Facebook lurking makes you miserable, says study

bbc.co.uk

20 points·BerislavLopac··4 comments

I have to agree and this is the main reason why I went extreme and deleted my profile. My life was at a low point and seeing everybody's high point of the day made it even worse; it was a decision that took less than a second and 90 seconds later my profile was deleted. To be honest, I regret it a bit now.

I was in a similar situation but took a less drastic route that has worked well for me.

First I posted a quick message about 'going dark' for awhile. I knew it was going to be a permanent change to stop commenting and posting, but a little white lie to make it less dramatic seemed fine.

Then I installed an extension that turns the facebook wall into motivational quotes. It gives interesting quotes, but more importantly it stops the feed from ramping up my dopamine should I unconsciously stumble back.

After that, I've stuck to only using facebook for its messaging and only update my profile picture once or twice a year to show i'm alive.

Ever since I've been much happier. All my photos and hard work creating my profile is still there, prople still know I'm alive and have a place to find me, and all the addictive cruft and spam is gone from my life! This has worked extremely well for me and I reccomend it to prople who want to change their relationship with facebook without deleting their profile.

I don't think you should regret it. I observed logging in once a week to check messages or any new friend requests and not looking at the feed helped me not to be miserable. I suggest you do the same if you need a profile.

Out of curiosity, why do you regret it?

FWIW I deleted mine under similar circumstances a couple years ago and don't miss it at all.

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