Media has now just become a part of my everyday life. From when I wake up for school at 6am to God knows when I fall asleep. Social media apps have become an unhealthy obsession that has wrapped it’s claws around my ever day life. It’s extremely easy to fall into a rabbit hole of social media for hours without even realizing it.
Like the large majority of teenagers in todays day and age media is in every aspect of my life from using it for homework or to just pass the time. Any free time I have Instagram is my go to for wasting time. One Saturday I checked how long I had actually used the app and I saw I had been on Instagram for about 9 hours. Then I thought about how if I had spent 1 of those 9 hours studying for a test, I could potentially raise my grade. That was just the use of Instagram. I then checked my use of YouTube for the day and it read 6 hours. So in total I had been on my phone for 15 hours in total. 15 hours. Thats more than half of the hours in a day. I realized that I had an unhealthy attachment to my phone. Whenever I wasn't staring at my screen, time would move so slowly and every action I did but seem like it took forever. These apps are designed to keep us in the app and they were successful. Everything in digital media happens so fast that it actually alters our reality of time. I decided enough was enough and that I would see how long I could swear off of social media. Taking baby steps I deleted Instagram which, as you can probably tell, didn't last long. After about a week I was filled with boredom that I just redownloaded it without even thinking. Social media platforms do such a good job keeping you attached so that overall my social media experience is mostly negative. In writing this media blog I have taken at least 7 "breaks" and went on Instagram for 5-15 minutes.
Wow, 15 hours! That seems like such an obscene amount that I would never be able to reach, but upon checking my own screen time, I am closer than I would have expected. Phones are almost an extension of ourselves. We constantly check it, glancing down every other minute and not realizing how quickly that time adds up! The last line about breaks might as well have been directed at me (because everything should be about me). The way that we use social media to "reward" ourselves, instead of understanding that it is a distraction keeping us away from getting an assignment done is very unhealthy. Speaking of, my imaginary friends are texting me and I have some YouTube videos to watch as soon as I am done with this, so let's wrap this up. What do you think we should do in order to resolve our addiction? Does trying to live without our phones work, or will we just be more drawn to them later?
ReplyDeleteHi, it's really Jack Galvez because his blog comments don't work. "I think this blog emphasizes the actions that almost all of us take during high school. It was interesting to see how long you were actually on your phone and it was cool to see how much you actually cut back on it. When I was reading this blog I was baffled by how closely related our screen habits are. If I had one comment on it, it would be, why do you still take breaks when you can turn it off? Overall, it was a great blog!"
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