For quite some time now I’ve had a love/hate relationship with Facebook. I love it for my ability to keep in touch with friends around the globe, specifically via FB chat. I hate it for how engrained it’s become into my life. The daily ritual of checking Facebook, documenting the happenings of your life via a status update and keeping tabs on your ‘friends’ life via their status updates!
I’ve found it’s becoming harder to separate Facebook and the real world with each passing day!
The more reliant we become on Facebook the more I’ve begun to question it’s effects on us. We’re now starting to rely on Facebook and other social media tools to build our relationships with people, ‘Face to Face’ interactions are fast becoming the exception rather than the norm. What’s this doing to the quality of our relationships? Can we really apply ‘Fast Food’ principles to building relationships?
I fear that’s exactly what we are doing as we replace ‘Face to Face’ interactions with Facebook interactions. Consider all those stats we’ve heard about public speaking, your body is responsible for delivering close to 70% of your message. Surely that means our Facebook driven relationships are missing almost three quarters of ‘content’? Perhaps the ‘Fast Food’ is more accurate than I first thought! Where’s the substance? What happens when these relationships are brought into the real world?
I really think that an over reliance on Facebook and other social media apps whilst seemingly increasing our social connections could infact be undermining the strength of those connections. The questions I’ve raised above have been stewing in my mind and are becoming more and more pressing. I think it’s time I try and come up with some answers.
With that in mind I’ve decided the time is right to break away from Facebook. I’m going to start off with a month and I’ve even decided to include Twitter as well (even though I feel a lot fonder about Twitter!).
I’m going to use that time to try and restore some balance and find some clarity. I’ll be focusing on actually strengthening my relationships with people via good old ‘Face to Face’ communication. I may well go back to Facebook at some point. If I do go back though I’ll be aiming to using it in a different fashion, supplementing my ‘face to face’ relationships rather than replacing them!
I’ll keep you informed on my progress!
Cheers,
A
P.S
I’m amazed at how lost I feel without being able to update my status feed about how I just devoured that entire Lindt Easter Egg!
Happy Easter all!
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