https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/shift-your-focus-from-your-phone-to-an-activity/ When I tell you to think of a purple car, you will imagine a purple car in your mind. When I tell you NOT to think of a purple car, you will imagine a purple car in your mind. The same applies to the concept of the Law of Attraction. When you keep telling yourself “I don’t want to drink coca-cola anymore” or “I will stop drinking coca-cola”, the focus is on…exactly: coca-cola. The word don’t or stop have very little effect when comparing the statement to “I will drink 2 infuser bottles of water and lime 3 times a day”. Now the focus is shifted to a solution, a replacement activity, a different action. That’s why it is so important to brainstorm about activities you want to take on. You want to ask yourself questions like: What do I want to pursue? What would I like to do instead of using my phone? What activities can I replace with certain activities on my phone? What would I like to achieve in my life? How do I like to carry myself? How do I want to identify myself as a person? What habits are required to make a successful transformation? Think in terms of solutions and actions, instead of what NOT to do. When we talk about spending less time with our phones and social media, we often concentrate on this very desire. We keep using social media constantly while complaining about it afterward. It is easy to dismiss a social media session as a relevant or innocent session when you listen to that voice saying “don’t worry, everyone is using social media!”. When you do catch that voice trying to convince you no change is necessary, you don’t want to merely tell yourself: next time I will not go for my phone so quickly! Go deeper than that. It’s a great start that you acknowledge your phone use as extreme. However, to really get that motivation going, you want to have a vision to focus and cling on. I’m asking you now: Why do you really want to use your phone less? Why is it so important to use social media less? What are you missing out on in your life? How is too much tech use preventing you from growing and improving your life? For who are you doing this other than yourself? Your spouse? Your children? How do you want to use your smartphone and social media? Get very real about why it is so important to control your phone use. With this clarity, you want to create a vision for your life where tech is helping you achieve it. Together with the answers to the questions mentioned earlier, you want to create a clear picture of the steps you need to take to build a new identity for yourself. Get pulled by a vision of the future. Turn your back on your phone instead of looking at it while trying to push it away. Don’t keep your attention on the phone. Place your attention on something else, and your phone automatically disappears from your thoughts. Introduce other digital wellbeing strategies such as placing your phone out of sight and the use of the Do Not Disturb option. Out of sight out of mind. That’s the beauty of focusing on something very important in your life: the road you’re traveling on to become better every single day. When you’re so immersed in your own development and evolution, your phone won’t stand a chance to demand your attention like you’re some cute obedient puppy waiting to take orders.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/be-in-awe-of-your-life-and-the-world/ Who doesn’t love flying? The main experience starts when you enter the airplane while hearing this calm melody and a voice welcoming you aboard. You look for your seat, put away your hand baggage and finally sit down while looking for the seatbelt. Some people immediately take their book, send their last messages on their phone, or place earbuds in their ears so they disconnect from that chaos of people finding a spot for their luggage and seats. Next, that moment arrives where the plane starts taxiing slowly towards the runway. On the runway, it stops and prepares for takeoff. When the plane moves with enormous velocity to takeoff, some people stop their activity to fully experience their last minutes in that city while others keep doing what they’re doing. Most passengers sitting next to the window take a moment to look outside when the plane is ascending. They experience this feeling of awe, this feeling of reverence and admiration for the world that is becoming smaller and smaller. Feelings of clarity and awareness kick in, making you realize that you’re actually leaving a city and heading towards your next destination. There are some key moments that are happening during that moment and the entire trip. First of all, most people put their phones away. When they do use their phone (while wi-fi is disabled), there is a clear intention behind the action. They may change the song they are listening to, look at some photos, or play a game. We don’t use our phones mindlessly as we are used to when we’re with both feet on the ground. What’s interesting as well, is that people have to become creative with how they spend their time. Some passengers play card games, watch movies on their tablets, read a newspaper, eat, or sleep. Everyone has their own way of making the best use of their time. It’s nice to see that some start a conversation with a fellow passenger they don’t know. Not everyone appreciates this of course, but it is positive to see we are able to engage with one another when our phone is not constantly asking for (demanding) our attention. What really fascinates me personally, is that because you are forced to sit still and wait, your mind travels and starts reflecting. You’re reflecting on your new adventure, how you left that previous city, whether you will go back one day, if you have spent your time wisely there etc. Other questions that tend to arise are more existential such as am I making the right move to go to the city I’m going to now, what do I expect from my next adventure, what do I actually expect from my own life, am I happy with my choices and what are my next intentions and goals in my life. I guess such questions may arise because you are completely disconnected from all the noise below you on planet earth. You are up in the air completely zoomed out from your life, society, expectations, and responsibilities. Now there is time to think, reflect, and contemplate. Now there is time to really go through with yourself what you want for your next steps to be like in your life. It is really possible to completely zone out, especially when you immerse yourself in the unique view while listening to uplifting or calm music. You are in awe of your life and the world, similar to the overview effect I imagine. Such feelings of reverence in the plane are not as powerful probably, but that feeling might be the overview effect’s little cousin. You think more macro about your life and the world than micro. The more mindful, intentional, appreciative, and aware you become, the more you are able to resist going for your phone.