This might be ironic coming from someone who ran a social media platform with millions of active people, but let me be honest with you all:
We should put our phones down!
I suggest stop posting for the next week. No more likes. Leave the emojis behind.
Over the week we’re all gathering with our families and friends to celebrate the season. See the new babies. Hear grandma’s same old stories. Catch up with that one buddy from high school. But the problem is, most of us will have a phone in our hands.
A 2022 survey found that nearly half of all Americans can’t go more than two hours without checking their phones while on vacation. It wasn’t always that way.
Try to remember what you did 15 years ago before you (probably) had a smartphone. Surely you celebrated the same holidays with the same people back then – so what did you do to pass the time? You talked. You laughed. You cried a little. You ate a lot. You enjoyed old relationships and built new ones. You reveled in a community you loved and one that loved you in return.
Social media was supposed to be about that, taking the real world’s emotional and intellectual connections and sharing them online. For a time, that worked. But somewhere along the way, the goal became adulation instead of commiseration. Being liked was more important than being likable.
And now we find ourselves seeking moments, or arranging moments, that can get us the warmest fuzzies on our favorite platform. That’s not family, it’s performance.
We built a community – one that had its warts, but a community nonetheless. And when it’s gone, and you have quiet moments without that constant stream in your hand, you realize some things.
Food tastes a little better when you’re not photographing it. Kids’ joyful laughter is that much warmer when you’re not adding stickers and a soundtrack. Your curmudgeonly uncle is nicer to be around when you’re not live-posting a running thread of his crankiest comments.
You won’t miss anything if you put the phone down this holiday season. The world won’t pass by, you won’t be left behind, nothing will be lost to you forever. Your online “family” will still be there, ready and waiting to interact in the new year.
In this joyous season – you don’t have to be on social media all the time. And you shouldn’t. Be with other people instead.
The love is better than any digital like you could ever receive.
Oh and one more thing before putting my phone down, Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays.
