The Trap of Social Media

Consuming social media kills productivity.

Not just because of the time it takes. But because of how it trains you to think.

On social media, you’re constantly following other people's lives. Some people justify it by believing it's great for their personal brand. But it isn't. Social media is a trap that leads to distraction and wasted time.

The problem starts with your feed. Your feed is composed of the most glamorous moments of people's days. You signal your approval by liking and sharing their posts.

This behavior is dangerous because it forms a bad habit: you habitually compare yourself to others, and you try to imitate their lives. But not their real lives. The most glamorous moments of their day.

That isn't how important work gets done. Important work gets done by working tirelessly. By persevering when it gets hard. By adding value to other people’s lives.

Not by living a montage of picture-perfect moments.

The constant feed of inflated highlights from people's lives can create unreasonable expectations. Those expectations make you less persistent when things feel hard. You’ll feel frustrated because your life seems boring compared to your perception of others' lives.

Browsing social media also leads you to judge other people's value by how well they appeal to the mainstream. Not by measuring how great their work is. Not by seeing the real impact of their work over time.

Worst of all: sharing your own life on social media also creates a trap. It starts a vicious emotional cycle. You leave the present moment to document the highlights. Then you post, craving social approval and engagement. Repeat.

This cycle distracts you from doing the work that matters. It's a trap in which you seek validation for the progress you've made, instead of making more.

The most important, powerful, and impactful people have lives that wouldn't appeal to the mainstream. They don’t optimize for mainstream validation or approval.

Instead, they do the unglamorous work of building assets. Brick by brick, they make progress, without concern for what others think of them in the short term.

A far more powerful version of social admiration follows.

It isn't that way at the beginning, though.

At first, the lives of the most important people seem undesirable. Like they're enduring irrational amounts of pain with little reward. But the assets that they build over time—both internal and external—compound. Drip by drip.

Eventually, that road leads to massive rewards and a fulfilling life.

The process takes time and patience. And the reality isn't glamorous enough to share on social media. Sharing how that journey really looks would seem terribly boring.

That's why sharing at all is a bad idea. It’s a stupid game with a stupid prize.

Of course, there is one exception to this: actually using social media for business. Not for social approval. Not for vague “personal branding." But with a specific set of goals.

Maybe your goal is to build a massive consumer brand. Maybe you're bringing together your tribe of customers.

That can be good.

But it can be a slippery slope. Without realizing it, you can end up living a fake life vicariously, substituting artificial connection for the real thing.

That’s what social media is engineered for.

The real work happens when you're extremely focused, studying the world, and building solutions to its biggest problems. Sometimes that involves using social media as a tool.

Usually, it’s best to just stay focused on work that matters.