Speaker 1: Attachment and aversion are two sides of the same coin.
Speaker 1: Rite this idea that attachment. If I'm addicted to something,
Speaker 1: if you're trying to push it away and reject it,
Speaker 1: it's as strongly present in your life. Right If you
Speaker 1: love someone and you hate someone, you almost think about
Speaker 1: them equally. If you hate someone with that same obsession
Speaker 1: or that same intensity as you love someone, you almost
Speaker 1: think about them as much as you love someone. Hey, everyone,
Speaker 1: welcome back to on Purpose. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: being here right now. I am so grateful for your time,
Speaker 1: your energy, your presence. And this is one of those
Speaker 1: themes that I'm really excited I get to address with
Speaker 1: you today. I think that I'm reading more and more searches,
Speaker 1: more and more trends, more and more articles about how
Speaker 1: social media is negatively affecting our mental health. And as
Speaker 1: someone who creates a lot on social media, who's sharing
Speaker 1: a lot of insights and ideas on social media, I
Speaker 1: want to help you navigate and understand how you can
Speaker 1: use social media so that it stops using you. And
Speaker 1: today I'm going to give you a step by step
Speaker 1: plan to block social media from controlling your life and
Speaker 1: your mind. And I want to start off by saying this,
Speaker 1: All new technologies are always going to catch us off guard.
Speaker 1: They're always going to surprise us. There's always going to
Speaker 1: be pros and cons. It was the same as when
Speaker 1: TVs arrived, then color TVs, radios, the Internet. Right, There's
Speaker 1: always been fear. It's always affected us positively and negatively.
Speaker 1: But what I've understood is that a lot of the times,
Speaker 1: we spend a lot of our energy talking about the challenges,
Speaker 1: the stresses, the pressures, the fears of what this new
Speaker 1: technology brings. I'm not saying we shouldn't do that, but
Speaker 1: often we spend such a high amount of our time
Speaker 1: on the issue that we don't really talk about how
Speaker 1: to maneuver, navigate, and guide ourselves through with what is happening. Inevitably, right,
Speaker 1: social media happened and is happening. AI has already happened
Speaker 1: and is happening. And I think unless we can truly
Speaker 1: understand how we fit into a world where it exists,
Speaker 1: it's really difficult for us to take steps forward. We
Speaker 1: can't just keep talking about the challenges and the issues.
Speaker 1: We have to use the challenge and the issue, which
Speaker 1: is what I'm going to attempt to do today and
Speaker 1: then give you solutions, actions and a plan to transform
Speaker 1: that now, just to make it really, really clear, because
Speaker 1: maybe some of us are thinking, Oh, it doesn't affect
Speaker 1: me that much, or it's okay, or maybe you're listening
Speaker 1: right now and you're saying, Jay, this is exactly what
Speaker 1: I need right now. Right If you're someone who spends
Speaker 1: it's too long on social media, if you're someone who's
Speaker 1: feeling a lot of fomo, if you're someone who's feeling
Speaker 1: more stressed and anxiety about your social media usage, you're
Speaker 1: in the right place. So this study blew my mind.
Speaker 1: Forty six percent of respondents indicated that social media makes
Speaker 1: them want to permanently change a part of their body
Speaker 1: through surgery. Now I'm raising that not because I have
Speaker 1: any issues with surgery. I'm raising that because it just
Speaker 1: shows the level of impact. This isn't just an idea.
Speaker 1: It's an ideology that makes us want to physically permanently
Speaker 1: change something because of what we're seeing, because of what
Speaker 1: we're exposed to. Now, listen to this. Eighty nine percent
Speaker 1: of respondents indicated that they feel unsatisfied with their life
Speaker 1: and comparing it to others on social media. Raise your
Speaker 1: hands if you felt that way, Raise your hands if
Speaker 1: that thought has crossed your mind many, many times. I
Speaker 1: think we all have that thought. Now the next one
Speaker 1: thirty two percent of respondents indicated that they feel addicted
Speaker 1: to bad news online. How many of us know that
Speaker 1: when we see bad news, we share it more, we
Speaker 1: comment more, we talk about it more, we hang out
Speaker 1: with our friends more. It's fascinating to me. Now, why
Speaker 1: am I sharing these three things? I know we all
Speaker 1: do them. And you know what the biggest challenge is,
Speaker 1: we want to completely eliminate the thought. Here's the truth.
