I Cured My Social Media Addiction by Reading Books

Simon Doherty

I woke up yesterday at 8:15 a.m. and instinctively1. instinctively: 本能地，下意识地。reached for my MacBook. I checked my emails and how many people had liked the article I wrote yesterday, on which someone had commented that they wanted me to kill myself.I climbed out of bed, showered, brushed my teeth, and made a cup of tea—though not before checking social media again and sending my girlfriend a meme2. meme: 互联网文化基因，或说“梗”，这里指配字的表情包。.

At my desk, I spent half an hour scrolling through my Facebook feed, skimming information I have little interest in,like someone with a life sentence reluctantly reading every book in the prison library.3. 在我的办公桌前，我花了半个小时刷Facebook动态，浏览我并不感兴趣的信息，就像一个被判无期徒刑的人不情不愿地阅读监狱图书馆里的每一本书。scroll:滚动，翻看；feed: 动态消息；life sentence: 无期徒刑；reluctantly:不情愿地，勉强地。Someone I went to school with is getting married. I read a think piece4. think piece: 评论文章，时事短评。about effective time management, and three pointless articles: an egg exploded in a microwave, a woman lost weight for her wedding, and someone was arrested for punching a police horse. It’s now nearly 11:15 a.m., and nothing in this vortex5. vortex: 涡流，旋涡。of irrelevance has helped me pay my rent.

Social media sucks the productivity out of me like this every day, half my time consumed by digital procrastination.6. 每天，社交媒体都像今天这样大大降低我的工作效率，让我把一半时间都浪费在数字化拖延症上。procrastination: 拖延。I need the internet to work, of course. But my rampant7. rampant: 失控的。web use doesn’t feel healthy, and certainly isn’t productive. As I write this,I have 27 browser tabs open and only four are related to my work.8. browser: 浏览器；tab: 标签页。None of these tools help users to manage their time effectively—quite the reverse9. reverse: 相反的。.

Facebook、Twitter、Instagram和Tinder等社交媒体已经成为现代人际交往的基石，人们在上面晒图发帖，获得朋友的评论点赞，以赢得归属感和认同感。的确，社交媒体有很多好处和积极的影响，然而它们也会浪费我们的时间，分散我们的精力和注意力，甚至让人上瘾，不能自拔。本文的作者就曾沉迷于社交媒体，然而最近，他想出了一个很好的方法来转移自己的注意力……

I’m aware I may have an “addictive personality,” and can be excessive with anything from drugs to Net flix and Pringles.10. addictive personality: 成瘾人格；Net flix: 奈飞公司，在线影片租赁提供商；Pringles:品客薯片。I’m also aware that this susceptibility can be channelled in a positive way; I knew someone who was addicted to crack but got clean,11. susceptibility: 敏感，易受影响的情况；crack: 强效纯可卡因。and subsequently became addicted to library books—taking out the maximum amount before borrowing his wife’s library card to get his next hit.

So I decided to quit social media for a month, and when I felt the urge to login, I’d read a book instead. It could be glorious, I decided. It had to be better than where I was.

Day Two: By the second day of my experiment, I’d noticed my muscle memory urging me to type Facebook.com into my browser,like an athlete with a body finely tuned to perform the same motor movement over and over again.12. tune: 培养，训练；motor movement: 肌肉运动。This “social media twitch13. twitch: 抽搐，抽动。”happened progressively less throughout the month, and every time I felt it, I picked up a book. There were links to social media embedded14. embed: 嵌入，植入。in a lot of the digital articles I read, and that was hard. Now I know how recovering alcoholics feel when they walk past their local bar every day.

Day Six: Facebook’s omnipotent algorithm had noted my absence, and began to send ever more desperate emails to try to lure me back in.15. Facebook的万能算法发现我没有登录，便开始发送更多迫切希望我回归的电子邮件，试图把我引诱回去。omnipotent:万能的，无所不能的；algorithm: 算法。

Day Eight: Facebook had emailed me five times to tell me I had 135 noti fications16. noti fication: 通知。. It felt like inappropriate behavior from an ex-partner, maybe grounds for a restraining order?17. 这感觉就像前任的不当举动，或许可以申请限制令？restraining order: 禁令，限制令。My cursor hovered over the login; I yearned to see who had sent me friend requests.18. 我的光标悬停在登录界面上；我好想知道是谁给我发了好友邀请。cursor: 光标，游标；hover: 徘徊，悬停；yearn: 渴望，向往。My mind started to suggest I could have just one look, and then restart the experiment tomorrow, but I resisted, shut my laptop, and picked upSlouching Towards Bethlehem19. Slouching Towards Bethlehem:《向伯利恒跋涉》，作者琼·迪迪翁是美国散文家、小说家，曾是著名的新闻工作者。这本散文集奠定了她在散文创作领域的地位，记述了她20世纪60年代在美国加利福尼亚州的生活经历。.

