Social Media Anxiety & What You Can Do About It

Alissa Schneider
Sep 8, 2018 · 8 min read

About the Writer: I am a licensed mental health counselor in the state of Florida, and I work with young women to help them heal from anxiety and overcome fear. I offer online video therapy services to individuals throughout the state of Florida.

How are anxiety and social media related?

Social media seems almost essential to our being these days. We are always on social media sites, and often find ourselves scrolling through our feeds at any moment that we find ourselves bored and not doing anything else. I can say from personal experience that if I am not busy with something else, that I am often on social media. It is hard to believe what people did with all of this time before these websites and apps were invented.

Social media has a lot of benefits. Firstly, it can help us reconnect or stay connected with other people we may not normally stay in touch with. We can find people we went to high school or college with, and make business and work connections. Sometimes you may not always feel comfortable with giving your personal cell phone number or your email out to these acquaintances, so it is an easier way of staying in touch while also keeping our distance. Social media also allows us to stay up to date with the world and with recent news, and helps us keep track of things like birthdays and events in the lives of the people we follow. There are a lot of good things about social media, but it also has some downsides.

Many people are struggling more and more with anxiety in general, and anxiety related to social media use as well. Anxiety is typically defined by a level of excessive worry, and may be comprised by a variety of symptoms such as rapid heartbeat, fatigue, poor concentration, nausea, lightheadedness, irritability, and the list goes on. Some people even have episodes of “panic” attacks, in which many of these anxiety symptoms come on sometimes for no apparent reason, and can even leave the individual in fear of their lives. Many people think that they are having a heart attack or some physical ailment because there are often so many physical symptoms. Anxiety can really mess us up, and it is becoming more and more common in today’s world.

But, why? What are the reasons for the increase in anxiety disorders in today’s culture? It is just my opinion, but I think much of it has to do with the rise in things such as technology and social media. We are more connected than ever before, yet more disconnected than ever before as well. We constantly receive notifications, text messages, and emails, but our phones constantly buzzing may lead to a disconnect with the real people standing right around us. It may not seem like it takes very long to reply to a simple text message or social media post, but if we added up throughout a week or month, I bet that most of us would be completely astounded by the amount of time these tasks actually take. It can rob us of our connection to other people, and also our precious time.

Social Media May Lead to Anxiety

All of this constant connection can lead to a dramatic increase in our levels of anxiety. We use this constant connection as a way to fill our time and reduce boredom, but since when is boredom such a terrible thing? Boredom can lead to great insights and can drive us to invent, create, and interact with those around us. Boredom is treated as if it is this century’s plague, when in fact boredom is one of the potential cures to this high anxiety.

Anxiety often causes us to avoid. When we experience a negative emotion such as anxiety, one of our most common defense mechanisms is to go into avoidance mode. This is a completely natural response, because we don’t like the way that the trigger or situation makes us feel. However, avoidance is not always very helpful. Avoidance, however, is not a typical tool we use when we suffer from anxiety related to social media. We are often caught in almost an abusive cycle with social media in which we keep going back for more, even though we may experience heightened negative emotions such as panic, anxiety, and poor self-esteem.

When using social media, we often get an instant high of good feelings and emotions, and we get a sense of instant gratification. Instant gratification seems like a good thing in the moment, but we should really often run the opposite direction if we feel it coming on! This gratification we receive when people like, share, and comment on our posts is the thing that keeps us coming back, and it covers up those negative emotions such as anxiety. However, this does not counteract the anxiety, and merely covers it up.

Social Media: A Toxic Cycle

Social media may also lead to an unhealthy comparison between ourselves and others. How often do you scroll through your feeds and find yourself comparing yourself to other people? If you are like many people, you often struggle with this as well. The thing is, is that we do not post pictures of ourselves with tangled hair and last night’s leftover makeup smeared all over our faces; we post edited pictures of ourselves with a full face of makeup while laying on the beach in our bikinis. Only we look 15 pounds lighter and fix our skin discoloration and the cellulite we have on our hips due to today’s simple-to-use editing tools. We then compare ourselves to these images while we are sitting on our couch in our pajamas eating a donut on a Sunday morning. How is that a fair comparison? Social media does not depict real life, only the high points and parts we want others to see.