Speaker 1: You can't eliminate the thought. You can only have a
Speaker 1: response to it. You can't eliminate ever having a thought
Speaker 1: about fomo or bad news. You will have it. It
Speaker 1: will always be your instant response, because that's how we've
Speaker 1: been conditioned for years. All you can change is how
Speaker 1: quickly you have a response that's healthy. Right, So, the
Speaker 1: unhealthy thought of I feel unsatisfied with my life, which
Speaker 1: doesn't make you feel great about yourself, right, It doesn't
Speaker 1: make you feel good about yourself. That thought is going
Speaker 1: to keep recurring for probably most of your life. But
Speaker 1: that's not something to get discouraged about. What we need
Speaker 1: to recognize is at the same time, if we can
Speaker 1: say I don't feel satisfied with my life and ask
Speaker 1: the question, but I'm going to figure it out. What
Speaker 1: is it? What would make me feel satisfied with my life?
Speaker 1: Because guess what, it's not just doing what that person's doing.
Speaker 1: I don't really want to go to that party. I
Speaker 1: don't really want to be invited to that event. But
Speaker 1: I'm saying that there's a part of my life that's
Speaker 1: not satisfying. And that's the really interesting trick or switch
Speaker 1: that we need to make. Right, we're not really saying
Speaker 1: are we really saying that's the life we want? Or
Speaker 1: if we stop to think about it, we're just saying, no,
Speaker 1: there's a life I want, but I'm not there yet. Right.
Speaker 1: You are going to respond to bad news. It's how
Speaker 1: our brains are wired. You're going to see bad news
Speaker 1: and become attracted to it, and you're going to want
Speaker 1: to talk about it. But how about next time you're
Speaker 1: with your friends and you start a conversation, you purposely
Speaker 1: propose a positive news topic. You say, hey, did you
Speaker 1: see this? Did you see this amazing video of this
Speaker 1: little kid? Did you see this incredible thing that this
Speaker 1: person did in the media. How about you become that switch.
Speaker 1: I want you to try it out for seven days.
Speaker 1: Please please, please, please please, Because what we don't understand
Speaker 1: is when we talk negatively about other people, we're then
Speaker 1: more fearful of people talking negatively about us. Right if
Speaker 1: there's been the latest scandal, the latest issue, we're diving
Speaker 1: into the gossip. It feels like it doesn't affect us.
Speaker 1: I promise you it does because you now become less
Speaker 1: vulnerable about your challenges with your friends, because you don't
Speaker 1: want to be the talk of the town. Here's what
Speaker 1: I want to add as our direction for today. If
Speaker 1: we don't learn how to use technology, it ends up
Speaker 1: consuming us. We're not trained how to interact with new technology.
Speaker 1: And on top of all of that, it's designed to
Speaker 1: be addictive, and therefore we have to be more careful
Speaker 1: when we interact with it. I find it really fascinating
Speaker 1: that addictive substances are generally bound by age, So you
Speaker 1: have to be eighteen to smoke, right, and nicotine is
Speaker 1: one of the most accessible legal drugs, and it's also
Speaker 1: one of the most addictive, and most people who smoke
Speaker 1: just a few times will get hooked, and only a
Speaker 1: very few people are able to smoke occasionally without being addicted. Now,
Speaker 1: what's really interesting is I feel that way about social media. Right,
Speaker 1: you only have to use social media a few times
Speaker 1: before you're addicted. It's not something that's like a slow burner.
Speaker 1: More like alcohol, which is kind of like this. You
Speaker 1: don't get immediately hooked, but it takes a longer period
Speaker 1: of time. Social media, I think we'd all agree, is
Speaker 1: far more instant. And what's really interesting is when you
Speaker 1: look at the relationship, we understand that what's happening chemically
Speaker 1: is the release of dopamine, and studies showed that scientists
Speaker 1: used to think that dopamine was a pleasure chemical in
Speaker 1: the brain, but now we know it actually creates desire.
