Hello. My name is Yaz, and I am addicted to social media.

I never thought social media would overtake my life like it did.

It started with posting a single picture of me with my puppy. No filter. No manipulations.

After a few short months, I started to edit my pictures with filters, as it was trending.

Then it went to the point of blurring out unwanted blemishes to messing with the temperature of the photo to make it look like a nice sunny day.

I wanted the world to see me, but edited me.

I wanted my friends and acquaintances to believe I was this fun, popular, athletic, and smart person, and that's exactly what my social media profile portrayed me as.

After three years, I came to this point of obsession. Obsession with likes and comments.

I would constantly go through my profile and make sure I had above a certain number of likes on each picture, and if not, they were instantly deleted.

I would search my photos to see if certain people liked what I was posting, and it got to the point where I downloaded an app to see who would unfollow me.

After years of this, I always found myself disappointed. The guy I liked would unfollow me and some friends wouldn't like my pictures.

I wake up every morning and go straight to my phone. I scroll throughout my feed and see what other people are doing with their lives. And I repeat that same process right before I fall asleep.

I would do this without even saying good morning to my family first and even my roommate now.

According to an article by Forbes, researchers at University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine conducted a study on social media and the effect it has on depression. The participants would use social media for an hour a day and out of the 1,787 subjects, aged 19 through 32, more than a quarter were classified as having a 'high' indicator of depression; "participants that use social media very frequently have 2.7 times the likelihood of depression."

After reading this article, I am not surprised at all.

A video my mom forwarded to me, This is EXACTLY what's wrong with this generation, was quite the eye opener for me.

Simon Sinek is a motivational speaker, author, and consultant who writes on leadership. He believes that technology is a huge factor that separates the millennial generation from others.

He brought up the example of waiting in a conference room before a meeting. Everyone is on their phones, and then the meeting starts. All (most) phones are down and they begin. There is no face to face interaction with anyone in the room before or after the meeting.

For me, I thought of the example of waiting in line for my Starbucks drink to be ready. I would pay and I rush to a seat and scroll down my Instagram feed or look at stories on SnapChat. I was essentially hiding myself from any interaction.

Enough with the facts. As I write this, there are thoughts are going through my mind about how hard this will be to ween myself off social media. I keep making excuses about how I need it to keep up with news and friends, but why can't I call them and ask how they are doing, or go to my favorite news website and read the latest news?

I hope to see improved relationships and live in the moment. I want to pay attention when seeing a movie or a friend, rather than reading tweets while "half-listening." I want to enjoy a concert rather than watch it through my iPhone. I want to find out about my friend's new boyfriend from her and not Facebook.

I am confidence that, a life, a year, or even just a few months without social media , I'll will be a better and happier person. I am not living for my followers, likes, or attention. I am living for myself, and that is all that matters.

Life is much too short to live it through a screen, and to make other people perceive that you are someone who you are not.

Stop living for others and their acceptance, live for yourself and your happiness.