you are a horrible person. You honestly can't win.

That is why I am done. There are too many problems that occur with social media. If you think about it, there are way more cons than pros. Pros are you can see what other people do and can keep in touch or find entertainment. Cons are you can lose friends, get hurt, hurt others, overthink, cause drama, be surrounded by drama, get addicted, have low self-esteem and so on. I have unfortunately lost friends due to social media, and to be honest, it is so stupid. Why are we letting social media run/destroy our lives? Why does one picture or post have the power to ruin friendships? Social media does more harm to us than good.

Social media has really done nothing good for our society, and especially for my generation. I challenge all of you to erase your apps for a week, at least. Try life without being attached to social media. Honestly, you probably won't even miss it by the end of the week, and you will realize how much more time you have to do much more important things than to see what picture Bob posted on Instagram today.