TikTok, What Have You Done to Me?
TikTok is ruining my brain. To be exact, it’s ruining my attention span.
Watching movies becomes boring (except if it has a good hook at the beginning), I can't sit through 20 minutes of reading time when I have to catch a break from social media, I find myself constantly looking at how many minutes I have left while watching youtube and I was only 2 minutes in– it felt like I’m already 10 minutes in, I even started skipping some parts to get to the point of the video.
And I thought to myself, oh no this isn’t me. This is ridiculous.
Even before I downloaded TikTok, my attention span had already been bad when I was still doing my internship. I constantly lose my focus, unable to finish the task quickly as I keep finding myself drowning in another ‘keep opening a new tab and new website every time something unimportant I need to know pops up in my brain’. I have no idea what caused it though. And ever since I downloaded it at the end of last year, it got even worse — in only 6 months.
To be fair, in my opinion, all social media does ruin my attention span but it wasn't as bad as what TikTok did to my brain. I am losing track of time while falling into the doom scrolling, I constantly need something that can hook me at the beginning of the video to catch my attention or else I’ll become bored.
The other day, I noticed I even became uneasy while watching a YouTube video. As if my fingers keep telling me to exit the application and go to another application. If I did what my brain tells me to do, the cycle will continue. I feel like I can never take a break from it.
This morning after I woke up and thought about this matter, I started searching on Google ‘TikTok ruining attention span’ and endless articles showed up. I didn't read any of it though, I just need to know if someone else is in the same shoes as me, and looking at the endless articles before my eyes is enough to validate me.
So, this is what happens.
To you, it might sound like I am facing the end of the world, but I genuinely am concerned with it now.
But on the other hand, I can't seem to uninstall the app. What about all the funny and inspiring videos I bookmarked? (I never look back into it) All the places' recommendations? (I rarely go out) All the fashion inspo? (Pinterest is right there). That is what is going through my head whenever the thought of uninstalling the app appears.
You can see from all these questions, I already found the answers and alternatives but still, what’s going to happen with all that videos and drafts?
