Who do you follow?

Posted on September 7, 2016 by betsybeadhead | Leave a comment

I like that the word on Facebook when you don’t want to read everything that someone is saying is “unfollow”, rather than something else like “hide” or “block”. Not following some people is a good idea.

I don’t want to follow the people who continually refuse to take care of themselves and then complain about it. I don’t want to follow the people who, through every fault of their own, are obese or have cancer or in miserable relationships or jobs. Facebook is not the place to continuously complain about migraines or insomnia or sinus headaches. If they are happening that often, go to the doctor.

I don’t want to follow people who feel it necessary to share their fear about the government, the environment, or the future. Their need to “educate” me about their pet fear of the week is disturbing. I don’t read the news for a reason. The news is full of bad news with no way out. The news and these people show only the sickness and don’t offer the cure.

I don’t want to follow people whose every post is a passive aggressive rant about the world. Where they start off everything with “Dear (fill in the blank)” – someone that they are not friends with – such as “Dear person who pulled out in front of me at the Walmart shopping mall” or “Dear postman who lost my important parcel”. They complain about how that person did something wrong that adversely affected them. They’re addressing their anger to people who don’t deserve it. The people who are reading it are not the people who harmed them – they are their friends. I’m tired of listening to their craziness and having them pour their anger upon me – someone who doesn’t deserve it.

I won’t follow these people because I’m afraid I’m going to become like them. I’m afraid that I am going to drink the Kool-Aid along with them and become just as miserable as they are. They are addicted to their own pain and they want to share it. But mostly I don’t want to follow them because I’m afraid of where they’ll lead me.

The news is too much with us.

Posted on July 12, 2016 by betsybeadhead | Leave a comment

Overwhelmed by your Facebook news feed having a bit too much news about the world and not about your friends? Facebook is a way we can find out how our friends are doing. We can’t get that information on Google or the evening news. So why is it that so many people find it necessary to fill up the feed with everything but information about themselves? Why do they feel it is essential for them to educate and make others aware? And why is it that what they want to make us aware of is only bad news?

It can get a little overwhelming reading about all the bad that is going on in the world. Bees dying, poisons in food, conspiracy theories, mass murders – you name it, there are some people who are convinced that they have to share their fears with everyone. Think of it this way – this is just the same as coming to your house and dumping a load of garbage in your living room. They didn’t even knock on the front door and ask you if you wanted their garbage. They just barged on in.

But – how do you filter out those people yet still stay in touch? You could just “unfollow” and you’ll still be friends, but then it is hard to remember who to check up on. Sometimes they might share something personal. What with the decline in newspaper readership, Facebook is often how we find out that a friend’s parent or spouse has died, or that they are going to get married, or that they are going to have a child. So sometimes we need to see what they have to say.

Here’s how – create an “interest list”. Go to your home page, and then look on the right. Find “interests”, click “more” to the right of the word, and then click where it says “add interests”. Name a new list there. You can add friends on the right who feel it necessary to share every conspiracy theory, political rant, or social woe. Then go to each friend’s page and “unfollow”. You are still friends, and you can still see what they have to say when you go back to that interest list. But otherwise, your newsfeed will have only the stuff you can handle.

About face – on social media addiction.

Posted on January 5, 2014 by betsybeadhead | 1 Comment

Facebook has been my addiction for several years. The more I use it, the less I actually do that is meaningful. I’m trying to resist the impulse to check it multiple times an hour.

I’m like my Mom, who lit up a cigarette every 20 minutes she was awake. Instead of flicking my Bic, I’m clicking a mouse. I probably won’t get cancer from checking Facebook this often, but I’m just as surely losing pieces of my life.

So, like with any other addiction, I need to study it and replace it. I need to study the power it has over me, and dig down to what “hole” I’m trying to fill with it.

Then I need to address that underlying issue and fix it or make peace with it.

Part of that is filling the “hole” with better things. For me, that means writing and drawing and beading. If it was warmer outside I’d probably add in walking. Maybe I’ll do more yoga.

But I feel it is critical to not substitute one addiction for another addiction. Even healthy things can be misused and abused. It isn’t about the thing but the reason behind the thing or the intent.

If we are not being mindful, we are being mindless.