Speaker 1: Dopamine causes us to seek, want, and search, and the
Speaker 1: pull of dopamine is so strong that studies have shown
Speaker 1: tweeting is harder for people to resist than cigarettes and alcohol.
Speaker 1: You know, you don't have to be twenty one to
Speaker 1: be on social media, but our brains are not fully
Speaker 1: developed when we're using it, and it's more addictive. So
Speaker 1: I also want to take that as a point of
Speaker 1: empathy and compassion with yourself. That if you, your child,
Speaker 1: your niece, your nephew, your cousin is struggling with social
Speaker 1: media addiction, please don't see that as a weakness. Please
Speaker 1: don't see that as your fault. It's designed to do that.
Speaker 1: And I think when we stop guilting ourselves, we have
Speaker 1: the opportunity for grit. When we stop making ourselves feel
Speaker 1: bad about something, we might actually be able to make
Speaker 1: a good choice. Right. Think about that. Listen to that again.
Speaker 1: When we stop making ourselves feel bad about something, we
Speaker 1: can actually start making better, good choices. Right. And it's
Speaker 1: just interesting how we've given access to something that is
Speaker 1: so addictive to everyone. Think about gambling, right. Gambling activates
Speaker 1: the brain's reward system, which is powered by dopamine. And
Speaker 1: dopamine is a neurotransmitter inside the brain that reinforces sensations
Speaker 1: of pleasure and connects those sensations to certain behaviors or actions.
Speaker 1: So we're getting locked in that loop. Right. You go
Speaker 1: on social media, you see someone like your post, you comment,
Speaker 1: you get that dopamine reward bang. I'm going to keep
Speaker 1: using it, keep using it to get that same dopamine reward,
Speaker 1: And the way it works is you have to keep
Speaker 1: doing more and more and more to get the same
Speaker 1: level of benefit. It's not like you do more and
Speaker 1: you get more benefit or more excit It's almost like
Speaker 1: you've got to do more every time to get the
Speaker 1: same level of excitement. So we have access to something
Speaker 1: very addictive, and if you're addicted or if you're struggling,
Speaker 1: that is not your fault. It is natural. And today's
Speaker 1: all about saying, well, how can I actually develop a
Speaker 1: healthy relationship with something which has benefits, which has pros,
Speaker 1: which can benefit my life in many many ways? But
Speaker 1: how do I make sure that that's what I'm getting
Speaker 1: out of it? And that's really what life is about overall,
Speaker 1: is saying this exists, how can I interact with it
Speaker 1: in a way that it's beneficial to my existence. So
Speaker 1: let's dive in. One of the first things I read
Speaker 1: which blew my mind in this studies that people talk
Speaker 1: about themselves around thirty to forty percent of the time
Speaker 1: in person. If you're an in person conversation, you're going
Speaker 1: to talk about yourself thirty to forty percent of the time.
Speaker 1: Is the other time you're talking about them and maybe
Speaker 1: you're talking about a world event, right, So if you're
Speaker 1: talking about yourself thirty to forty percent, and they're talking
Speaker 1: about themselves thirty to forty percent, that's sixty to eighty percent,
Speaker 1: and then the rest of the twenty to forty percent
Speaker 1: is about what's happening in the world. Check this out.
Speaker 1: On social media, people talk about themselves eighty percent of
Speaker 1: the time. Eighty percent. That's double what we do in
Speaker 1: real life. So when we receive a notification of positive feedback,
Speaker 1: we feel a positive sensation from dopamine. But let's look
Speaker 1: at that the other way. When you get a negative comment,
Speaker 1: it has a negative interaction. What I'm really learning here
Speaker 1: and I looked into some more of the research, and
Speaker 1: it says that talking face to face is messy and
Speaker 1: emotionally involved, and we don't get the time to do
Speaker 1: what psychologists call self presentation or positioning yourself. So on
Speaker 1: social media we get to position ourselves how we want,
Speaker 1: as opposed in real life when you have to do
Speaker 1: it in the moment, we struggle to do that. Now,
Speaker 1: the challenge with that is also that when we position
Speaker 1: ourselves and we take a lot of time to curate ourselves,
Speaker 1: but then people don't like the way we curate ourselves.
