How to avoid social media burnout

4 min read
5 March 2019

If you actively promote something on Facebook or Instagram, sooner or later the time will come when:

  • Ideas for posts will end;
  • You will get tired of permanent Internet surfing, likes, and comments;
  • You will want to throw away your smartphone or break your notebook;
  • You will have insomnia and depression.

Congratulations, these are the first signs of the burnout!

Is it possible to avoid it? Of course, it is. Like any other kind of burnout, it can be beaten very easily. The problem is that none of us even tires to do it, that’s why pull yourself together and follow the instructions which have already saved millions of bloggers.

Content plan

The content plan is a list of possible topics for your blog for a specific period of time. In other words, it is when you think that you are very clever and make photos for half a year ahead, and then you can hardly help yourself from bursting into tears because you do not know how to caption them.

It is not bad to make an approximate monthly content plan indicating all important dates, and then make a shorter but more precise weekly plan. This way you will save your time and will not puzzle over what to post tomorrow. By the way, do you remember our article about how to make a content plan quickly and for a long period of time? These tips are still relevant.

Bonus: If they bother you at home with “find a real job”, print your content plan on good paper and hang it on the wall. Let everybody finally see what a “burden” you carry: 3 posts per day, 5 articles per hour, 100 comments per minute.

Check your social media accounts twice a day

In fact, once is enough because you can hardly miss something important, but to keep calm, twice is perfect. You should not check Direct messages, comments, likes and reposts every single minute — this will lead you to regular psychiatrist appointments.

Change activities during daytime

For example, if you are a freelancer, switch from working with a computer to other activities, especially to those ones which are related to physical efforts. Due to hypodynamia — decrease in body muscle activity as the result of a sedentary lifestyle —people start suffering from burnout faster. Much faster.

Physical exercises lower stress and give you energy, and they prevent exhaustion, and nervous exhaustion as well.

If you work at the office, set a reminder on your phone to leave your workplace and have some rest at least once in 1-1,5 hours. Do some exercises, let your eyes and brain have rest. Do not allow yourself to see only your working desk. Have lunch in a beautiful park or at a nice cafe.

Plan your complete social media detox

No jokes. It is important.

If you do not plan your leisure time, your body will have to find itself a way to relax, and when it happens, it will not be the most pleasant thing in your life. That’s why not to come down with the flu when the deadline is close, write your plans for the weekend and vacation in your diary right now. First, it will not be easy, but you will get used to it. Our previous article with a carrot picture is right about it: https://onlypult.com/en/blog/drastic-and-funny-ways-of-detox-against-social-media.

One new strict rule

No computers, tablets, and smartphones an hour before going to bed.

The matter is that the blue light which comes from screens suppresses the effects of the sleep hormone melatonin. Sleep disorder specialists have discovered that the bodies of those who read electronic books or check social media in bed late at night produce half the quantity of melatonin of those who prefer printed books and real communication.

At most, just try to use electronic gadgets with the smaller screens and do not have them too close to your eyes to minimize the blue light effects. Give melatonin a chance.