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/introduce-intermittent-smartphone-fasting-in-your-life/ You may have heard of intermittent fasting. You choose regular time periods to eat and fast. For instance, you might try eating only during an 8 hour period each day and fast for the remainder. Fasting for 16 hours is popular when it comes to intermittent fasting. You start your breakfast at 9 AM and finish your dinner by 5 PM. The next time you eat will be breakfast at 9 AM the next day. I won’t discuss the pros and cons here, but this is a popular and interesting concept that is followed by many. Intermittent smartphone fasting has basically that very same definition. You choose regular time periods on a daily basis to use your smartphone. For example, you are allowed to use your phone between 7 PM and 9 PM. Create such time periods for your daily mornings, afternoons, and evenings. I can imagine you won’t introduce a 16 hours fasting period, but you may introduce a 10 hour fasting period from 10 PM to 8 AM. Then you will control how your evening ends and not your phone. You choose the last message or person you see and not your phone. The same applies to mornings. You wake up and decide what the first message is that you will see that sets you up for the day. Too many people allow their smartphones to decide where their focus should go first thing in the morning, with what feelings and thoughts they should start the day. Take control over your evenings and mornings by implementing this type of fasting. Stop using your phone at 10 PM and only check it again at 8 AM the next day when you have taken care of your morning habits. Let’s not forget, you can also implement intermittent social media fasting. You dedicate a time slot where you are allowed to use social media or where you are not allowed to use social media. Or what about intermittent Instagram fasting for example. Set the alarm that reminds you to initiate the fast and one that reminds you to end it. Decide after the experience if you want to increase or decrease the fasting. What matters is, that you train your willpower to not touch your smartphone, social media, or a particular app during the fast that you have agreed with yourself for your own benefit. Screen Time for the iPhone and Digital Wellbeing for Android can help you with that by setting time limits for your apps.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/delete-the-social-media-app-when-youre-done/ Reducing your phone use has a lot to do about what apps you have installed on it. Remove all apps and you will use your phone less. No surprise there. What we really want is to be able to use our phones less while all apps remain installed. This is possible but requires some reprogramming of our habits. You want to add some friction to make it harder for yourself to use an app. When you’re able to use the app more mindful, you can keep it installed. Although there are many cases where people don’t want to reinstall certain apps. They are so aware of how time is wasted on an app, they don’t want to see it on their smartphone anymore. What is important is that you start to pay attention to how and when you use the app. A strategy you can use is to delete the app after you’re done using it. That’s it. Let’s say that now, this very minute, you open the Facebook app. You can use it as you please, but you have to delete it when you finish. Now you start to be more mindful of your use. Your thinking will be future-oriented, meaning you anticipate opening it another 4 times, so you do all the necessary tasks now that you normally would do 10 minutes later when you open the app again. When you’re done, you delete the app. BUT! When you want to use the app again, you download it again. That’s it. That’s the strategy. When you go through that whole process of opening Google Play or the App Store, you’re going to think twice before opening and closing the app! You will use the app with more intention now. The whole habit of opening the app is so ingrained in your system, that you will look for it at random moments. Since you won’t find it, you get out of the “programming”. You “wake up” because the app isn’t there anymore. That’s how you become more self-aware. This is a prerequisite for change to happen. You want to make the unconscious conscious. it’s fine to reinstall the app and use it again, as long as you delete it again when you close it. Unprogram yourself to tap the Tik Tok app just because you wanted to check the weather. Get out of this app cycle habit where you have to go through 5 apps before locking your phone again. Train yourself to be more mindful. Take control over the apps instead of them controlling you. So choose which apps you want to use for this strategy and start deleting them after you’ve opened them. Later on, you can always decide whether you want to leave certain apps permanently deleted.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/move-an-online-relationship-to-the-offline-world/ It is much easier to fool someone online than offline. Online you can tell any person any story you want since all you need to do is typing the words. While typing you can decide to beautify particular details or invent details to spice up your story. I mean…who will find out right? The level of anonymity makes it much easier to fool people. To manipulate people. When you’re naive or haven’t experienced blunders online, you may find yourself believing a story a bit too quickly. What’s different now in comparison to many years ago, is that video conversations are very common now. Many years ago, it was normal to be talking, “falling in love”, and establishing a (romantic) relationship with someone while never having seen that person on video, let alone in real life. We were sending each other photos of course, but enabling the webcam wasn’t always common. As you’ve probably guessed, sending a photo is easy. Who will know if it is really you in that photo!? You can easily send fake photos and the person won’t know. Nowadays we video call and get to know each other that way. Starting a romantic relationship online is the new normal, and I definitely support that. What can be troubling, is when people keep their engagement online. Of course, now with the pandemic, it is much harder to meet each other in the real world. But even in a time where people could only associate corona with a beer brand, people often hesitate to meet offline. Meeting someone in the offline world is vital. You will want to put yourself in a position where you can feel that person’s energy and witness their body language, attitude, and behavior. I’ve heard people say they are in love and have a girlfriend or boyfriend for 2 years, but have never met in real life yet. Some couples that do finally decide to meet in person, find themselves disappointed in each other