Speaker 1: That causes an issue, right, just as we like the
Speaker 1: positive feedback, of course, we get negatively affected by the comments.
Speaker 1: And sixty two percent of people say they feel better
Speaker 1: about themselves when people react positively to what they post
Speaker 1: on social media. But of course we know the same
Speaker 1: is true for the negative. So what are we trying
Speaker 1: to say here? We're trying to say that we're basically
Speaker 1: more self obsessed on social media. We're more self focused,
Speaker 1: and that ends up creating rewards, but it also ends
Speaker 1: up creating issues. Here's how I want us to shift.
Speaker 1: How can we shift to focusing on connecting with others
Speaker 1: on social media? How can we comment positively on other
Speaker 1: people's posts? How can we truly feel excited for others?
Speaker 1: This is the real question that we're struggling with because
Speaker 1: we get so self obsessed, which makes us more amplified.
Speaker 1: It's almost like putting a magnifying glass on the self,
Speaker 1: which means the positives gets bigger and so does the negative.
Speaker 1: But it's actually the struggle that we have is how
Speaker 1: do we actually feel more excited about other people's joy.
Speaker 1: Here's a few things I want to share with you.
Speaker 1: Someone else's joy does not take away from your opportunity
Speaker 1: for joy. There is no cap on the amount of
Speaker 1: people getting married in twenty twenty three. There is no
Speaker 1: cap of the amount of billionaires or millionaires or financially
Speaker 1: free people in twenty twenty three, or twenty twenty four
Speaker 1: for that matter. The world has made us believe that
Speaker 1: there is a finite number of seats. There's limited availability,
Speaker 1: there's VIP, and then there's normal, the special seats, the
Speaker 1: last seats, the final few, it's sold out. Write This
Speaker 1: language has created this belief of scarcity, that there is
Speaker 1: less and less and less opportunity for you to live
Speaker 1: the life you want. And I want to remind you this.
Speaker 1: There is unlimited opportunity. There is no limit. There is
Speaker 1: no cap on any of the things you pursue. They're
Speaker 1: just don't Maybe you have to wait a bit longer,
Speaker 1: maybe it's not your turn this time. But I promise
Speaker 1: you that someone else winning does not mean you're losing.
Speaker 1: And this is something we have to remind ourselves off daily.
Speaker 1: When someone else is winning, that does not mean you're losing.
Speaker 1: And instead of feeling envious and jealous when someone else
Speaker 1: is winning study them, study, learn take notes, learn about
Speaker 1: their struggle, learn about their journey, learn about what they
Speaker 1: did to get there, whatever that may be. Because when
Speaker 1: you study and you understand the struggle, you no longer
Speaker 1: feel envious. You recognize that it took a lot out
Speaker 1: of them, and you're ready to go down that same path.
Speaker 1: So we have to shift our focus on how we
Speaker 1: view others and how we view ourselves. I think we
Speaker 1: spend too much time on social media thinking about ourselves,
Speaker 1: and we need to kind of get back down to
Speaker 1: that thirty to forty percent. If we're on social media
Speaker 1: spending thirty to forty percent of time on ourselves, but
Speaker 1: then thirty to forty percent of time supporting our friends,
Speaker 1: supporting others, and maybe twenty percent of time making sure
Speaker 1: we follow and unfollow the right places, Like I have blocked, muted,
Speaker 1: unfollowed so many things that I don't want to see
Speaker 1: on a daily basis because I know that they trigger
Speaker 1: certain responses, and that's really important. Are you aware of
Speaker 1: what triggers you down a negative path? Are you aware
Speaker 1: of what sets you off? Right? Who are those pages?
