“You will document your life so much less”: College student who quit social media for three years talks about the benefits she missed

Most of us can’t go more than a few hours without checking TikTok, Instagram, or Snapchat.

Social media has become a constant backdrop to everyday life, whether it’s to keep up with friends, scroll for entertainment, or stay in the loop about what’s trending.

But one college student decided to step away for nearly three years—and now she’s sharing what she realized she lost by doing so.

Positives of returning to social media after a long break

TikTok creator Billy (@1ilyp00h) posted a video, now past 37,000 views, where she explained what it felt like to rejoin the apps after years away. 

She began, “So I was off most major social media for around three years, like most of my college life.” While she says that the break brought plenty of benefits, she wanted to highlight what she had missed.

The first was motivation. “When you’re on social media, you’re constantly challenged,” she said, pointing out how inspiring it can be to see people in the same age bracket starting businesses, changing careers, or climbing literal mountains.

Without that exposure, she admitted it was “very easy to convince myself that I was doing enough” and to get too comfortable. Being back online, though, gave her fresh drive.

Losing connections

She also reflected on connections. Without apps like Instagram or Snapchat, she noticed friendships slipping. “There will be social situations where people bring up something that is viral on social media… and you’re like, hey guys, I actually didn’t see that, but I would like to be involved in the fun.” She added that many of her friends communicated by sending memes or TikToks, something she couldn’t reciprocate during her break.

Another drawback was losing a record of her own life. “You will document your life so much less if you are not intentional about it,” she said. While stepping back helped her live in the moment, she now regrets not having photos from those years to look back on.

@1ilyp00h just my thoughts from my own personal experience :) #socialmediadetox ♬ original sound – billy newspaper

Finally, she mentioned losing touch with people she met only briefly, like at camps or internships. Before, she would have followed them on Instagram and stayed loosely connected. Without social media, she said, those people simply “fall out of your life completely,” which felt like a loss.

Commenters mostly agree

Viewers related to Billy’s perspective. One said, “People I had known IRL didn’t really start liking me till they saw me on social media—it felt like they preferred getting to know me online instead of IRL.”

Another, now past university, admitted, “It became so hard to keep those people in my life and all of those friendships really suffered the second I deleted social media.”

Others echoed her point about balance. “Of course, social media can be good… if you use it correctly. However, almost no one uses it correctly and just brain-rot scrolls, myself included.”

One person even credited TikTok with changing their life in unexpected ways: “Positive things TikTok has influenced me on: owning dairy goats, canning my own foods, learning how to sew, going to engineering school at 34.”

The Daily Dot has reached out to Billy via TikTok messages.

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