The advice about going outside is great. It's really good to have repeatable weekly interactions with people too. Your hobbies, or your kids hobbies are easy ways.

But how bad things are online, I've only only heard about, and rarely seen.

I use twitter. Web only, no notifications, timeline view (only people I follow, chronologically). If anyone retweets drama, I block the author. Second time, I unfollow.

My feed is full of awesome smart people in different industries building things that matter. I learn, and I can interact with great people in my industry. It's as good (though different), as ICQ/AIM back in the day or the early days of Facebook.