Being mindful is what makes us different from animals.

Prayer makes me mindful. Being thankful makes me mindful. I’ll start there.

Also, part of it is being observant. I’m noticing that I want to check Facebook, and just observing that feeling but not yielding to it. That alone is a big deal. I’m trying to make it harder to do as a way to remind me of my intention. Instead of having my phone right next to me, I’ll have it in another room, and turned off. Instead of having the Facebook icon on my Kindle, I’ve removed it from the carousel so I have to go into the Apps page to access it.

These things slow me down so that I remember. It has to be a conscious, intentional act to check it. That is my goal – to have everything I do be conscious and intentional.

Are you my “friend”?

Posted on October 8, 2013 by betsybeadhead | Leave a comment

I think we need a new definition of the word “friend”. Or perhaps we need different levels of “friend.” We use the word so loosely these days that it has no real meaning anymore.

One reason we need different levels of “friend” is when we are talking to one about another. I’ve recommended that one “friend” connect in a business relationship with another actual friend. But I don’t know the “friend” very well – and I don’t want the actual friend to think badly of me if the “friend” acts strangely. I can’t vouch for him. I’ve only met him once. I know people he knows, but I’ve not personally spent much time with him.

I think Facebook has blurred the lines of what “friend” means. There are plenty of people who I think of as friends who I only barely know. I only know about their lives virtually. With some people this is how I get to know them. I’ll meet them somewhere at some gathering and “friend” them. In reality I know nothing about them. My plan is to learn more about them, and them about me, in the safe near-anonymity of the cyber world.

I’m discovering that this causes a whole new set of problems for me because I’m still working on my boundaries.

Sometimes I’ll keep someone as a “friend” who only posts to complain or argue. Maybe I’ll move them to another page that I only look at every few days instead of every few hours. Then they will comment on my page only to complain or argue. Seems like that is all they do. This reminds me of the coworker who starts of every (rare) conversation with me to say “Now, I don’t mean to complain…” and then she complains. I need balance. I really can’t handle someone who only complains. This gets really old. I’m not paid to be a therapist.

Perhaps I’ll keep someone as a “friend” who never posts or never comments or even “likes” anything. Will they even notice that I’ve unfriended them? Plenty of people have a Facebook page and don’t really use it. Plenty of people lurk too. Perhaps I need to understand that they just aren’t that into me. Perhaps I need to not take it personally.

Maybe I keep some people around as “friends” because I think they may be useful some day. I think that I may need to contact her or him, so I’ll not “unfriend” just yet. Maybe I’m thinking of people like craft supplies.

Maybe I need to edit. I do this, but perhaps not as deeply as I should. I try to keep my “friends” list to under 200, when in reality I only really interact with a tenth of that, at most.

I care, sort of. I feel like I should care. They are “friends” after all, right?

Recently I unfriended two women that I thought I should get along with, but don’t. One I met in my old church. I’ve finally come to realize that she is just an unhappy person, and I don’t care to participate in her angry world. Another person was a girlfriend of a friend of mine. She was really interesting for a while. Then she started being threatening to me. Nothing big, and I suspect she thought she was being funny. Jokes aren’t funny if both people aren’t laughing.

Rather than tell them how I felt, I deleted them. If I really cared about the relationship I would have told them how I felt. But I didn’t really care. And that was a turning point. I realized that I didn’t owe them anything. I may never see them again. And I’m OK with that.

Would it be different if I did see them often? Maybe. It gets really awkward when people confront you for unfriending them. I’d think they should get the clue and not ask, or not take it so personally, but that is probably my desire to not be confrontational.

There is nothing saying you have to be friends with anybody, cyber or otherwise. Being a friend should be a choice, not an obligation.

I have to think of Facebook as like my home. Sure, they aren’t physically there. But they are inside my head, which is far more intimate. Why would I let someone rummage around in my home who doesn’t really respect or resonate with me?

So why would I let that person in my head?

For a while I’d keep my really conservative friends because I thought that I might have a positive influence on them. In fact, they ended up having a negative influence on me. I got more bitter and cynical. I felt really tense every time they would post something hateful. So I deleted them.

I’m getting more and more protective of my space. I’m just glad that I realized that my space also refers to the space in my head.