Digital Agoraphobia & Social Media Self-Care

What to do when we don't want to engage online

Photo by Cody Doherty on Unsplash

“I think I have digital agoraphobia.”

In trying to explain why I wasn’t doing my typical social media cheerleading for businesses, causes, and people I support and believe in, I blurted out these words.

The term fits the way I’ve been feeling lately — an irrational fear of entering crowded digital spaces.

It took me a few weeks to name the feeling. After all, I’m a defender of digital media — a lover of the ways social media expands our worlds, empowers connection, and helps us find better ways forward together. How could I possibly be fearful of engaging online?

At first, I attributed it to overwhelm — something I’m also experiencing, and have been trying to write about (unsuccessfully) for weeks — but it only takes a few seconds to share an insightful article, an uplfting story, or to send words of appreciation or encouragment. Overwhelm alone didn’t account for my reluctance to show up online.

I didn’t want to go into online spaces at all. I didn’t have the energy to deal with posting and responding even in the most positive scenarios. I definitely didn’t have the bandwidth to deal with any negativity or ugliness.

Digital agoraphobia seemed like an accurate description.

So, I started googling. I figured someone has studied this phenomenon or at least talked about in these terms. The only hit I found, however, was a 2014 Medium post from Ivan Campos addressing the fear of an open/uncontrolled web becoming “a haven for data thieves, uninformed amateurs, and enemies of capitalism.” Not my fear at all.

My fear was simply about being present online.

Since I didn’t find any ready-made advice on how to manage digital agoraphobia, I followed some of my own from Digital Grace: Pouring Benevolence into an Outraged World …

Accept that it’s perfectly okay to not engage on social media for whatever period of time makes sense … and disconnect from digital technology altogether during that time.

“Multiple studies show that anxiety is markedly reduced … not by simply turning our phones off but by having them not physically with us,” says naturalist and ecophilosopher Lyanda Lynn Haupt in Rooted: Life at the Crossroads of Science, Nature, and Spirit. “It is imperative that we allow ourselves time to free our minds from even the possibility of constant connectivity.”

Haupt goes one step further, recommending regular bouts of solitude, which “allows our brains to form interconnected neural root strands beyond those we typically utilize.” Solitude, she says, “unshackles us from the compulsion (for some, an addiction) to curate and display our lives on social media.”

Solitude disrupts our pattern of creating a narrative around all our interactions and experiences. It allows us to simply be, without the pressure to “make sense” of what we’re experiencing and communicate that sense-making to others. 

That’s why you haven’t heard from me for a few weeks. I’ve been battling digital agoraphobia by allowing myself to experience life without documenting or sense-making as often as I normally love and choose to do on social media.

Indulging in more nature and solitude has been refreshing, helping me center myself for kind, graceful, and positive engagement once again.

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ALSO FROM LAUREN HUG: Digital Kindess: Being Human in a Hyper-Connected World and Digital Grace: Pouring Benevolence into an Outraged World

REVIEW OF DIGITAL GRACE: “I spent much of my time with this book highlighting and rethinking my own role in digital interactions. I agree with the author about the need to give grace in these spaces and open our minds to see the value of diverse perspectives, even if we disagree. We can respect each other without agreeing on every topic.” (Click to read entire review.