Speaker 1: I literally know the page when it pops up, if
Speaker 1: it ever does again, and I say, Okay, now, no
Speaker 1: wonder I'm feeling this way. Okay, number two, this one's
Speaker 1: really really important to me. And this one is something
Speaker 1: that I think we underutilize. And I'm sure you've heard
Speaker 1: this before, but I just want to reiterate it because
Speaker 1: I find it becoming so common. Please do activities without
Speaker 1: your phone when you're with your friends, like dinners, lunches, brunches,
Speaker 1: Like put the phone away and put it away together.
Speaker 1: Make it a ritual where you all put it in
Speaker 1: a bowl at the beginning. You will put it away
Speaker 1: in your own bags or someone's bag at the beginning.
Speaker 1: Like make a commitment out of it. Make a commitment
Speaker 1: out of it, because we all know that everyone starts
Speaker 1: a good conversation phones on the table, Take phones off
Speaker 1: the table. Take the phone off the table, and keep
Speaker 1: each other accountable to this because it's so easy for
Speaker 1: when someone says, I'm going to the bathroom, you just
Speaker 1: take your phone out. I've been forcing myself to not
Speaker 1: take out my phone in gaps. It's hard for me too,
Speaker 1: By the way, The gaps are the easiest time for
Speaker 1: me when someone's gone to the bathroom or I'm getting
Speaker 1: in the elevator. I've been trying really hard to not
Speaker 1: distract myself with my phone and use it in that
Speaker 1: way and instead to just be present, listen to the
Speaker 1: music and the elevator, to observe the cool clothes someone's
Speaker 1: wearing next to me, to take a moment at a restaurant,
Speaker 1: to just look at the menu, to just take in
Speaker 1: the sense and the sites. It's really hard to do this,
Speaker 1: but it's so important that we get used to not
Speaker 1: using our phone as a gap filler. And you'll say
Speaker 1: to me, Jay, well, how do I do that? Because
Speaker 1: my natural instinct is to pick up my phone, make
Speaker 1: your background on your phone saying put down your phone,
Speaker 1: put it away right. Whatever you need is that reminder
Speaker 1: when you take it out, right, when you first take
Speaker 1: it out and you're about to start scrolling, just take
Speaker 1: a moment to set the habit of when you pull
Speaker 1: your phone out, to ask why am I here? Do
Speaker 1: I actually need anything from this? And it's going to
Speaker 1: feel weird at first, it's going to feel strange at first,
Speaker 1: but I promise you that the more you can actually
Speaker 1: create that distance between you and your phone in those gaps,
Speaker 1: the more you're going to start feeling peace and ease,
Speaker 1: and you just need to try it a few times
Speaker 1: to feel it. A study found that ninety four percent
Speaker 1: of participants reported feeling troubled when they didn't have their phone,
Speaker 1: eighty percent were when someone else use their phone, and
Speaker 1: seventy percent expected to feel depressed, panicked, and helpless if
Speaker 1: their phone weren't missing or they couldn't find it. A
Speaker 1: study found that eighty nine percent of undergraduate students experience
Speaker 1: phantom vibrations. This is the perception of vibrations from a
Speaker 1: mobile device that isn't vibrating. People crave receiving notifications so
Speaker 1: much that they start imagining them right, and this is
Speaker 1: why we have to get out and do activities where
Speaker 1: you don't even think about your phone, like ping pong, tennis, pickleball, walks, hikes,
Speaker 1: getting out there into nature with friends, with family. You
Speaker 1: won't even think about your phone. You won't even need
Speaker 1: it because you have to use your body in mind.
Speaker 1: What's happening now is we're doing more activities that don't
Speaker 1: require our three sixty presents. For example, if I'm playing pickleball,
Speaker 1: or if I'm playing ping pong or tennis or whatever
Speaker 1: it may be, I can't be on my phone and
Speaker 1: hold a racket at the same time. It's just not possible.
