At 6:30 a.m. on December 31, 2016 I deactivated Facebook. The election posts really put me over the top. There was so much hatred, lack of respect and unhealthy debating that I found myself getting anxious just scrolling through friends’ posts. I decided I needed to change, but I didn’t know then that I would be here now as a deactivator.
When the crazy political posts became too insane for me to handle, I reviewed my friends list and, feeling too guilty to actually unfriend, started unfollowing.
Despite unfollowing, the occasional hate post from others became more frequent. It spurred a second review of my friends list where I began unfriending acquaintances. Like the woman I worked with while bagging fresh produce, who lives in a hammock in the forest — fun to see her adventures on Facebook, but probably not someone with whom I’ll ever develop a relationship.
I then found that my Facebook feed posts fell into several categories:
Hey Look At Me
Those who are constantly posting pictures of themselves. “Here I am doing this,” “Now look at me doing that,” “Now just look at me because it’s me, and here I am.” I always felt like replying to these posts with my version of a selfie — “Hey, look at me sitting in my yoga pants and sweatshirt, with no makeup, watching the dog eat my coffee table and the neighbor’s cat peeing in my window boxes. Now, THAT is life through the selfie lens.
I’m here to convert you
The ones who use Facebook as a platform to try and convert you to whatever their passion is by posting things that are meant to incite unrighteousness. These are the activists of their own passions. If you post that all people who eat meat are inhumane, and then show me a picture of a pig on a fire pit, no offense, but I’m just going to think about how much I love bacon. I applaud those with passion, but I don’t want to be lectured or solicited through Facebook.
The World is going to hell in a hand basket
These are the ones that find the most bizarre articles about horrible things happening in the world and post them. Like the one about the boy who was raised by wolves and now walks and howls like a wolf. Sorry guys, but I think that was already a movie called “The Jungle Book.”
Everything in my life is perfect
We all have a few of these. “Look at my perfect family,” “Here we are on our perfect vacation,” “Look at our perfect home and our perfect lives.” We all know that outside the pages of Facebook, life is a roller coaster, and we need to lean on our friends and family to make it through.
So now that leaves me with the ones that I will truly miss. The friends and family who share their life in a way that makes you laugh and cry. You feel their pain when they are sad, and you want to stay connected. This is my tribe, and I did not truly learn who they all were until I posted that I was skipping Facebook and deactivating my account in the new year.
I received an outpouring of messages from those who were inspired and encouraged to do the same. Many shared how my posts helped them smile when the world seemed too much to handle and that they’d miss staying connected with me and my family.
I suppose I could have just logged in less frequently and unfollowed more, but I found that once I was logged in, I had trouble getting out.
So today I begin my new adventures, skipping Facebook in 2017. I have learned over the last few days that if and when I decide to return, my friend list will be a much smaller tribe.
I’m reminded of the movie Christmas with the Kranks, where the Kranks decide to skip Christmas because their daughter will not be home for the holiday. She surprises them with a visit home accompanied by her fiancé, and all of their family and friends stop what they are doing to decorate. They find a hickory honey ham, open their house, and host the best Christmas gathering ever to welcome home their daughter and her fiancé.
So, here’s to skipping Facebook and to what my new adventure will bring. If anyone has a hickory honey ham feel free to send it my way.
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