I’m doing good—no questions about that. Over a year sober. Physically fit. Mentally stable. But something still doesn’t feel right. It’s the ghost of the past that continues to haunt me.
A few years ago, I went through a breakup so devastating it almost ended me—literally. I was lost, confused, and ashamed. And what made it worse? It all happened in my 30s. People assume you’ve got life figured out by then. I didn’t. Not even close.
I had been overstimulated for years—constantly distracted by everything the modern world throws at us: social media, mindless content, digital noise. None of it helped. They didn’t solve my problems; they just numbed me to the storm building inside. That was when I realized how vulnerable and mentally weak I had become.
The first step in rebuilding myself was obvious: quit alcohol. It had been the main culprit behind most of my missteps. But the deeper I went, the more I saw how the internet—and social media in particular—was quietly eating away at my focus, patience, and peace.
I took action. I slowed down and eventually shut down my accounts for prolonged periods. And here’s what I discovered:
Realizations from Logging Off
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Instant gratification is a dangerous drug. It makes you crave validation, convinces you that your worth is measured by reactions and comments. You chase that high, but it crashes—hard. And when it does, you feel empty, without even knowing why.
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The addiction is subtle. Scrolling endlessly becomes a reflex. You feel “busy” but go nowhere. Each post gives you a dopamine hit that lasts a second, then you’re back to the void again. It weakens the mind, erodes patience, and warps attention. I realized this loop needed to stop.
Just today, after keeping Facebook active for a little over two weeks, I deactivated it again. My sleep, which had been solid for months, started to slip. My focus at work dipped a bit too. Sure, my social life got a boost—but nothing deep. Just exchanges of surface-level validation, traded like currency.
To be clear, I’ve built a solid foundation of discipline. I don’t spiral like before. But the triggers are still familiar. So I asked myself: why put my hard-earned peace in jeopardy for something so unnecessary?
So here I am again—back in late-2000s mode. Offline. Unreachable. Free.
The Deeper Ghost: Love and Loss
But it’s not just the overstimulation that made me deactivate. There’s something deeper—something older.
Facebook was the medium that gave me the greatest love of my life. And staying active on it is like lingering at a tombstone, constantly visiting a graveyard of something beautiful that’s now gone. That’s exactly how it feels.
Though my desire to reconnect with her has faded over time, it still pokes at me. Each reactivation is like turning a doorknob I’ve promised myself to leave alone. At first, there’s excitement. But then the memories rise—uninvited, unstoppable—and I spiral again.
Apparently, I still love her.
Choosing the Hard Path
There’s no rule that says, “Just go with the flow. Everyone’s online. Why resist?” No. When I quit alcohol and committed to fitness, I had one clear goal: to reclaim my mental health. And I’m applying the same mindset to my digital life.
I’m not rejecting connection or trying to live in complete solitude. I just believe in taking vacations from overstimulation. I believe in facing boredom. Facing internal struggles. We don’t need to always distract ourselves from what hurts.
Sometimes, the best way to heal is to look straight into the pain—without filters, without scrolling past it, without numbing it down.
