Six months without the big FB

Six Months.  Sounds like a long time to go without Facebook huh?  Oh the dread of not knowing what’s going on or missing out on the social loop of who’s doing what or visa-versa. 

Well not really.  It’s actually been incredibly refreshing.  But that’s a point for later.  First it’s important to establish why I got rid of Facebook.  Why a fairly loyal user of seven years (nearly a third of my life) just up and quit the biggest social network site in the world sixth months ago.  That’s the question.

The truth is I’m not an overly active producer of social content.  Even in my prime Facebook days I didn’t post hundreds of photos.  In fact, besides my phone, I don’t even own a digital camera.  I don’t like to take photos of what I’m doing or the people I’m with.  I’d much rather just interact with them.  So really, there wasn’t even a single picture of me on my page that I’d taken. 

I wasn’t a big “post-er” either.  Sure I’d throw in a comment every so often, but I wasn’t one to throw countless lines of content into Facebook cyberspace.  And there’s a danger in that.

We form social identities for everyone we meet.  We form concepts of who they are just a few seconds after meeting them.  Or after spending a few seconds on their Facebook profile.  Yes these concepts change overtime but first impressions do mean a lot.

Here’s how this all played into my decision to get rid of Facebook.  In high school I interacted with most of my Facebook friends on a regular basis.  This provided them with the opportunity to form social concepts of who I was based on more than just my Facebook profile. 

When I left for college that changed.  Not only do I not see my prior Facebook friends but the new ones I was accumulating were dispersed over a greater space, population and, to be honest, I interacted with them on a much less frequent basis.  Thus to fill that absence my Facebook profile stepped forward.  It became more predominate in other’s people’s roles of determining who I was. 

Now because of this, and my lack of my own content posting, I slowly came to realizing that I was letting other people form other people’s concepts of who I am.  That’s absolutely terrifying—especially as I enter the professional world. 

So I had to do a bit of analysis.  In the end I just didn’t care about Facebook enough to expend the effort to justify keeping it.  It was a habit.  Not something I looked forward to, or something that I felt obliged to do.  It was just a simple habit— a habit that could be broken. 

So I did it. And the results have been pretty interesting.   I certainly don’t miss it.  That’s for sure.  But I find myself reaching out in the real world more often.  Instead of thinking, I wonder how so-and-so is doing I’d better go check Facebook, I find myself just calling or texting them instead.  It feels far more rewarding, and I believe it helps the relationship grow more than simply exercising the low commitment of a “like this” click. 

I stop and talk to people as a I pass them more, after all it’s the only way I have to learn about how they’re doing.  Maybe some relationships have run by the wayside.  Some of my acquaintances from high school probably think I’m dead.  And I doubt I’m keeping those relationships up as much as people with Facebook. But that’s the way things like this work.  Life moves on.  And it was time for Facebook to do the same.  

Now I’m the only source of other people’s perception of who I am.  No one tags me in anything.  I’m who I am.  And that’s pretty cool.