There are some report of people feeling lonely and isolated when they quit social media. I live with 20 other people, so I always have someone to talk to. But I did feel “out of the loop”20. out of the loop: 在圈外，不知情。when it came to some conversations.

Day 12: I was having dinner with my girlfriend and her friends. Despite the fact that, in the U.K.,our politicians were taking part in a historic Brexit vote at that very moment, the hot topic of conversation was the stock image of an egg that had amassed over 50 million “likes” on Instagram.21. 尽管当时英国的政客们正在参与一场历史性的脱欧公投，然而我们聊天的热门话题却是Instagram上一张鸡蛋的素材图片，这张照片已经获得了超过五千万个赞。amass: 积累，累计。It broke the record for “likes” on a single post, previously held by Kylie Jenner.22. 它打破了之前由凯莉·詹纳保持的单帖点赞的记录。Kylie Jenner: 凯莉·詹纳，美国演员、模特、企业家和社交媒体名人。

“Simon doesn’t know about any of this,” said my girlfriend, helpfully, “because he’s taking a break from social media.” I politely nod while considering how many cultural reference points I would miss if I continued my abstinence23. abstinence: 节制，禁欲。inde finitely. Could I still write about youth culture, or would I be too out of the loop?

In the past, national TV moments—the Super Bowl’s halftime show, the police pursuit of O. J. Simpson, and Nixon’s resignation speech—used to wield such cultural capital that everyone was talking about them the next day.24. 以前，超级碗的中场秀、警方追捕辛普森以及尼克松辞职演讲等，这些全国性的电视播送片段都曾掌控巨大的文化资本，从而成为所有人隔天谈论的话题。Super Bowl: 美国职业橄榄球大联盟（NFL）年度冠军赛，中场秀即上下半场之间12分钟的表演时间；O. J. Simpson: O. J.辛普森，前美式橄榄球运动员，被指控于1994年杀害其前妻妮科尔·辛普森（Nicole Simpson）及餐馆服务员罗纳德·戈德曼（Ronald Goldman），后因证据存有漏洞，被判无罪，成为当时美国最为轰动的事件；Nixon: 尼克松（Richard Nixon，1913—1994），美国第37任总统（1969—1974），1974年8月因“水门事件”辞职，成为美国有史以来第一个主动辞职的总统；resignation:辞职；wield: 运用，掌握。Now, it’s memes and viral videos and Twitter threads that generate a much more fragmented discourse.25. 如今的对话则更加零散，讨论的都是网络上的“梗”、广为传播的小视频以及推特动态。I might not have been following some conversations but, hey, I was on my fourth book by then. It seemed worth it.

Day 18: I imagine what the trolls26. troll: 网络喷子，键盘侠。have been posting about my latest article. They probably still wish me dead, but I almost miss their hateful bile; I’ve always enjoyed the writertroll relationship in a perverse, self- flagellating kind of way.27. bile: 气话，愤怒；perverse: 故意作对的，任性的；self- flagellating: 自我鞭笞的。I miss them with the kind of begrudging28. begrudging: 不快的，不满的。affection a child might feel for an older sibling who bullies them. When I write for a few hours in the afternoon, I feel sharp29. sharp: 敏锐的，有洞察力的。and focused.My work is punctuated30. punctuate: 不时打断。only by checking for updates on the Brexit. Things are looking up (for me, not for the U.K.).

While I did manage to reduce my procrastination, I didn’t totally eliminate it. My ever-creative brain found new ways to distract itself, seeking solace31. solace: 安慰，慰藉。in stranger corners of the web that I found boring before—like using Google Translate to learn funny phrases and saying them to my Spanish housemates.

But nothing is as much of a compulsive time sink as social media.32. 但没有什么能比社交媒体更让人无法自拔地消磨时间了。Facebook is my biggest problem, perhaps because I’ve been using it for more than a decade. It’s useful for keeping in touch with people on the other side of the world, and for listings of exhibitions and gigs and club nights—but it’s very hard to isolate these from all the flotsam and jetsam of the news feed.33. gig:（尤指爵士或流行音乐的）演奏会，演唱会； flotsam and jetsam: 原指失事船只的漂浮残骸，引申指零碎杂物，无价值物。

Stripped back to essentials,Facebook is really a direct contact marketing agency.Facebook’s executives line their pockets with advertising dollars that are generated by our attention. But our attention is one of our most precious resources. I resent being manipulated and my attention diverted away from my work, my personal development, my personal success.

By the end of the month, my social media twitch had almost completely gone, and I’d read five books and three magazines. I no longer ached for a social media dopamine34. dopamine: 多巴胺。hit first thing in the morning. In fact, my laptop had stayed in my backpack overnight, meaning the quality of my sleep improved because I wasn’t staying up until 2 a.m. watching ludicrous35. ludicrous: 荒唐的，滑稽可笑的。YouTube videos about dead celebrities who are supposedly still alive.