No social media for 5 days? No problem. Or that's what I thought until I realized that I use almost every social media platform out there — Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, Pinterest, and Tumblr — nearly every day. 

The first thing I did was move all my social media apps into a forbidden folder on my phone. "Out of sight, out of mind," right?

What Actually Happened

Day 1

water
Jocelyn Hsu

The first day wasn't so bad. I flew back to Berkeley for the start of the semester, and instead of scrolling through Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter while waiting to board the plane, I cracked open Pokémon GO. The weirdest part of the day was not being able to snap my friends that I was on the flight and then back in Berkeley.

Day 2

vegetable
Jocelyn Hsu

Day 2 was a drag. I got bored in the afternoon and had no idea what to do. After sitting on the couch for a bit, I decided to make use of my free time and clean my apartment. Our tables and counters have never looked so shiny. 

Thankfully, I had plans for the evening. My friends and I went out for dinner and watched a movie. However, once I got home, I was bored, again, so I baked chocolate chip cookies.

Day 3

espresso, beer, coffee
Jocelyn Hsu

This was an interesting day. My friend made a big deal of pointing out that we lost our Snap streak (sorry), and then I spent most of the night building a computer with my boyfriend. Another friend told me she snapped me, but it didn't matter because "it's not like you can see it." Plus, I almost typed "facebook.com" into the browser, but I caught myself right on time. 

Day 4

The semester also started today. Instead of scrolling through Instagram during class, I checked my email inbox more than I needed. That night, I got called out for sharing a Spoon article on Facebook, but I promise that I shared the article through Spoon and didn't actually go on Facebook.

Day 5

cheese, dairy product, dairy, milk
Jocelyn Hsu

The last day! It was raining like mad, so I tried my hardest not to leave the apartment. However, I did go to Plentea for a sneak peak of the new menu, and accidentally went on Facebook while trying to find the store's address online. I clicked their Facebook page on accident and quickly exited. What a close call. I almost failed this challenge at the last second. Yikes.

What I Learned

espresso, tea, coffee
Jocelyn Hsu

One of the first things I learned was that I spent more time on social media than I would have guessed. Before these 5 days, I scrolled through social media feeds a lot — on the bus, before I got out of bed, before I fell asleep, while cooking — the list goes on. Without those feeds, I had more free time to do more productive things like cleaning my apartment.

I also realized that my friends and I share quite a bit of our lives with each other through social media, specifically Snapchat. We constantly snapped each other where we were, what we were eating, and more. Without Snapchat, I didn't know what my friends ate yesterday.

Maybe I don't need to know what my friends are doing every second of every day, but it was also clear to me that, in this day and age, it's not possible to live without social media. These apps and websites are such a defining factor of marketing right now. I don't think I could be a very successful writer if I didn't share my articles online.

At the end of the day, while it was refreshing to step away from social media and the constantly updating feeds, I will definitely be returning. After all, odds are you found this article through Facebook.