How Not To Get Addicted To Social Networking

At one point of time, an average person’s daily routine would include, wake up in the morning, brush teeth, get ready, go to work, and begin work. Nowadays, with the coming of social networking sites, keeping a tab on them has also become an inevitable part of the whole routine – and it’s so ubiquitous, it could fit anywhere in the whole routine! One could check on his or her favourite social media site immediately after waking up, after their morning coffee, after having reached work or even in the restroom, in case it supports Wi-Fi! Such kind of culture can breed only one kind of species – the Networking-aholics who cannot live without their daily dose of the writing on the wall, poking, uploading pictures, playing various games or answering one of the various quizzes. The whole situation blows out of proportion when the addiction begins to creep into one’s normal lifestyle and begins to affect healthy human relationships with ‘real people’ and not virtual ones. Since it is difficult to get rid of a full-blown addiction, it is best to nip it at the bud. Here’s how to avoid social networking addiction.

 

How To Avoid Addiction To Social Networking Sites 

Here are some ways by which you can avoid getting addicted to social networking sites:

 

Limits Does It 

People get addicted to social networking over the internet because they do know when to start but not when to end – that is when to log out and turn their attention to something more important (like work or family). In many such cases, all people have to do is to set a limit (that’s the easy part) and then stick to it (which is, needless to say, the tough part). Compromising on the day’s work to make time for social networking is a sign of how the small amount of time that people initially spent with their virtual lives keeps stretching itself until is turns into a full blown addiction. Remind yourself that you have better stuff to do than just waste your time socializing over the internet. If you cannot keep track of it for the initial few days, set an alarm for about 15 minutes from when you open your social network account and switch it off as and when the alarm goes.

 

Schedule Your Day 

Surely, we all have more important stuff to take care of, while we are at work or home, when we are at the greatest risk of spending too much time socializing over the internet. If you schedule your day in such a way that you spend only a limited time networking over the internet, you will definitely keep addiction at bay. For all practical purposes, do not keep social media sites open in your web browser at all times. Try to make such media inaccessible to you so that you limit your interaction over the internet. Also, take a stock of other jobs that need to be taken care of – irrespective of the fact whether you are at home or office, you will have a lot of workload to finish. If you set timer to finish each of them and stick to that timer, you will be less prone to addiction to social media.

 

Choosey Does It 

People end up befriending too many people over the internet and cannot take time out for work, which is more important, because at least one of those friends keeps pinging and you feel a compulsive need to reply. Or else, one out of your over 200 friends posts pictures of his or her birthday party and you feel compelled to see it. Yet another friend of yours may answer a quiz and would have sent you an invite to play the same game and you feel the need to take a look and before you know it, you are hooked. Remember that if it weren’t for addicts, social networking site owners would go out of business. They make moolah while you suffer from addiction – money that they should be paying you! Jokes apart, they do keep coming up with various games and schemes to keep users glued, but you can always choose not to get glued.