Clearing the Cobwebs

It’s been four months since I last wrote here, its probably not the best idea to call attention to that but the past four months I think I’ve suffered something very much like a Social Media burn out.

Just the idea of looking at Facebook and Twitter was enough to make me cringe.

The only social media platform that didn’t make me feel fatigued was tumblr, but that belonged to another internet persona, and mostly all I felt like doing was reblog and liking, which was essentially the same thing and yet I felt tired just thinking of logging into Facebook, Twitter, and even Instagram.

I’ve been thinking why that is, why I suddenly felt so burned out with Facebook, and Twitter.

Since I had my lightning strike moment last 2012 I’ve been pushing myself to get out of my shell and meet more people through communities.

I enjoyed myself a lot since everyone I met were fun and welcoming, and then somewhere in early 2014, I was beginning to feel exhausted with everything.
It wasn’t just that I was joining meet ups and communities that taxed me, it was also because of things I was doing on my own time, aside from work I wanted to know everything.

I was subscribed to almost every newsletter and podcast I could get a hold of, enrolled in any online course. It was hard to keep focus, even my twitter feed, which I consider my reading list became unwieldy.
Eventually I let some subscriptions pass, I checked in on my Facebook less frequently and missed, to my shame, quite a number of really fantastic community meet ups.

I think it essentially boiled down to one simple reason, I’m an introvert.
This isn’t exactly a surprise, but it was a surprise to me that interacting, even online can still be very draining.
I only started back again recently, crawling back in slowly to twitter and Facebook. For some reason, I find I can handle twitter better than Facebook.
I also started reading (or insome places, re-reading) articles from Paul Jarvis, and Nate Kontny (Draft, recent CEO of Highrise), I’ve cut back on my reading list clutter. Especially once I’ve realized that both of these men are introverts themselves. I think that helped me a lot.

Another thing they both have in common, is they put a lot of premium on writing, Paul Jarvis is a web designer and a published author of a number of books, and Nate Kontny developed Draft to help himself become a better writer.

After paring down my regular reading list to those two, I suddenly felt everything was more manageable for me. There was breathing space in my head again, and it felt wonderful.

I go to Facebook but I don’t feel the need to always check in, I go to instagram and check on a few pictures, and ‘like’ a few posts.
I still fall off the wagon from time to time, and I still feel overwhelmed, and there are days when I still feel like checking into Facebook is too messy but its manageable now.

One other thing I’m going to try and remove the clutter on, is this blog. I started this trying to find the best topic I would be comfortable writing, and I largely did stick to topics where I felt I was interested in but it still didn’t feel like me.

So I’m going to try an experiment and try to focus on things that felt more like who I am, and not what I think would be the most popular thing to write.

To do that, I have to come to terms to the idea that I am a geek. An entertainment, pop culture geek. I love everything about books, TV shows, and movies. Its pretty hard to go a full day without me consuming something fictional.

I’m also an internet enthusiast, I’m also quite easily diverted by the shiniest tech gadgets out now.

People I know know this about me but, I think not enough.

I’ve also re-started my TV review blog All Star TV. Come on over, I’m currently focusing on Person of Interest but that will change since I find myself enjoying Madam Secretary too.

But back to this blog, I’m going to start writing about a social media platform that I think I’ve become very acquainted with the past few years, Tumblr.

The first in the series will be out soon, so watch this space!

Have you experienced social media burn out? How did you cope with it