Speaker 1: If you're into golf, if you're into football or soccer
Speaker 1: or whatever it may be, you're not going to be
Speaker 1: able to be on your phone at the same time,
Speaker 1: and you could be out there for two three hours. Right,
Speaker 1: And we're doing too many activities where you can be
Speaker 1: watching TV while you're on your phone. You could be
Speaker 1: cooking while you're on your phone, right. You could be
Speaker 1: doing so many other things while you're on your phone,
Speaker 1: while you're talking to someone else. And the more we
Speaker 1: take time every day to do activities where it's just
Speaker 1: physically impossible that you're incapable of doing it while you're
Speaker 1: on your phone. Especially sports is such a great way
Speaker 1: of getting outdoors and being away from it. And that's
Speaker 1: where we're training ourselves to have extended periods of time. Right.
Speaker 1: If I just told you just sit in your house
Speaker 1: and don't be on your device, it's not going to work.
Speaker 1: And so we have to find that alternative. We have
Speaker 1: to find a way of being off our devices in
Speaker 1: a way that's fully present. I know that I can
Speaker 1: play pickaball for three hours and then I'll go back
Speaker 1: to my phone and I'll think, Wow, like you know,
Speaker 1: I didn't even miss my phone. Now the next one.
Speaker 1: We all know we need to reduce usage. And this
Speaker 1: is something I want to talk about because a lot
Speaker 1: of us think we need to completely stop using social media. Now.
Speaker 1: That can be useful in small periods, but overall, we
Speaker 1: need to build a healthy relationship. And a healthy relationship
Speaker 1: is not a version. There's a beautiful quote in The
Speaker 1: Bug with Ghita which says that attachment and aversion are
Speaker 1: two sides of the same coin. Right, this idea that attachment.
Speaker 1: If I'm addicted to something, actually, if you're trying to
Speaker 1: push it away and reject it, it's as strongly present
Speaker 1: in your life. Right. If you love someone and you
Speaker 1: hate someone, you almost think about them equally. If you
Speaker 1: hate someone with that same obsession or that same intensity
Speaker 1: as you love someone, you almost think about them as
Speaker 1: much as you love someone. And so with social media.
Speaker 1: If you hate it, if you're trying to be like
Speaker 1: I don't want it, I want to be away from it,
Speaker 1: it's almost like you're thinking about it again. Now here's
Speaker 1: something I want to say to you that's really helped me. No,
Speaker 1: technology zones and times in your home, and I want
Speaker 1: you to think about this in a fun way. You
Speaker 1: can literally put print out signs with the no phone
Speaker 1: sign almost like a no smoking sign, but with a
Speaker 1: phone picture, in areas of your home that you want
Speaker 1: to be reminded that you have to leave your phone
Speaker 1: out of. So I remember, for me, I almost visualized
Speaker 1: lasers in certain parts of mine and my wife's apartment
Speaker 1: and now our home where it's like, okay, in the bedroom,
Speaker 1: no phone area, right the dining table, no phone area.
Speaker 1: Like what are those areas in your home? And literally
Speaker 1: put up signs make it fun and silly if friends
Speaker 1: will come over and they'll have to leave it out
Speaker 1: as well, and all of a sudden it's like, okay,
Speaker 1: we're in a no phone zone. We're in a no
Speaker 1: phone zone in the house. This area we're not using
Speaker 1: it. It could be a table, it could be a bedside table,
Speaker 1: it could be wherever you think it's important for you
Speaker 1: to disconnect. Because people who limited their social media use
Speaker 1: to ten minutes day for three weeks led to lower
Speaker 1: loneliness and depression. You think your loneliness may go up
Speaker 1: if you're not on social media, your loneliness actually goes
Speaker 1: down when you reduce your time on social media, and
Speaker 1: reducing social media use to even thirteen minutes per day
Speaker 1: results in significantly lower levels of anxiety, depression, sleep problems,
Speaker 1: and of course fomo. Now now I like using social media,
Speaker 1: and I found a way of limiting my social media
Speaker 1: in a way that I'm following things that make me happy,
Speaker 1: following things that don't give me those negative responses. And
Speaker 1: that's what it is. It's those it's the responses that
Speaker 1: make us feel unhealthy that we're looking out for. So
Speaker 1: I want you to think about the no technology zones
Speaker 1: and no technology times in your home, Like for me,
Speaker 1: an hour before bed and the first couple of hours
Speaker 1: when I wake up, they're no technology times. And I
Speaker 1: found that the easiest way to do that is to
Speaker 1: lock in to my morning routine. So, whether it's my meditation,
Speaker 1: my reflection, I need to do something in the morning.
