How to protect your inner peace when using social media

Social media is everywhere and you can’t escape a new app or trend of the week.

However, research has shown it can have a detrimental affect on your mental health.

A survey by social media-based company Gee Hair found that approximately one in three men experience negative feelings when scrolling through social media. Despite this, it found that women experience 70% more negative feelings compared with men. Younger people were also most likely to be negatively impacted than those in older age groups.

The website Wholewellness therapy gives you two ways to quit social media completely, these are: to quit cold turkey or to wean yourself off by limiting the amount of time spent online a day by setting limits. However, if you don’t want to cut yourself off totally, heere are our tips to help you use social media in a healthy way.

• Sort through your followers – only keep people that make being online a positive experience.
• Post things that make you smile – posting shouldn’t be a big, calculated drop that happens once a month, make the most of moments and post that cute picture.
• Engage with content you love – unfollow that account that makes you self-conscious, instead follow accounts that empower you.
• Regularly check in with yourself – see how you’re feeling about your social media use and if it’s not having a positive impact on your life, change how and when you use it.
• Restrict your screen time – continuously doom-scrolling can lead you to a dark place, instead split up the time you spend online by setting timers, so you can enjoy the world around you.

If you’re having a hard time with your mental health you can find help here.