I hate Reddit but I can’t look away
Sometimes when I have no idea what to write about I’ll look through my scratch pad and see if past me left any scraps I can doll up. Last night I found an unposted life update I wrote back in March:
“I finally got my first job application rejection”
[I didn’t want to work there anyway, job hunting sucks, etc.]
Even though my funds are shrinking, I only get truly worried when I scroll Reddit. I keep getting subreddit recommendations about job hunting, and it’s literally “I applied to over 1,000 jobs and haven’t had a single interview” or “my entire day after work is to prepare for the next work day” and it’s like. Fuck I don’t want a job, but also I do. But I don’t, I just want to keep living here and have food.
Thankfully I got a job, but lately I’ve noticed how much I truly hate being on Reddit and it’s for all of the typical reasons: the clickbait titles, reposts, bots, the overall pessimism about everything. It’s just an angry and boring place and I can’t stop going there.
I never read it, but a long time ago a friend told me about Allen Carr’s “Easy Way to Stop Smoking”. He said Carr suggested paying attention to every single detail of what it’s like to smoke. Opening the pack, looking for your lighter, inhaling, tasting and smelling the smoke, everything. Like by paying attention to it all you’ll notice how gross and unpleasant the whole thing is. That’s the method I used last year to quit Instagram and it worked like a charm. It took two days before I deleted my account and I’ve never looked back. I’ve been trying to apply the method to Reddit though, and it’s been dreadful.
I know I’m just getting more bored, restless, and angry every time I scroll. When I take the time to read each post title, I catch myself thinking, “I don’t care” 99% of the time. Even though I call it a “break”, I forget to blink and can feel my heart rate rising, so yeah, nice break.
But when I get bored, even for literally just a few seconds, I reach for the phone and open up Reddit.
When you know something’s bad for you but you don’t stop, it’s really time to stop.
In other parts of my life right now I’m actually on kind of an upswing. Yeah I still have problems, but I have some real momentum - even if it’s just delusional/hopeful momentum - and I want to run with it. I’m so susceptible to falling back into old, depressed patterns, but I’ll be damned if it’s because of stupid fucking Reddit.