due to a mismatch between the actual person and the person they thought they were. The click just isn’t there somehow. Not that this happens all the time of course. There are many success stories of people who meet online and end up in marriage. Do keep in mind: do your best to meet the person you’ve met in the virtual world in the real world. When you meet someone on Tinder or Bumble for example, make sure you go for that first date as quickly as possible. Not that you should ask the person to meet up after 2 text messages, but after a few days of exchanging text messages which represent mutual interest, you will want to ask that question. Ask that simple question: let’s meet up for a coffee? You can only go to the next level in your relationship when you have been in each other’s company. When you have embraced one another and when you have looked in each other’s eyes without a screen in your midst. Don’t assume that technology can help you with everything. Screens won’t be always around to save you. Rely on yourself and be confident that the person will like the real you and vice versa in real life. When someone is reluctant to meet you and keeps making excuses why they are not able to, something is up. Be firm with the standards you uphold for yourself and don’t kid yourself while trying to ignore the red alerts. Be careful not to be all in love while thinking your boyfriend or girlfriend you’ve met online is perfect, it is easy to display “perfection” online. It is easy to come up with your own story. No wonder why so many people are manipulated and realize this too late, unfortunately.
Who doesn’t love food!? A life without the pleasures of food will undoubtedly be less exciting. Food is one of the many go-to factors of life that we can feel easily grateful for. Like with anything, good high-quality food takes time. Patience, care, and dedication are required like with everything else that is great in life. No wonder we post dishes on social media, especially when we don’t really know what else to post about! Food always does well. Most of the time. Especially when you’re in a totally different continent where you witness meals you didn’t know could look like that! When I see a photo of a dish that someone posted, I’m keen to check if the person is mentioning the ingredients. If the goal is to teach, then they are included. Oftentimes the photo represents a moment of “the good life”. Nothing wrong with that. What is fascinating though is the number of effort people put into taking and posting these photos. I’ve been in various restaurants where I see people treating taking a simple photo as some complex project that has to be right. Sometimes there are levels of stress involved. In those moments I wonder: why do you find it important to take that photo? Who are you doing this for? This process can take quite some time… The angle isn’t right, or dozens of photos have to be taken first. That’s not the end of it of course. Now there is the challenge to choose the best one! When that’s finally done, there is some extra contemplation regarding which filters would match perfectly with that photo. Of course, this entire process has to happen right there and then. This is not a process that is happening after the meal. As you can guess, sometimes the food gets cold and the stress continues. Now the person doesn’t stress because they have to post the meal on social media, they stress because they have to eat fast. Witnessing this whole undertaking does make me think: where does this desire to share with everyone real-time come from!? Why does everyone need to know right here right now? This is just an example of why we miss out on opportunities to enjoy the moment. We bring extra concerns with us no matter where we are or what we do. We feel the world needs to know what we do and they should know it now. Relax. The world can wait. Yes, your meal looks fantastic, but the only person who will eat it is you. Take that photo if you want, but then put your phone back in your pocket. Leave it there during your entire restaurant experience. Savor the food. Enjoy the smell and taste. Be one with your meal and the person at your table. Don’t invite the world to such intimate moments. Own those moments. A joyful life is just a series of happy moments. Allow the happy moments and stop being busy trying to get a joyful life. Experiencing such great moments right there and then, that’s the key to a happy life.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/ask-yourself-the-right-social-media-questions/ When we approach someone or meet someone, questions will be asked. You ask questions to get information from that person. The more information you gain, the more opportunity there is to connect with the person. You learn about the person. You understand what the person is about it. You find out if this person is someone you want to talk to again. The above mostly happens when the questions are right. The better the questions, the more you may understand how someone operates on an emotional and spiritual level. While we do ask questions, we don’t always ask deeper ones. This doesn’t only apply to others, but to ourselves as well. While the whole concept of why asking questions is a no-brainer, it’s interesting that we don’t ask clear questions to ourselves. We don’t really have such deep conversations with ourselves. If we have established that we ask questions to know one another, why don’t we attempt to know ourselves better? Why don’t we get to ask the hard questions to ourselves? We may have many answers to deep questions, but are we actually conscious of those answers? Have we really contemplated challenging questions we don’t always dare to ask others? Asking questions is a vital activity that we should be taking on. This is one of the reasons why people journal: to have a conversation with oneself, to gain clarity of one’s own feelings and answers. It isn’t always comfortable. No wonder we oftentimes avoid asking the hard questions to ourselves. We may know the answer but we don’t like it, we don’t want to be thinking about it. When you’re not happy with your social media and phone use, it’s time to ask yourself some questions. Ask yourself the following questions after a phone session or social media session: What have I learned? Have I learned something? Has this session benefited me in any way? What have I gained from this? How do I feel about it? Did I feel happy about it? Do I still? Have I built a connection with someone? Has this improved a relationship? Get honest with yourself. Write your answers down. Get a clear look at those answers, have them out there. Carefully analyze the results after each session and see what activities you should reduce. Make it clear to yourself why you want and should reduce your screen time. Make it clear to yourself how you want to use social media and your phone. How do you want both to enhance your life? Go deep and confront yourself. With clarity comes power. It might be provoking at first, but the result is that you will feel a lot more comfortable with yourself. You can be yourself when you know yourself. Besides, the better you get in asking questions to yourself, the better you understand what questions are useful when you meet someone you really want to connect with.