Social Media Detox Challenge Results

Back in January we did a month long social media detox and it was such a great experience for us.  In fact, it was so great that by early March I wanted to do it again.  I had an idea. Let’s see if there’s anyone else out there that would want to do a social media detox as a team challenge during the month of May.  I honestly thought maybe 1 person would be interested in joining.  And then this little pandemic hit the world and I thought absolutely zero people would want to partake.

Well, I am happy to report that I was wrong!  We ended up having 34 people join us, nuts! Honestly, I was shocked and so excited.  It made me more amped to do this May challenge with a group versus our solo January challenge.  Of course, I figured we would not get a 100% participation rate but even just getting one person to take a break was a win in my books.  And just like with our blog, getting comments and feedback from the community was the best part of this experience for me personally.

Looking back, taking this detox during this pandemic might have been the best thing possible.  With more time on your hands these days, many people are finding themselves with more screen time.  Taking this detox forced us to find alternatives rather than hours of mindless scrolling.

What Did the Social Media Detox Team Challenge Look Like?

To preface, this was a challenge to disconnect from social media only.  Emails, text, internet, non-social media apps, etc. were all still on the table.  But Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc. – see ya in a month.

We’re not looking to get you fired from your job if you need to be checking email from your phone!  However, I would argue that your employer should not expect you to be glued to your email via your phone 24/7 to read – and potentially respond to – any emails that come your way, regardless the time or day of the week.  Sadly, I see more and more corporate employees (especially those who receive a free work phone) expected to “on” more than the typical 9:00-5:00 work hours.  I think we all can learn a thing or two from the French labor laws.  I digress…

To start off, we sent out 5 emails in April to the team as prep for May’s challenge.   These emails were packed with facts from the two books that I had read earlier that greatly influenced me wanting to escape from my phone addition: Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport and How To Break Up With Your Phone by Catherine Price.  These emails also included action items to mentally prep for May such as taking a 24 hour break from your phone completely, installing apps to track how many times you pick up your phone each day, etc.  You’ll have to sign up for our next social media detox group challenge to see all the gory details and action items for the lead up.  We also sent over questions for the group to respond back to so it provided a team atmosphere showing we are all in this together.

We then sent out another 5 emails in May while the challenge was taking place.  (Yes, we were busy over here spitting these emails out for 2 months on top of weekly blog posts!) These emails provided tips and tricks to help the team to engage in more meaningful connections during those times throughout the month when we’re typically having surface connections online. They also provided a ra-ra-cheerleader-you-can-do-it-positive-outlook for those feeling intimidated/scared/nervous throughout the journey.  Typically these anxious feelings start to dissipate after the first week of the detox and suddenly you start to feel relieved that you no longer are hooked to your social media accounts and have successfully found more meaningful ways to utilize your time.

The Challenge is ON

We received numerous emails through April and May and we are so grateful for all the feedback and thank yous we received.  In order to prevent this from being a 6,000 word post, we selected some of our favorite responses over the course of the challenge to share with our readers.

Here’s some of the feedback we received during the month of May while the challenge was taking place:

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Here were some comments we received in early June after completing the challenge:

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“I have completed the challenge and thank you for that. Breaking up with my phone in the past is really hard. This challenge reminded me about the past in 2009 where I could go out of the house without any worries if I forgot my phone at home. Yes, that was me back then. Things have changed when I switched to a smartphone. It totally stole every minute of my life. Maybe that’s too dramatic. But the reality is I spent too much on my phone just like everyone else. The challenge gave me a different perspective and I realized that a phone is just a tool if we know how to use it.

During that 30 day period, I have created a quieter morning where I started my day with prayer and gratitude without looking at what’s happening on Facebook or Instagram. I have found the time to adapt a skin care morning routine followed by making coffee then doing a free yoga on YouTube. I have also found my passion about plants. Though we don’t have a backyard I used pots to plant. Adding greens inside the house makes a huge difference. Taking time off from the noise of social media taught me to slow down and be kind to myself. Sometimes, I tend to compare myself to others when I see what’s out there. But then, with the challenge, I am seeing my progress and I became more focused about me alone and not others.