Speaker 1: But I found that my phone just has to be
Speaker 1: far away. Right. At one point, I literally used to
Speaker 1: lock my phone in my laptop in my car and
Speaker 1: I got a real alarm clock and it saved the day.
Speaker 1: Now I want to address fomo. I want to address
Speaker 1: the idea that we think that everyone around us is
Speaker 1: having an amazing life, and the reason we think that
Speaker 1: is because we don't actually know them. Our relationships through
Speaker 1: social media become shallower. As your relationship becomes shallower, people
Speaker 1: tell you less personal, intimate information about them. Therefore you
Speaker 1: only have the very non intimate public version of this person,
Speaker 1: and that's the version you trust to be reality, when
Speaker 1: what's actually happening is there's so much going on behind
Speaker 1: the scenes, which is why we need to have deeper
Speaker 1: relationships with people. Now I'm not saying the reason to
Speaker 1: have deeper relationships with people is to so that you
Speaker 1: know how sad they are, so that you don't have FOMO.
Speaker 1: But it's a natural impact. It's a natural byproduct. When
Speaker 1: you get to know people deeply and intimately, you realize
Speaker 1: we all have so much going on, we have so
Speaker 1: much stress. You realize everyone's life is not perfect, and
Speaker 1: you say to yourself, oh, okay, I get it. We're
Speaker 1: all struggling. We're all in the same boat. And I
Speaker 1: want to take this opportunity to say that to you.
Speaker 1: I'm in the same boat as you. I have stresses,
Speaker 1: I have anxieties, I have challenges, I have problems. I
Speaker 1: have all of the above, right, And it's so easy
Speaker 1: when you don't know someone deeply to just assume that
Speaker 1: they're fine. I remember last year when I was talking
Speaker 1: about the surgeries I went through, or you know, on
Speaker 1: the podcast, of course, if you listen to me, we
Speaker 1: have a deep into my relationship. You know, I talk
Speaker 1: about my issues and challenges. But if someone just follows
Speaker 1: me on Instagram, I don't get the context to go
Speaker 1: this deep all the time. Right. And by the way,
Speaker 1: I love posting on Instagram. I love sharing what I share,
Speaker 1: but the podcast is always giving you more context of
Speaker 1: what I'm going through, And so I encourage you to
Speaker 1: have more curious, vulnerable conversations with people you love, and
Speaker 1: especially the people you have fomo about. Right, those people
Speaker 1: in your life actually get to know them and you
Speaker 1: start to realize that their life is imperfect. This one's
Speaker 1: a big one for me. Become a creator not a consumer.
Speaker 1: This is something that has helped me on social media.
Speaker 1: I find myself because I'm a creator. I'm often on
Speaker 1: social media to share as opposed to consume. And there
Speaker 1: are over two hundred million creators worldwide, and of these creators,
Speaker 1: two percent, which is around four million, have more than
Speaker 1: one hundred thousand followers, while most creators, about one hundred
Speaker 1: and forty million, have between one and ten thousand followers.
Speaker 1: The idea is when you're creating, you have less time
Speaker 1: to consume. Also, when you're creating, you have less to
Speaker 1: be on social media because you're actually creating off social media.