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/leave-your-smartphone-dormant-at-a-concert/ Our phones have amazing high-quality cameras. The need for a separate device to film events, trips, and priceless moments is long gone. The smartphone brought many devices to old school level or made them simply obsolete. Combine that with the fact that a smartphone is not as heavy as a 90s camera, and you understand why people can hold smartphones for hours just to document every single second of an event. A few years ago when I went to Coldplay’s concert, I noticed how many fans were filming with their device. That didn’t surprise me, what did was for how long they were actually filming. There were fans who felt the need to document every single song for at least a few seconds. When you add up all those minutes, you realize how much of the performance was witnessed through a screen. You’re there, with all the people around you, listening to music and watching a performance, but then decide to experience all that glamour through that little screen. I totally understand when you want to record a moment or two with your smartphone, but why focus on documenting the whole thing? Not only that, some decide it’s a good idea to share all these moments on social media right there and then. One post okay, but 10? I wonder how many times someone will look back at those videos. It’s fun for the first few days, but anything that I film personally I don’t look back anymore. In case I want to watch the concert back, I’ll just go on Youtube and find a professional or at least a better quality video that I can enjoy. When you’re witnessing a breathtaking one-of-a-kind event, you don’t want to be thinking of tech for more than 5% of your time. Enjoy and savor the moment. Allow your eyes to witness the magic and be in awe of the energy that you feel around you, that you are participating in. Don’t disconnect yourself from the collective experience. Don’t disconnect from that moment you are sharing with your friends. When you use your smartphone, you don’t experience that level of immersion your friends are experiencing. They will have both hands in the air to enhance the immersion, not because they want to document anything. Don’t think too much about “I need to share this” or “I need to save this”! Take a few clips and put that device away. Do both yourself and the artist a favour: don’t have it in your hands the entire time!
Scrolling is an addictive activity. The same applies to swiping on a dating app, you just don’t know when to stop. You tell yourself okay this is the last post I see or the last person that I will swipe left or right. But somehow you’re still scrolling or swiping 5 minutes later. Swiping on a dating app has a clear purpose: to connect with someone, however that connection may look like. When we scroll however, we don’t really know what to expect. Will we see a post, a photo, a video, a quote? What will that say, why has that person posted that, what is someone random up to in their lives or at this very moment? That anticipation of a potential funny or shocking post makes us keep scrolling. We are curious human beings, and scrolling is a superb way to distract ourselves. You can escape yourself and your life, similar to when you’re watching a TV show. Only with scrolling you don’t know what surprises await you in that loooong news feed. It keeps going and going…. Now some social media platforms tell you when you’ve seen everything. Instagram for example tells you when you’re all caught up. I have not encountered this message yet, but that’s probably because I don’t scroll often. Sadly we scroll and scroll when we are not alone. There are people around us, but somehow we care more for the online persona’s of our friends, strangers, and influencers. The problem is not so much that we scroll when we’re not alone, it’s that we scroll too much while we should pay attention to our offline environment. We show more interest in the people who we wouldn’t even call when we are in trouble than the people who really matter to us. It’s easy to take the people for granted who you see every day. Friction happens in households which causes uncomfortable situations. Instead of discussing this friction, the discomfort incentives us to take our phone and scroll. To see how everyone else is doing in comparison to ourselves. We don’t ask relevant questions anymore. We may ask if someone can do the dishes or how their day was, but it doesn’t get deeper than that. Scroll offline more. Be interested in the lives of your nearest and dearest. Notice what they say and don’t say. Are they doing fine? Are they happy? Are you helping them or supporting them with their endeavors? It’s okay to check the virtual world and see what everyone decided to share with their friends and fans. Let’s not forget though that our offline world needs as much scrolling as well. That level of curiosity. That level of interest. That level of care. The next step after noticing and paying attention is to offer any support or to simply acknowledge that person’s efforts. Go for deeper questions. Deeper conversations. Show that person in the offline world that you’re able to laser focus on them too. Gift them with your presence and attention. Whatever happens to the people in the virtual world won’t have an immediate impact on you. Make sure that the people you’re surrounded by, love, and cherish, feel supported by you. Let them feel comfortable, heard, and understood. Their happiness is your happiness. Take care of your own offline environment first, that’s where you are most of the time after all.