Depression caused by Facebook (or any other social media)

[JohnV]

Recently i came up with the idea of abandoning any social media to increase my positive energy. Since i was very young "i was online" and over the years i saw my daily mood fainting. So i made a research on human psychology , and to be specific i tried to investigate WHY kids nowdays feel so jealous,greedy,bad,sad etc. for no reason. (eg. Seeing someone being "famous" or makin' "check in" and you're home alone and you feel sad). So to start with, i'll tell you my reason for going through all these things. I get asked all the time why I’m not on Facebook, so I thought I would share my thoughts with you. The main reason was that I was a compulsive user of Facebook. It was the ultimate distraction. I couldn’t even wait in line without checking the Facebook App on my mobile phone. I’d be going about my day and Status Updates would constantly pop into my head. It was a bad habit. I am fully aware of the benefits of social media – it’s extremely useful for keeping in touch with people, marketing, networking, job search and spreading information.
So..
The 5 benefits of not being on Facebook:

More Time: One of the main benefits of not having Facebook is how much time I suddenly had. I was so much more productive! I could write more music, work on more projects and have more time to spend it with people I cared about. I could also spend more time enjoying the outdoors or cooking a delicious meal.

Deeper Connections with People: The second most important benefit I had was that the level of depth to my friendships and relationships increased. Without the ability to check in on how people were doing online, I was able to have real meaningful conversations, you know, like we did in the old days ;)

More Privacy: I had more personal privacy and control over the info that was posted online about myself, and I had privacy from the Facebook information thieves.

Living in the Moment: Being less fixated on the online world helped me to become more present and aware of my surroundings. I was able to truly enjoy the here and now.

Higher Self Esteem: There have been studies that Facebook makes us unhealthy, sad and jealous because we compare ourselves to others. Well I can say with confidence that it hardly comes up for me anymore as I can’t peer into anyone’s lives.

I hope i motivated even one person to slightly change his "social-network habits" so that he or she can feel a little better and enjoy life to the fullest without feeling depressed !

I would love to hear your thoughts about this topic. :)

[Ridonks_CB]

I do agree that an excessive amount of time on social media can lead to less positive moods, withdrawal, and laziness. Im really glad this route you took has been helping you :)!
For me, these days I spend most of my time on my social media reading about the news, politics, getting actively involved with social issues, this like that. Many people become upset seeing the horrors of what goes on with the world, though personally I feel more open-minded when I know what's going on. I do enjoy speaking to people in real life more though and, though I'm not perfect (I should be doing my homework right now for example haha :P) I have lessened the amount of unproductive hours I spend in a day in comparison to only last year and years before that.
Before, I would always feel bored, get headaches and forget to eat even, I was very lazy and had a narrow mind. Now I love going outdoors, I began to excercise, and got better connected with some friends and family members :)

[Karkat]

If you feel it'd be beneficial to you, by all means.

I do have to disagree with some of the points you've brought up- maybe they're true for you, but not necessarily everyone.

Honestly, I, for instance, wouldn't have deeper conversations with people. I wouldn't end up having them at all. I have severe social anxiety, and I am often isolated due to health issues and controlling parents. (Yes, you heard that right. Adult with controlling parents. It's either that or homeless and...Dead.)

As far as living in the moment, I'd probably just end up sleeping. A lot. I don't have anything to do, and I have severe depression. Does Facebook help? *snort* Not really, but it's a distraction.
Same thing goes for more time

As far as self-esteem goes, I get it thrown in my face that I'm worthless daily. The only way to fix this would be [-]kill my parents and every one who has ever employed me ever[/-] (Don't worry, that was completely sarcasm.) to dig a hole and climb in.

I mean, would I have more privacy? I guess? I'm not super concerned about it. (Between you and me, I almost hope someone stalks and kills me just so it can be done and over with)

But once again, if it helps you, then by all means.

[Microcosm]

For me, I just rarely ever get on FaceBook. It can actually be quite helpful in certain situations when you might need to get into contact with someone. I'd say you should just keep the account, but maybe disconnect it from notifications and e-mail. Then you wouldn't be bothered by it so much. But I definitely see where you're coming from. I had the same thoughts to at one time.

[JohnV]

I think you should give it a try and quite any social media just for a week or something, and join a team,club etc. to keep you busy and im sure you'll feel a lot better !!
Thanks for your time :D Good luck with any choice you'll make!

[Dying Ember]

I have to agree with Karkat on this one.
I don't actually have Facebook or intagram or any other soical network apart from twitter which I barely ever use. I still face the problem of low self esteem and I find it hard to talk to people face to face about 'important' things so I tend to use text or phone for speaking to people about deeper things which is a good release of everything bottled up inside me. Without being able to do that I think I would be in a far worse situation than I'm in now.
However, I do think that reduced time on soical network would be benifitial to the majority of people, not necessarily for the points that you've made but for other things such as bullying

[fiftycents]

This is quite true, I deactivated my Facebook last month and it actually felt refreshing. I could focus on something that isn't "online socializing". Social networking sites should increase our socializing skills but in reality all it did was to kill the art of communication. We keep ourselves busy in front of a screen, we don't realize that there is so much more enjoyable other than that. I'm thinking that the 80s & 90s kids had the best childhood and teenage years, I mean like they are really "socializing" with one another.

This isn't really related to the topic but I suggest you all should watch this, if you already did.
Let me see what are your thoughts on it.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipe6CMvW0Dg