3 years ago, I made the decision to completely go ghost on social media.And by social media, I mean Facebook because Facebook was like the only social media I was active on back then. I didn’t do it because I lost interest in the memes and fun on it. I did it for my mental health.
Image from pexels
Let’s just say that back then, I had serious inferiority complex and comparison problems, and seeing everyone my age all happy and making it whiles I didn’t even know where my life was headed made me feel like I was ending up a failure. Mind you, this was the thought of someone at 18. You can imagine how bad the pressure must’ve been for an 18 year old whose life is only getting started to feel like he missed the train of life already.
If you’re from Africa, you understand exactly what I’m talking about. Internet fraud or “Yahoo Yahoo” as it’s popularly called has shot a lot of teenagers and early adults into positions they shouldn’t be at, everything being equal.
Almost everyone my age at the time (and even still) are involved in some sort of internet scam. And for most of them, they’re making big money, and they just won’t let the rest of us normies rest! It always nights out, parties, cars, apartments and cars, girls, the complete sweet package. I decided already from day 1 I was never going to do fraud, but if I say the thought of regret of not doing it didn’t cross my mind back then, I’d be tagged liar of the century. I used to think about what my life would be like if I just followed Yakubu to the cafe a year ago😂
At some point, the pressure was becoming overwhelming, and I figured social media wasn’t healthy for my mental health. First thing, I deactivated my Facebook account for a couple of months. And let me tell you, it is one of the best things I’ve done for myself! Just the hit of a button has changed my life so much. It was very difficult the first few weeks and months, living completely blind, devoid of what was trending in my neighborhood, who bought the latest flashy car, where the boys are getting turnt at. But I found that after like 5 months, I started caring less and less for every passing day I didn’t open Facebook.
To compensate for going off of social media, I researched and found better substitute social media apps where I didn’t know anyone and where no one knew me. I loved the anonymity so I signed up on Tumblr and Reddit! These two are partially responsible for my sense of humor. Lol
Screenshot is from reddit(obviously)
I met a serious lot of strangers and read tons and tons of stuff that enriched my mind, in both good and bad ways. For the most part, I never commented or posted on Reddit myself until like a year later when a serious wave of depression hit me one time. And even though I was a total stranger who’s been lurking in the community, the Reddit community still came through with emotional support and encouragement. I’ve stuck to Reddit since then and by far I use it more than anything aside WhatsApp and Hive now.
The entire time I went ghost on Facebook, my WhatsApp was still active because even though I didn’t like the pressure, I still needed to stay in touch with WhatsApp and my inner circle. But there’s been a number of times I’ve gone ghost on WhatsApp itself, but in those cases, it wasn’t because of pressure. It was mostly because my seasonal depression just made me want to disconnect with everyone and everything.
Even on days when I’m not ghost on WhatsApp, I live a very private life, so much such that people who know me but are not on Hive would think I don’t have a life. A lot of people don’t post on WhatsApp to “show maturity”, but I do it to enjoy my life in private. I bomb my status with as many memes as I find hilarious when the memelord in me awakens occasionally though:D
University made it really difficult to come and go as I please though, because I needed to be online and active to stay updated on important information. But since only people I give my number to can have access to my WhatsApp, that wasn’t a problem. I just block and mute people who seem to contribute any sort of bother to my mental health. I’ve ghosted a lot of people and deleted a lot of numbers without explanations because of this.
Lol I’ve found recently that I have close to zero tolerance for anything that troubles my mental health. I’ve muted many many people (and blocked a few as well) on my WhatsApp because for one or two reasons, they make me feel a way I don’t want to feel. They just gotta go!
My most recent case of protecting my mental health from pressure was my decision to delete TikTok. The pressure I was getting from TikTok was a bit different. It wasn’t about money or finance. It was about how toxic content on there almost got into my head. My for you page was getting littered with them, and that could only mean one thing- that TikTok’s algorithm for some reason figured that was what I was interacting more with. And it wouldn’t be wrong to assume that because to some extent, it was true. To rid myself of having my decisions and thoughts influenced by 100 creators suggesting contrasting things, I hit delete. Another thing I’m proud of myself for doing this year.
One thing I find myself doing a lot recently is that I bury myself in so much work that I literally have no time to care for things that don’t matter. I find it really funny when people ghost me or cut me off to me because I literally will not notice I just for cut off because I’m too busy with other stuff.
I’m sure you’re wondering how come I’ve talked about social media for so long and yet Snapchat and Instagram still hasn’t been mentioned. My Snap and Insta are as dry as a desert. Lol I come once a while to Snapchat when I’m bored enough to remember I have a Snap. As for Insta, lol I don’t even remember my damn logins. Twitter rates next after Reddit, and it’s probably the popular social media I use most aside WhatsApp. Twitter is the hall of memes and you know I like samadat:)