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/assign-certain-tasks-to-certain-devices/ Those days that we only have 1 screen to entertain ourselves with are long over. With the advent of the television we started to program ourselves that it is perfectly fine and normal to look at a screen for a couple of hours. Then the personal computer made its introduction which was great for processing, but too boring to use for many hours in a row. Soon afterward the internet become mainstream which changed everything! Now it was really fun to be on our computer! We could communicate with others and let magic appear in front of our eyes by typing a few words and a few clicks. In those days it was normal to write BRB aka Be Right Back. You couldn’t bring the computer to the toilet, let alone outdoors. The flip phones and feature phones made their introduction and slowly we got used to looking at a screen in the open air. Not that we did this for long, a game of Snake could only last so long before it got boring. With the advent of the smartphone in 2007, it seemed we were ready to increase our focus on those little screens wherever we are. Of course, let’s not forget the tablet which became a popular household product as well. So there is the television (with game consoles connected), laptops, computers, smartphones, tablets, handheld consoles… There are so many screens in our lives that would love our attention! It can certainly get messy. It’s hard to focus on just 1 screen for 2 hours straight. Multitasking with 2 or 3 devices involved is the norm rather than the exception. The biggest problem maker is undoubtedly the smartphone. Write down what activities you are doing on that small device. Make a list. Now assign a few of those activities to other devices like the tablet or laptop. Do you want to play games? Assign this task to a game console, handheld console or tablet. Do you use Facebook a lot? Assign this task to a laptop. Do you email in the evening? Assign this task to a laptop or desktop. Outsource as many tasks as possible to other screens. Don’t be all over the place with your activities. Don’t play games on multiple devices. Pick 1 device and when you play on it, play well. Max out every activity and you do that by being mindful of it. Don’t do a little bit of a lot. Be super conscious that you’re going to read your emails now. Be super conscious that you will scroll and comment on Tik Tok now for 30 minutes. When you have assigned certain tasks, delete apps on your phone that are redundant now. Have you assigned Twitter to your laptop? Remove the Twitter app from your phone. Too hard? Then start by using your laptop to post tweets and your phone to read tweets only. Small steps are fine, as long as it is a step. You can make a list of activities for every device so you know exactly what to expect from yourself. You just want to pick your most popular device and outsource multiple activities to those other devices. The ultimate goal is to use your smartphone less so you can enjoy your offline life a lot more.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/use-email-filters-in-iphones-mail-app/ Smartphones are marvelous. Smartphones are fantastic and enhance our lives in such unique ways. There are so many opportunities for grabs because of our smartphones. The invention is so phenomenal, that we often get a little bit too excited… We want to use it all the time!! If only we would be able to regain control over our smartphone use! Luckily this is possible, that’s what this website is all about! We don’t need to put our phones away permanently. It’s not necessary to live like a Luddite and be busy dodging and hating technology. What a relief that is! We just need to use smartphones and their apps more wisely, more effectively. In case we use an app multiple times a day, we want to know exactly how to use it effectively. You want to get to the settings for example and check all the available options. Let’s talk about iPhone’s Mail app and one simple feature: filtering. When you open the Mail app and you’re in any box like your inbox, you see the filter option at the bottom left corner. When you tap that symbol with the 3 lines in it, you immediately see in the middle below Filtered By: When you tap there, you can select specific filters like emails that are Unread or emails that are Flagged. There are more filter options like Only from VIP or Only Mail With Attachments. When you tap done, you see the inbox with the filters applied. When you tap the filter symbol again, the list with all emails returns. By the way, You find the flag option by tapping the arrow icon at the bottom when you’re in an email message. So many interesting options can be found in the apps we use the most, it is vital we are aware of those. So don’t miss out on my videos and blogs to stay updated!
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/use-privacy-shortcuts-facebook-app/ Facebook is known for its many (hidden) settings that are actually very important to be aware of! Facebook’s mission is to connect you to the world. In other words, many default settings of your profile cater to this very mission. Is this a good thing? I don’t believe it is. Facebook users should consciously decide when they make their content available to friends of friends, strangers, the entire world basically. They should realize how a setting may influence their own behavior on the platform. Many users don’t really know or understand what people see and what is private. People create a Facebook account and simply copy other people’s actions on the platform. You really do not want to see your profile filled with photos posted by others just because they tagged you. Some details you may want to keep between you and friends or even to yourself. Luckily there is a way to quickly go through all the privacy settings. You find a handy tool called Privacy Shortcuts in the settings of your Facebook profile. You tap the hamburger menu below and you go to Settings & Privacy. Now tap Privacy Shortcuts. Here you can check and modify the following settings: Privacy Location, who can see what you share, data settings Account security Change password, use two-factor authentication Ad preferences Which ad topics to see fewer, which ads to hide Your Facebook information Manage your information, see your activity log Safety Find resources for parents, help prevent bullying If you haven’t checked your privacy settings yet in your account, make that your priority number 1 when opening the app. Whether you’re in or out of your house, you make sure it’s safe and secure right. Especially when it’s bedtime. Treat your personal online environment similarly. Take your privacy seriously and take ownership of your own online space and presence.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/enable-two-step-verification-in-whatsapp/ I won’t tap dance around this very important message: Whenever you can: enable the two-step verification option. There is no way around it. It is super important that you secure all your accounts, whether they are social media accounts, email accounts, messaging accounts gaming accounts, etc. Don’t wait. Don’t postpone this. Make hacking into your account as complex as possible. People will try to hack other people’s profiles, and since you use yours a lot you better protect them. In this blog I will explain how to add this very important security step in WhatsApp: Go to Settings, tap Account, tap Two-step verification, tap Enable. Enter a six-digit PIN of your choice and confirm it. Enter an email address (you won’t be asked to verify it) or tap Skip if you don’t want to. According to WhatsApp, if you don’t add an email address and you forget your PIN, you’ll have to wait 7 days before you can reset your PIN. Now you’ll need to enter your PIN when registering your phone number with WhatsApp again. In future blogs, I’ll go over how to set up two-step verification aka 2-factor authentication in other platforms. However, do already check in your social media account and email accounts if this option is available (it probably is!).