Speaker 1: And the reason I encourage you to create not just consume,
Speaker 1: is your consumption becomes more strategic and effective. You're now
Speaker 1: watching things that inspire you. Now watching things that help
Speaker 1: you learn what's your passion go and follow accounts that
Speaker 1: really speak to your passion. One of my favorites accounts
Speaker 1: right now is Amy McNee and her account is called
Speaker 1: Inspired to Write. She is a writer and an author
Speaker 1: and a creativity coach, and she posts some of the
Speaker 1: best advice for creatives. And I think when that pops
Speaker 1: up on my feed, it makes my day because it
Speaker 1: reminds me how I want to create. It reminds me
Speaker 1: how I want to show up. Whereas if I'm just
Speaker 1: following things that don't give me that reminder, if I'm
Speaker 1: not making it easy for myself, right, if I'm not
Speaker 1: making it easy for myself then of course I'm only
Speaker 1: going to see things that trigger me and bring me down.
Speaker 1: I think too many of us that proportion of things
Speaker 1: that inspire us, that ratio of the things we follow
Speaker 1: between the things that inspire us and the things that
Speaker 1: trigger us, is like for every one thing that inspires us,
Speaker 1: we seeing like twenty five things that trigger us, and
Speaker 1: that needs to change. Now. I want to share with
Speaker 1: you some apps that may help as well, because sometimes
Speaker 1: we need to not be limited by the apps we
Speaker 1: have by more apps. So freedom for blocking distractions and
Speaker 1: all yours at once. This is an article I saw
Speaker 1: on zapia dot com which gave these great recommendations. Cold
Speaker 1: Turkey Blocker for scheduled system wide blocking, leech Block NG
Speaker 1: for free browser based website blocking, Rescue Time for time
Speaker 1: tracking with built in website blocking, Forest for motivating you
Speaker 1: to put your phone down, Self Control for a nuclear option,
Speaker 1: Focus for a combination, Pomodoro timer and distraction blocker, Poor
Speaker 1: Block for distraction blocking with cute animal pictures. Now I'm
Speaker 1: not affiliated with any of those apps, but those are
Speaker 1: just some that came up through my search that have
Speaker 1: heard about being useful for people. But I've also found
Speaker 1: and here's here's the reality that I've found that having
Speaker 1: alternatives is better than having blocks. Blocks is almost like
Speaker 1: it's almost like teasing yourself where you want to break through. Right,
Speaker 1: It's like when your parents told you you're not allowed
Speaker 1: to play on the PlayStation for this much time, or
Speaker 1: you're not allowed to be on your phone for this long.
Speaker 1: You just want to break that rule. So I don't
Speaker 1: think rules help as much as alternatives. And that's why
Speaker 1: I love that you're turning to the podcast app, have
Speaker 1: an audiobook ready to go on your phone, have a
Speaker 1: book on your kindlelap on your phone. That's what I
Speaker 1: do to me, That's what I turn to. So I
Speaker 1: used to come into my phone and go straight to
Speaker 1: Instagram or TikTok. I've trained myself to open up Audible
Speaker 1: or Kindle for me to get me doing the thing
Speaker 1: I want to do. Now, really, all I want is
Speaker 1: something to do in my gap, right, because I want
Speaker 1: to distract myself or be busy or whatever it may be.
Speaker 1: And I found myself giving myself a healthier distraction is
Speaker 1: far better than trying to avoid a distraction completely. Right,
Speaker 1: It's been really, really tough to do that so I
Speaker 1: hope that this episode helps you. I hope that you
Speaker 1: try out at least one of these techniques. I'm so
Speaker 1: grateful for the energy and time that we get today,
Speaker 1: and I want you to have a healthier relationship with
Speaker 1: social media. It is going to take a bit of discipline,
Speaker 1: it is going to take a bit of work, and
Speaker 1: this is the core rule I want to share with you.
Speaker 1: Find alternatives, Find the thing that you're going to choose
Speaker 1: over the thing that forces you to choose it. Finding
Speaker 1: a first choice. Making something a first choice is far
Speaker 1: better than just trying to resist it completely. That will
Speaker 1: break down your willpower and your personal energy, and it
Speaker 1: will just make it way way harder. Thanks for listening
Speaker 1: on purpose. Make sure you leave a review, make sure
Speaker 1: you share your biggest takeaway on stories on Instagram, on
Speaker 1: TikTok in the comments. I'll be looking out for them,
Speaker 1: and I wish you an amazing bit