Sometimes social media use can even leave us avoiding face to face interaction, favoring the “safety” and instant high that we feel on social media. We often feel that social media is safer than direct interaction with others, because there seems as though there is less of a risk of rejection because we have a barrier between ourselves and others: a computer screen. If you are thinking that you do not struggle with avoiding face to face interaction and that social media is not impacting your social relationships, think about what you did the last time when you were in line at the grocery store or when bored at the office or in your college class. Many of us find ourselves reaching for our devices and using social media, when we could be taking these opportunities to use boredom to our advantage and brainstorm new ideas or using it as a chance to build our relationships. This is all the perfect storm to create a very unhealthy cycle of unhealthy social media use, avoidance of face to face interaction, and anxiety.

Signs You Are Struggling

If you are still questioning whether or not you are experiencing social media anxiety, here are two signs you may be struggling:

  1. You feel drained of energy while using or after using social media. Anxiety is draining and robs us of our energy. If you use social media and then feel totally drained, you may have social media-related anxiety. You might feel emotionally and/or physically fatigued and moody if you are struggling with this anxiety.
  2. You constantly check your notifications to see if you have had any likes, comments, or shares. If you feel dependent of getting attention on social media, it may be a sign of anxiety. You might be constantly worried and thinking about getting feedback online.

What To Do About Your Anxiety

If you have been experiencing this anxiety, you are NOT alone. Many people struggle with anxiety, especially related to technology and social media. In fact, there are many things you can do about it! So at this point, you may be asking yourself about what exactly you can do to to fix your social media-related anxiety. Here are three things that you can do about it:

  1. Embrace your boredom. Get used to feeling bored! I know it feels downright icky and uncomfortable, but that’s because we aren’t used to it! Many people have their greatest inventions and creative ideas when they are the most bored. Boredom leaves room in our lives, and it creates margin. Who doesn’t need more margin in their lives in today’s world?
  2. Challenge your negative thoughts as a result of being on social media. If you find yourself comparing yourself to what other people post, start thinking about more positive and realistic thoughts. Every time a negative thought pops in your head such as “She is so much prettier and skinnier than me”, stop and think or write down a realistic thought that proves that thought to be wrong. You might say to yourself “I always get complimented on how nice I am, and I know that I have a really pretty smile”. Get into this habit, and start thinking with the realistic side of your brain, instead of only the emotional one.
  3. Reduce your exposure to these sites. Set specific times for yourself for when you would like to use social media. Make sure that the goal is realistic as well. Maybe you would like to only spend 45 minutes per day on social media, or one hour a day 3 times per week. Whatever sounds realistic for you is a good place to start. Turn off your notifications, so that you are not constantly tempted and bombarded with social media updates and messages.

If you struggle with anxiety related to social media, you are not alone! Many people are in the “same boat” as you, and there are steps you can take to reduce your anxiety. If you feel you are struggling with this on a consistent basis or it is impacting your daily life, relationships, or work, reach out to someone who can help. This might be a close friend or accountability partner, or it may be a therapist. A good place to find a therapist is www.psychologytoday.com or www.goodtherapy.com. If you are interested in finding out more about me or interested in working with me, feel free to visit my site:

I hope that this article serves as a first step towards the healing of anxiety and helps you to become the best version of yourself.

*Disclaimer: Nothing in this article or anything posted by me on Medium is meant to diagnose or treat any mental illness or health issue. If you are having thoughts of harm to self or others, visit your nearest emergency room, or dial 911 or your local emergency number.

Alissa Schneider

Written by

I am a Licensed Mental Health Counselor in the state of Florida. I work with women ages 18 through the mid-thirties who are struggling with anxiety.

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