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/enable-ghost-mode-in-snapchat/ If you would go back in time to 1952 and tell people how much information we are sharing with another in our present time 2020, they may be thinking we are stalking each other. The good citizens of 1952 will probably think why we care so much about sharing so much info about ourselves. I can imagine that today there are still people who wonder: why do you share so much private information about yourself and your life? Why would I care? Why would you think that I care? Why would you care? The reality is that people love to show that they are interesting, that they matter. Sometimes the information can be useful in certain situations of course. What about the Snapchat Ghost Mode option? You have probably heard of Snap Map when you use Snapchat. On Snap Map you can see where all your friends are, you can see their locations. Not only can you see their location, but they can also see yours too. Unless you enable Ghost Mode! When you enable this option, you can choose who is allowed to see your location. You can choose the option Only Me, meaning your location won’t be visible to anyone else on the map. You can choose a duration of 3 hours, 24 hours and Until Turned Off. Or you can choose specific friends to share your location with. The friends you select aren’t notified when you choose them Or you can choose to share your location with all of your friends, including friends you add in the future. You find Ghost Mode by tapping the gear button in the top-right corner of the Map screen. Revealing your location doesn’t need to be a problem and can be functional actually, but…does everyone really have to know where you are all the time? How do you really feel about that? You may want to start to be at least selective with who can see your location. Let’s not make a habit of handing over our privacy so easily just because we can.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/increase-the-playback-speed-of-youtube-videos/ As they say: time is money. Time is valuable. You can lose money but you can always make money. Time passes, but we can never create more time or buy more time. The sand in the hourglass is moving downward, we just don’t know how fast. Life could end in 60 years or tomorrow perhaps. We only know for sure that it will all be over one day. When you love, cherish and appreciate your life, that may be a sad thought. The power of this fact is that it gives us the opportunity to live our lives to the fullest. To live our lives mindfully and with intention. If we could speed up certain things to save time, would you do it? Well, luckily we can speed up YouTube videos! There are multiple speeds: 1.25, 1.5, 1.75, and 2. I suggest speeding the video to at least 1.25. You will still be able to understand everything the person is saying. If the person is communicating slowly, you may go for 1.5 or even 2. it is also possible to slow down the video if you’re following a tutorial closely for example. In the browser, you find this playback speed option by clicking on the gear icon below the video. On your device, you want to tap the ellipsis (3 dots) to find the playback speed option. Of course, this option is not always recommended! When you listen to your favorite songs this option is an absolute no-go! But for any other type of content (even my videos that’s fine :-D), you will definitely want to make this option a habit.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/dont-keep-hiding-online-because-of-fear-of-judgement/ The ego, that voice in our mind is super clever. It comes up with very good reasons why you should not do something. You might feel this burning desire to act on a particular idea you are having, but that voice has the power to quickly dismiss it. The voice tries to protect you. It does what it thinks is in your best interest. We just believe that story way too quickly. Ultimately it often comes down to fear. We want to learn, teach, inspire and act. As we know, social media is a fantastic vehicle to share your personality, brand and mission. That’s the way I love to use social media! To use social media in such a way that it will enhance your life, not limit your life. When you use social media mindfully because there is a certain objective, I fully support that. If you use social media every day for multiple hours you must be good at it, at least better than I am I’m sure! While you’re logged in anyway, why not strategize your social media skills? Are you thinking of creating makeup tutorials? Do you want to help people with social anxiety? Does it look fun to show people how certain games are played? Then go for it! When this voice seeps in to convince you not to show yourself, acknowledge that voice and do it anyway. People will never be able to go to the next level if they listen to that subconscious part of the brain. Consciously you may say out loud that you do want to sing songs and post on Youtube, but those subconscious beliefs may hinder you instead. The sad truth is that we don’t even realize this and take it seriously. The best thing you can do is to talk back to that voice. Literally. Yes it might be scary, but I choose courage instead I don’t want to live my life with regrets I deserve better in my life I refuse to play it small I’m ready to learn from my mistakes and understand that no one gets anything right the first time! I choose day one instead of one day No negative comments will hold me back There are literally 0 people in this world who have received only positive feedback. That just doesn’t happen. Not on our planet. With the amount of misery that is unfortunately present in our society, we shouldn’t be surprised really. Negative feedback can be expected. People will judge you. It’s never collectively okay. You sit at home all day and people say you’re lazy. You work on weekends and people say you’re not taking care of yourself. People always have something to say. That’s why it is imperative that you are in love with yourself. If you wait for the good comments to feel good about yourself, you’re also going to believe the bad ones. Do it for yourself. Know why you’re going to post 3 videos a day where you’re street dancing. Let people say whatever they want. It’s easy to criticize others when you’re watching Stranger Things and playing it small in life. The people you want to surround yourself with will support you. They understand the struggles. They have similar ambitions, they want to pursue their fullest potential too. Don’t underestimate yourself. Aim to impress yourself. Reframe “what if they reject me or don’t like me” to “what if people like my dance moves and skills!” Now that’s a thought that you want to stick to because there really is bliss on the other side of fear.