An alternative to social media that is actually good for you
By: Andrei B
Tags: Social Media, Diary, Self Improvement, Journaling

You probably heard by now that social media can have some nasty negative effects on its users.

It’s not all bad and some positives are there as well.

But what if there would be something similar to social media that would make you less stressed and actually healthier?

I’m here to propose journaling as at least a partial alternative to social media.

Just think about it, the same way you post on social media about your day to day you could post privately and even go more in depth.

Sharing your emotions good or bad in private means you don’t have to censor yourself or your train of thought.

There is no one but you who sees it so there is nobody to judge it.

So, you ask, what would be the point if nobody is going to see it?

Glad you asked.

Let’s start with the positive stuff, your wins.

You can simply post about your successes, what you learned from them and how much they mean to you. And nobody is going to judge you or claim that you are bragging.

But taking the time to celebrate even small wins is an important part of our confidence building so it’s definitely worth doing.

On the flip side, with the negative stuff, you can write about it without self-censoring. This helps you process the full thing better.

It may also help figure out solutions, where you may have made any mistakes or to simply see things from a different perspective.

It might even be the case that when you put things in writing the problems starts looking smaller than you initially thought.

You certainly can’t explore things too deeply on social media knowing that people will see and judge what you are saying.

There is still more to it

Removing yourself from the comparison culture that is promoted on social media you can focus more on the things that really matter to you.

On social platforms, you only see the best of people, highly edited and unnatural.

Everybody is a contest to look happy and successful.

For the most part, it’s fake.

It’s fake in that it’s not a representation of these people’s lives, but we tend to think it is.

We tend to get sucked in this contest and we end up focusing on the image we try to create of ourselves to others.

That changes our value system and with that focus on artificial things we tend to forget about the things that really matter.

Getting yourself out of that game gives you a lot more room to think about and work towards your own dreams and ambitions with a lot less influence of artificial standards.

Journaling is not just for kids and teenagers

One common misconception is that journaling is only for certain ages but that just doesn’t make any sense.

There are lots of reasons to keep a journal and many kinds of journals. From the usual mind dump to travel logs, memory keeping, work journals, goal oriented journals that keep you on track and so on.

Journaling is for everybody, especially if you care about making personal progress in life.

You can’t make progress unless you keep an eye on what you are doing and where you are going.

And it doesn’t take much to figure out that a lot of people of all ages keep journals if you simply join some communities around the subject.

Don’t let this myth keep you away from trying.

How to get started

If all of the above makes sense to you and you want to give a try to journaling I would say start with a digital app.

The reason is that it will feel more familiar and easier to get into.

Something like our journaling app MusePeach could be a good choice, it’s free and you can use it on any device.

Of course, there are others as well, try them out and see what you connect with the most.

From there it’s pretty much the usual affair except that you can really speak your mind without any fear of judgment.

Explore yourself, your feelings, passions and whatever else comes to mind.

Start small, don’t push yourself to write novels, just the regular small update works just fine, to begin with.

When you feel you have more to say, just say it. You might be surprised by what comes out of it.

In conclusion

Journaling can be a great social media alternative with none of the negative effects.

It’s easy to get started with a bunch of free apps being available and you can really explore your mind and let it loose.

Give it a try and see what it does for you.