Setting Boundaries on Social Media
Social media’s presence in our lives is beyond significant. It is the friend we lean on when we are bored, need to distract ourselves, and zone out after work and before sleep. It allows us to stay in touch with friends and family and keep an eye on the world beyond our fingertips. Its presence, while significant, also contributes widely to our mental health, including our confidence, self-worth and self-esteem, feelings of inadequacy, highlights and triggers things such as insecurities, anxieties and provides us with a platform to constantly compare ourselves with other people. Becoming more mindful of your usage and consumption of social media can help mediate some of these complex feelings and increase our self-awareness of our thoughts and health.
Because so many of us are prone to overconsumption and usage of social media, setting boundaries may be a helpful approach to allowing us to reconnect with our real lives and reduce the pressures to stay constantly connected. Boundaries can help our mental health by minimizing and controlling what we expose ourselves to online and how long we spend on various apps and websites.
Examples of boundaries:
-Set time limits for the apps you use, and allow for some down time to replace that ‘scrolling’ time
-Unfollowing people and/ or accounts that lead to negative thoughts, and sometimes, negative thoughts about yourself.
-Muting posts that are not adding to your mental health
-Change your profile settings and privacy
-Redefine your purpose for being on social media. Think about what lifts you up and contributes to positive thoughts, future goals, and overall happiness.
-Deleting apps all together
How to stick to these boundaries:
Once you determine your boundaries and how to implement them, it might be challenging to stick to them without any strategies to help you. Determining if there are any triggers may be a helpful approach to understanding what might prevent us from ignoring these boundaries. Additional reminders to help you stay on track may motivate you to stick to your goals and adjust any boundaries that may not work as well as they could. Finding something to replace your time and attention can help you distract yourself from the old habit of scrolling mindlessly. Lastly, ensuring you sign out every time you use the website or app helps prevent you from getting back into the app easily and makes you less likely to check it.
- Written by Shannon Brass