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/dont-allow-the-google-effect-to-make-your-brain-lazy/ Having a supercomputer with you at all times offers astonishing advantages. It’s not hard to appear as the smartest person in the room when you’re allowed to use your phone. That small device can show you anything you want to know. It takes literally seconds to unlock your phone, open an app, and enter a query. Do you think you have a silly question? Guess what, there is already someone out there who wondered that very same thing and asked Google already! You can find an answer to any question, literally any question. How beautiful that may sound, this can also be a trap. If this supercomputer is 24/7 eager to do all the exploring, contemplating, and thinking for you, why on earth would you do it yourself? Unfortunately, the consequence is that people don’t bother to remember anymore. If your device can be used in mere seconds, why taking the time to remember stuff? That’s the trap of technology. Although technology is facilitating our lives in ways we never imagined before, we feel the unconscious tendency to invest less in our own power and capabilities. Imagine your leg is replaced by a robotic leg. With this robotic leg, you can run faster and jump higher. An amazing experience and advantage you would say! Nevertheless, you simultaneously stop relying on your own human leg. No effort is required anymore, your robot leg says I got this. When you take off the robotic leg, your human leg will be undoubtedly very weak. You haven’t used it. That is what happens when we rely on tech too much. We outsource our own brains and power to technology. We become less self-reliant and more dependent. This phenomenon where you have the tendency to forget information is called the Google effect. Other names are digital amnesia and digital dementia, which basically mean a decline in cognition and short-term memory loss. We human beings are creative. We need time and space to reflect, contemplate, and brainstorm. These powers should not be taken over by any form of tech. Technology definitely enhances our lives, but it shouldn’t bluntly take over our vital cognition-related tasks. Technology has the power to distract us, to lure us in, to program us, to tempt us, to make us think it sincerely cares for us. It doesn’t. If it was up to tech, you will use your every precious minute utilizing it in one way or another. Don’t underestimate your brain. Don’t forget that it’s a supercomputer too! Remain cognizant that if you don’t utilize this supercomputer of yours….its power declines. When you don’t use technology for a while, nothing happens in most cases. It’s no big deal. It can wait for years to show off all the tricks it is capable of when you turn it on again. Your brain is another story though. Neural connections relating to any challenge need strengthening, neurons wire together fire together. Those neural pathways that are used when facing a challenge need to get more rigid so it becomes easier to do the task (which hopefully benefits you!). Train your brain to get better, because if you don’t, it’s going to excel at just being average. Use tech yes, use all its benefits yes, but don’t go for your phone instantly when you need to know something. Contemplate. Remember. Pause and think. Let that brain motor operate on full power. Trust your own supercomputer. It can benefit your own life in ways any external supercomputer will never can.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/are-conspiracy-theories-worth-your-time/ You can find all sorts of information online. When you open YouTube to find a simple answer to a simple question, you never know what it could recommend you next. YouTube doesn’t necessarily try to lead you to content that is an exact copy of what you’re currently watching. What it tries to do is simply lure you into a potential rabbit hole that will keep you on YouTube for the next 3 hours. Topics that are recommended to you may indirectly relate to your (past) search queries or the current video you’re watching. What often happens, is that the platform will offer you content that may come from “crazy town”. What I mean by that is you may encounter content that may be disturbing, unconventional, or controversial. This doesn’t mean that the content presented is not true, but it can be “out there” for many viewers. Many of such posts are considered conspiracy theories. Nowadays many speak of conspiracy theories regarding the pandemic. I will be the last to confirm what is true or not true. This blog is not about what I believe or don’t believe. I respect everyone’s opinions and to be honest, I can’t confirm if someone is right or wrong. There is no way for me to check what is factual and what’s not. Of course, I may have an opinion, but it is just an opinion. This may be true for me, but I can’t guarantee that it is the ultimate truth. Openmindedness is key which makes me open to hear about various perspectives people may have. My preference is to ask questions, why would someone think and say that, why would the person be so certain about what they are saying. So because I don’t really bother myself to find out what is really true or not, I don’t tend to dwell on such theories. There are many theories to be found online about all sorts of subjects, but I personally don’t spend a lot of time reading them. Honestly, trying to find out the truth about me, what I’m about, what my weaknesses and strengths are is a full-time job in and of itself. For myself there is little time to focus on what others may have said or done, or better, I decide not to spend more time than I’m willing to invest on such matters. People may come to me and share their passions and interests which may be “conspiracy” theories, but I won’t actively research them. I know that there is a lot going on that many (including me) don’t know about, but it hasn’t immediate effect on my life. The reason I don’t talk about what may happen, or that someone is alive, or that some event didn’t happen at all, is that when we do find out the truth, it won’t affect my life so drastically probably. If the moon landing hasn’t happened after all, well…I will still be living the same life. If (or when) the outcomes of such theories present themselves I doubt that they will influence my life in any way. There are exceptions however, there are so many theories about the pandemic regarding where the virus comes from and if vaccines are truly helpful. This is an example of a theory that would definitely impact many lives including mine if they were true. It’s noble and encouraging that people voice their concerns and don’t just believe what they see and hear on television. The flip side is you want to be careful that you don’t find yourself in an echo chamber where one theory or opinion is voiced repeatedly. Stay open-minded, listen to different perspectives, think critically and logically, and make up your own mind. Just be careful that you don’t spend so much of your precious time convincing others of your truth or that you stay stuck in the pursuit of the real truth. Whether you are right or wrong, you want to ask yourself if it will really matter in your life.