Nowadays, we cannot imagine our everyday lives without social media which especially applies to the generation of the so-called “digital natives”. The uncontrollable flood of information, the urge for always being contactable and to permanently upload new photos or postings as well as the fear of missing something, however cause a continuous stress level which should not be underestimated and which can even lead to burnout in the worst case. Therefore, we will reveal what you should consider when using social media:

What are the signs for a social media burnout?

The intensive use of social media puts us in a chronical state of stress which mostly remains unnoticed at first due to its low level. However, also little strains accumulate slowly but surely and only when it is already too late and the first signs of burnout are showing, we realize it. If you notice for instance that you do not enjoy maintaining your social media accounts anymore and rather see it as a burden to feel constantly pressured to produce new contents, this is one of the first signs of an increased stress level. If you have the aspiration of being reachable around the clock and of being active in the social media channels nonetheless, this can quickly lead to a decreasing concentrativeness, headaches, a reduced productive capacity as well as to insomnia and in the worst case even to anxiety states, depressions and heart diseases.    

What can help against social media burnout?

In order to counteract this so-called “social media burnout”, you should massively reduce your usage duration and ration it reasonably. You do not need to be permanently online in order to observe your number of likes, shares and followers. It is completely sufficient to do this once per day and not everytime that you have a free minute. Also your friends and followers will surely understand when you do not always answer them within the next ten minutes. Moreover, you should completely renounce using your smartphone, tablet or laptop before you are going to bed. If it is important to you to regularly upload postings, you can plan them in advance (for example via Hootsuite) in order to allow yourself some social media free days from time to time. Aside from that you should try to consciously zone out and get away from your monitor. Go for a walk outside in the fresh air, for example or try to meditate or do some yoga in order to grant your mind a well deserved timeout.