I have been debating with myself for the past few months on why and how I use social media (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram etc). It’s wasn’t such a simple thing for me to understand how I felt about it, but what I did realise is that I needed to adjust some of my behaviour towards it. So here follows a bit of the process, thoughts and responses I have decided to take on-board …

I started out like most people overdoing it (could quite possibly just be me too), following and connecting with everyone, and in the beginning that did seem quite normal. I followed and un-followed people, became friends with people I didn’t always know and grew increasingly frustrated with the process of being a “friend” on a media network, when I didn’t really even know said person. In some cases when I saw them in real life, we never even said “hoezat”! Most often the people I did know and wanted to hang and connect with resulted in real communication, and we made time to do that in person, and that’s what it should always be for me, real!

So I decided to choose the social media platforms I wanted to use, and then also how and why these were to remain in use. I initially liked the friend connection type setup that Facebook had, but it’s a bit high maintenance for me now and also too many people cloning you, to be quite honest I am just bored and over it! Dropped that like it was hot, then I started cleaning out all “distant / vague” connections on LinkedIn, and the people who got the chop were typically recruitment type people who generally just abuse your profile and contact network looking for employment candidates, not that I have an issue with people making a living by the way. So that sorted Farcebook and LinkedIn, and then the process of Instagram came up, and I am very undecided about that and guess it will remain a work in progress for the time being. New rule seems to be that if I am not sure, then bail it in view of life simplicity! Perhaps that is the decision made then … major issue for me here though, is that photos capture moments that words can’t come close to, and Instagram is flippin awesome at capturing those moments … like I said, it’s a work in progress!

Then to the platform that I like the most … Twitter, I think it is the non-committal approach of following someone / company / interest because you can and want to that works for me. It’s such a great way to stay in touch with information that interests you without really needing to work too hard to get the information you are into. Interested in something or a company, follow it on Twitter and then the data comes right to you, and quicker than you would read about it on the internet too in most cases. As for people, a new rule for me is in most cases if I follow you then I know you as a real person. Either that or I hope to meet you and it’s likely I will meet you soon …

In this time hungry world we live in, this has been an area of simplification that needed to happen in my life, and the choices I have made hopefully allow me to get better information that interests me, saving me time and keeping me connected to people who matter in my life …