Last night, I logged in on Instagram for the first time to check my inbox and replied and that’s just it. I no longer scroll and watch every story of people I follow. In short, I’m way better now and I am going to spend my time on the things that matters. Thanks once again!”

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“Thank you so much for putting this challenge together. I had been implementing different ways to reduce or hinder my time on social media for the last 6 months or so, but couldn’t bring myself to delete the apps from my phone until you announced this little challenge. For some reason, knowing that other people (people I didn’t even know) would be trying this too gave me the courage. So I’d like to give you some feedback on my experience the last month.

Pros:

• I noticed my overall stress went down. With the craziness that is happening in the world, I needed to disconnect but it was hard to put the phone down.
• I wasn’t mindlessly scrolling. In April I found I was scrolling through Facebook, but couldn’t even remember what posts I had seen.
• I wasn’t sucked into the ‘perfect life’ posts. You know, the ones that make you feel inadequate.
• I reconnected with one of my friends through a new app (new to me anyway) called Marco Polo that involved video chatting. I was still on my phone A LOT, but at least it was conversing with an actual person in semi-real time.
• Caught up on a lot of blogs and books.

Cons:

• Unfortunately, I live far away from most of my family and friends, so Facebook is one of the biggest ways we stay connected. To this end, I did keep messenger app on my phone, just not the Facebook app.
• Couldn’t use Facebook marketplace to search for cheap things. (This is actually good and bad, I didn’t buy anything I didn’t need, but also there are a couple things I am wanting to look for.)
• I couldn’t keep up with my favorite groups or post adorable pics of my dog, cat, sidewalk art I found on my walks. Again, this is double edged. As much as I love my Facebook groups, sometimes they drag me down as much as they lift me up.
• Caught myself scrolling LinkedIn (what is wrong with me!?!). Had to stop that nonsense. Also, caught myself cycling through all my favorite blogs, even though I had already checked that morning for new posts.

The challenge was a lot easier than I thought it would be. Maybe because I had eased into it prior. I only found myself really wanting to check or post on social media a few times. I did go on 3x to participate in a neighborhood event. But I only went on for about 5 min each time, I only went to the specific page, and I did zero scrolling. I tried to get my husband to participate too, but as he works out of town and is pretty secluded a lot of the time, he was not ready for something of this nature. As it was, I was still on my phone a ton since I prefer to use it for emails, messaging my family and friends, and talking to my husband when he’s away (75% of the time).

Now I’m sitting here on June 2nd, I still haven’t gone on Facebook and I’m debating the merit of it and whether I want to download it onto my phone again. I probably do, but I think I might set some ground rules first. Thanks again!”

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So Proud

I am so happy of the turnout we received and SO proud for the team members who took this challenge seriously.  I know they will have a profoundly different outlook on social media going forward.

There’s so much more I could add to this post but it’s already long and I wanted the feedback from the team members to be the showcase here.  I am so humbled by all the amazing responses we received during this challenge and I apologize if your comment didn’t make it into this post – there were so many great ones to choose from!  I truly hope this was helpful for those who took part in the challenge.  And for those who “failed” kudos to you too for trying!  You now have all the emails of ammo we sent out to use as motivation if/when the time comes for you to try again.

Personally, my happy medium is to have a 30 minute time limit on my phone each day for all social media accounts combined.  This way, I can check in and see if there is any pertinent information to address and if not, move on with my day with the things that really matter.  I love the connections to the FI community that Instagram and Facebook have presented to me, but now that I have a wonderful community established, my heart is happy.  It may only be a few people I actually develop true connections with vs having thousands of followers, but these connections are deep and real and I appreciate them.

Anyone reading who has never taken a social media detox, would you be up to doing one if we did another group challenge later this year?  (Hopefully this post inspired you to say yes to this question.)  If yes, you’re in luck – we’re game to get ANOTHER group challenge going!  Yes, I think this is so important that I want to keep reeling people in haha. And for those who did take part in the challenge, we’d love to have you on board again!  Stay tuned for more details in a future post.

If you’re hesitant to take a break, what’s the biggest thing holding you back? (I promise, life as you know it will not end if you escape social media for a month.  And bloggers, your traffic will oddly enough likely be the same.)  Let us know in the comments below!

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• Investing Newbies: Check out our free Investing 101 Series.
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