I am an avid social media user— Instagram, Snapchat, and Facebook are a daily thing for me. I could stay on my phone for hours on end, let time escape me, and I wouldn’t even notice. Every night of the week, any free time in school, and especially before bed. Endless scrolling through pages of people’s lives and funny videos, but it began feeling like I was seeing the same things over and over again. I noticed I was trapped in this cycle: wake up, phone, bed, and repeat.

When I began falling behind in my school work I knew something had to change, so I had a chat with my physics teacher on what I should do. He asked me what I do when I get home from school. I reluctantly admitted that I use my phone for hours before starting any homework. He suggested I go on a social media cleanse.  Originally, I was going to lie by saying I would try it, but then I thought, “What could I lose?” So I started a detox, treating it as if it were an experiment.

On Sunday night, I deleted all the distractions off my phone and waited to see what the rest of the week would have in store for me. At first, I was bored, as expected. I was so bored that I cleaned up my entire house. Then I remembered I had a lot of work to catch up on. So I started my homework and studying, what typically took me the whole night, only took me two hours. Without all the phone breaks I take, I was able to finish my homework, talk to my friends, and still go to bed at a reasonable time. I continued my detox for the rest of the week. My free time consisted of doing my work, checking my emails, and even getting more sleep. It was one of the most productive week I’ve had in a while. On Friday night, I allowed myself to download the apps onto my phone again. It turns out I didn’t miss much of anything at all. When Monday came back around, I said “see you later” to my social media apps once again.

I found this detox to be very helpful. It is liberating to not feel like I have to check people’s statuses every couple of minutes. I would recommend a social media detox to anyone who feels like they use it too much, or even a slight cut back, to see what potential you hold.

-Alexis