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Disappearing Completely on Facebook
Seems tempting, but here’s how I stay on it without being annoyed or anxious all the time
It irks me that I am still on Facebook after more than a decade. But if it irks me that badly, then why am I still on it?
The “dire” need
Facebook used to be very useful to me, especially when I was a freelance writer and I needed to market my services to friends, friends of friends, and friends of friends of friends. At that time, having an online presence was a necessity because I usually found clients and gigs through the Internet.
Being on Facebook used to be okay.
I never hit Facebook’s 5,000-friend limit, thank goodness. But I remember reaching more than 2,000 contacts. My mindset was: if someone added me and we had, like, 99 mutual friends, I confirmed the request — he or she must be from the photography or music scene, anyway, which were the two small worlds in Manila that I used to frequent. But maybe I only knew less than 50% of them in person.
But after knowing people online, and some of them in real life, being on the platform eventually became suffocating. It felt worse how certain people were extremely toxic in person. Seeing their posts on my feed didn’t help them become better human…