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/idolize-yourself-instead-of-online-influencers/ Being a spectator of other people’s lives is easy. We spend lots of hours finding out what other people did, bought, or said. The more uncomfortable we feel about ourselves, the more we tend to look external. When scrolling, we see envy-inducing posts from our friends and especially influencers. Posts that make us say to ourselves: wow I wish I had that! I wish I could do that! We go to our friends and discuss all those wonderful excentric lives we see online. Or we are by ourselves and get more and more miserable because of that large contrast. The more “success and happiness” you see online, the harder it looks to achieve that. Witnessing these differences between your own life and the lives of others is not a healthy activity. No wonder we compare and despair. The more we expose ourselves to their lives, the more impossible it feels to introduce radical change in our lives. Or at least it feels impossible to “achieve” a version of happiness and success that resonates with you. That’s another problem. Influencers make us believe living the good life is happiness and success. We start to believe we need at least a million dollars to achieve some levels of happiness. Or that yacht, or the ability to fly around the world 20 times a year for example. The perception that is created about happiness and success is a distorted one. We don’t realize happiness and success are not “achieved” at some point. It’s very depressing when you compare your “normal and boring” life to theirs I get it. So you want to consciously decide to stop idolizing them. Stop looking at their profiles all the time. Unfollow them. All that energy you spend on idolizing them should be spent on activities that influence your own life. My strategy is to idolize my future self instead. I carefully think about what he is doing, with who he is hanging around, what he is saying etc. It’s that vision that I look up to. It’s that vision of my future self that I’m guided by. The “happiness and success” that is displayed online can be used as fuel or inspiration that’s fine, but I don’t get sad or obsessed by them without taking some form of action. When I see influencers chilling by the pool, I don’t get jealous, dream, and wish for it, I get inspired. If I like what I see and it really resonates with me, I incorporate that swimming pool in the vision of my future self, surroundings, and circumstances. Never will I think that I can’t achieve those results. Never will I think they are better than me. Never will I think that my destiny is to stay where I am. My focus is on my future self and I love to idolize him. What I love more though, is the journey to actually become him. Don’t get jealous and down when you see posts of influencers living “the life”, get inspired and start by switching from scrolling to actually building that vision of your own future self.
https://www.socialmediabreakup.com/go-to-war-with-yourself/ This year (2020) I’ve read the book Can’t Hurt Me by David Goggins. That’s the beauty of reading books from different writers: The ultimate message is the same, but there are so many ways of explaining just 1 concept. David Goggins has his own way of inspiring and motivating which doesn’t resonate with everyone. That’s not the goal anyway, but I appreciate learning from all these different perspectives that lead to that 1 universal message: you can do it. One of the lessons I learned from the book, is to go to war with yourself. This may sound harsh, but it does make complete sense. At the end of the day, we are our own worse enemy. We are in our own way. We are confined by the walls that we build ourselves. It is important that we don’t keep tap dancing around the truth. There is a voice in our mind that knows us very well. It knows what to tell us when we feel the motivation to do something scary. For a minute the feeling and thought of “yes I’ll change my life!” excite us, till that voice takes over. That voice that says: that’s too hard, you’re too old, that takes way too much time, it’s stupid anyway, this will go wrong that will go wrong, etc. It is very smart, we don’t even realize that the voice merely wants to prevent us from failing. So it believes it is better not to try at all and convinces you of this very detrimental opinion. Go to war with this voice. Hear this voice and understand that you are not this voice. It’s a voice that was programmed in you. It’s a voice that was created during the imprinting, modeling, and mirroring stages of your life. This voice is sadly responsible for anyone not achieving their goals. True you can’t be anything you want, but you can be everything you are. Therefore it is necessary to beat this voice. Override it. Don’t listen to it. Let a different stronger uplifting voice speak louder. It takes time to override this voice, but with continuous momentum building and affirmations for example you can train yourself to dial down this detrimental voice drastically. Get real with yourself. Expand your mind and become more aware of your thoughts, feelings, and actions. You have thoughts and feelings, but you are not your thoughts and feelings. When you do start to take action, and you fail to meet your own created deadline, don’t beat yourself up. You do not want to forget to be kind to yourself and appreciate you have taken those first steps. Let’s use the smartphone as an example. When you plan to use your phone for one hour per evening instead of the 4 hours that you are normally using your device, the voice in your mind will try to take over your mind. It will make you doubt all the reasons which are responsible for wanting to use the device for one hour only in the first place. When your phone use is improving and you have used it for 2 hours instead of 4 or 1, don’t beat yourself up. Talk to yourself as you would talk to a friend. Acknowledge that you are trying and that it may take time to reduce your tech use to 2 hours. Don’t get angry and quit because “you will never succeed anyway” or “because well what’s the point!” The opposite side of that spectrum is that you stay serious about your objective. So keep trying and doing. Stay focused and do your best to reduce your phone use to 2 hours. Take your mission seriously. Keep a level of strictness so you don’t get complacent. The key here is to find that harmony between acknowledging your success and keeping in mind that you can and should do better. Letting yourself off the hook can result in victimizing yourself.