As I rang in 2026, I read a lot of New Year’s resolution lists — looking for inspiration for my own — and one kind of item appeared again and again on many lists:
Reduce social media consumption.
Recapture time and headspace by limiting my use of social media.
Stop scrolling so much.
The writers of these lists often bemoaned the negative impact of social media on their lives, which makes sense.
The latest data shows Americans spend two hours and 14 minutes per day on social media platforms, or nearly 10% of their day and 14% of their waking hours.
That’s a hell of a lot of time.
Social media use is also linked with declines in subjective mood and life satisfaction. Extensive social media time is correlated with greater depressive and anxiety symptoms.
Research also finds that social media users — especially youth — often engage in upward social comparisons, seeing others as happier, more successful, or more attractive, which is associated with lower positive self-worth and higher negative self-worth on days when they use social media more.
Multiple analyses show links between social media activity and elevated anxiety, loneliness, stress, and internalizing problems like rumination and worry.
All of this is especially pronounced in adolescent use.
These findings are admittedly slightly nuanced. Research has also found a distinct difference between people passively consuming content (scrolling without interacting) and those actively engaging with content, such as using YouTube for a specific purpose, creating content for a platform, or connecting with people on social media for targeted professional purposes.
In other words, when social media is used as a purposeful, strategic tool, the impact on a person’s mental health is often shown to be nonexistent, whereas passive scrolling of content on platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook correlates to severe mental declines.
So yes, it makes sense that people are attempting to curb their social media use in their lists of New Year’s resolutions. The way the vast majority of Americans use social media today is disastrous, which leads me to a simple suggestion:
If you recognize social media as a problem, stop using social media. Eliminate the damn thing from your life.
And don’t let your kids use social media, especially in ways that are most detrimental to their mental health.
Some of the most successful people I know don’t use social media at all. I’ve had many of my former students — now high school and college students — tell me they quit social media entirely after realizing how platforms like Instagram and TikTok were affecting their time and mental health.
Some of my best and brightest former students have ditched social media entirely, and those who still use it are being thoughtful and productive about it.
Cultivating a professional network on LinkedIn.
Using YouTube to teach them how to cook, fix their plumbing, or study.
Using Instagram to stay in touch with family and friends by carving out 15 minutes per day to look at their posts only.
Smart people. Successful people. Thoughtful people.
My children have never used social media other than YouTube for educational or entertainment purposes.
No TikTok. No Instagram. No Facebook.
Their brains are not ready for that yet. They probably never will be.
Just get off the damn thing.
This is, of course, coming from someone who seems to make extensive use of social media, except for this:
I post and move on. I write a blog post every day that appears on many social media platforms, but once I post (or in many cases, an automation posts it for me), I walk away.
I don’t scroll.
I don’t watch TikTok videos or Instagram Reels (I had to look up the name of their short-form videos) or YouTube’s Shorts (also had to look up that name).
If Facebook has scrollable videos, I don’t watch those either.
IfI’m in line at the pharmacy or in a drive-thru, I might see what people said about something I posted, but many days, I never go back and look.
I post and walk.
Write my thing, click publish, and live in the real world.
It’s not hard. I promise.
Elysha went to Nashville earlier this year with friends for a reunion weekend. While she and her friends sat outside, enjoying conversation and drinks, they watched a group of young women spend endless time on a photo shoot of their own making, attempting to capture the perfect poses for posting on social media.
More than an hour was spent positioning, posting, and posturing so they had idealized versions of themselves to post on a platform where those photos would last for maybe a day or two before being forgotten and replaced by other photos that would also be forgotten and replaced.
When your life is reduced to a 5-inch by 3-inch screen, you have problems and are likely looking at a hell of a lot of regret in the future. Looking back on a life spent scrolling a screen will not spark joy.
So yes, making a reduction in social media use one of your New Year’s resolutions is a fantastic goal, but if you genuinely think social media is draining away precious time and harming your mental health — as so many Americans acknowledge in surveys — perhaps you should do away with it entirely.
Or at least be targeted and thoughtful about its use.
If you had a toxic friend who consumed your time and made you sad, you’d eliminate them from your life.
If you were taking a daily prescription that stripped you of your time and seriously harmed your mental health, you’d stop using that drug.
If your job required you to work on the weekends and made you depressed and anxious, you’d likely find a new job.
Maybe do the same with social media if you use it in harmful, time-wasting ways.
Be kinder to yourself.
Engage more with the real world.
Recognize the ephemeral, meaningless nature of scrolling.
Acknowledge that no one will ever care about your posts as much as you.
And please, don’t allow your children use it.
These are excellent New Year’s resolutions.
