Several of my friends have dumped their Facebook accounts (including one of my favorite writers), some are snoozing on social media, at least until after the election, others are moving over to Instagram. (You couldn’t pay me enough to use Twitter or TikTok, but that’s another story.)

You may be wondering, “What does social media have to do with adventure?” Fair question. The short answer is several of the adventurers that inform and inspire me are on social media. Plus, there have been many destinations and events that I’ve found because of Facebook posts.

Let me emphasize that every minute spent on social media is time out of your day you’re never getting back. This is why I’m spending less time on Facebook and Instagram, but due to a variety of reasons, I’m not pulling the plug, at least not yet. There are, however, a few things I do to make my experience better and thought I might share them with you.

First, most of my social media consumption is done at my desk, not on my phone. This creates a space for viewing and developing content with the added benefit of letting me put boundaries on usage. (If you’re wondering how to upload Instagram photos from your laptop, here’s an article you might find useful. https://www.cnet.com/how-to/instagram-from-your-mac-or-pc-how-to-post-pictures-from-the-browser-instead-of-the-app/)

As to Facebook. If you haven’t figured this out yet, Facebook isn’t your friend. As one person so aptly put it, “If you’re using a service and not paying for it, you are the product.” This doesn’t mean Facebook can’t be useful; it just needs to be modified. My favorite tool for making Facebook something I still want to use is Social Fixer. (https://socialfixer.com/)

Think of Social Fixer as a spam filter for Facebook. It can hide sponsored posts (i.e., ads, though not always perfectly), auto-switches to the ‘Most Recent’ news feed (as opposed to ‘Top Stories’ where Facebook algorithms decide what to show you), has settings to hide political posts(!), lets you create custom filters for your news feed, and even has a Friend Manager that notifies you when someone no longer appears on your friend list. And it’s free. (Social Fixer has proven so useful that I happily sent the developers a donation.)

Social Fixer, used in conjunction with snoozing or unfollowing people who mostly share other user’s stuff without creating their own content, as well as reevaluating which people, groups, and organizations I want to follow, has allowed me to create a news feed I look forward to perusing.

Finally, YouTube. YouTube is a great resource. I’ve lost track of the number of times I wondered how to do something and found an instructional YouTube video that walked me through it. And there are a plethora of outdoor adventure videos on YouTube (and Vimeo) that will keep you entertained and inspired for the duration of a pandemic. Want to improve your outdoor skills? Go to YouTube. And if you’re interested in watching a Monty Python skit, there’s an official Monty Python YouTube Channel for that also.

The thing that annoys me most about YouTube (besides ads) is another video starts up immediately after the one I’m watching is over. Yes, I can turn off autoplay, but there is still a bunch of related videos on the left to tempt me to go down a digital rabbit hole and eat up an indeterminate amount of time. The fault here is admittedly mine. (I lack willpower.) But there is an easy solution: The DF YouTube (Distraction Free) extension. DF YouTube eliminates the temptation, and it has saved me untold hours. https://www.lifehack.org/articles/technology/youtube-useful-chrome-extension-avoid-distraction.html

There are plenty more hacks out there; these are the ones I’ve found most useful. The key takeaway is this: if you don’t make a conscious choice of what you want from social media, and take steps to tailor it to your needs, others will make the decision for you. Social media is there for your entertainment, education, and edification; however, it is not a substitute for getting outside and living life adventurously.