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Social Media. We all have developed a love-hate relationship with all of it. It amuses us, keeps us informed of the latest scandals and lies, then in the end, totally pisses us off … I mean seriously where else can you get such a free dopamine rush?

Let’s take a look at TWITTER. Right off the bat, its mission statement gloriously brags:  "to give everyone the power to create and share ideas and information instantly, without barriers." This my friends can be an anarchist’s dream and it is! Think of the power and the access – you can even get that opinionated loud and foul mouthed celebrity to chirp back at you. Lawdy Miss Maudy now that’s heaven on earth! Post any meaningless twaddle you desire! I once posted an image of dog poop with no explanation or caption and received 10K in responses in a couple of hours. It made me a social media hero! NOT.

According to our esteemed psychological community, Twitter taps into our reward based personalities (and don’t kid yourself NO one is on social media just to stay in touch with family). It’s a whole process – trigger, behavior and reward! Those who strongly desire recognition get sucked right into this. They know it and they don’t care. An idea or topic tickles the fancy and they tweet it out loud and strong waiting with baited breath to see how many responses come in. It doesn’t matter if the tweet is a lie or the truth. As a matter of fact a lie works better. This behavior becomes ingrained and enforced in no time at all and leads to mad cravings for more and more attention. On the flip side, when not tweeting our own thoughts and ideas we can always rely on the rotten and habit forming ‘tactic and response approach’ to whatever ticks us off and we just know we must DO something and RESPOND WITH something. Who the hell do these people think they are? Yes folks you ARE capable of breaching the dark side of self-righteous indignation. It’s easy isn’t it? After all it’s only your opinion so why should you care if it offends anyone. That’s not your problem – right? You showed them who’s superior. The bad dog gets a cookie anyway. SO - How long did your euphoria last?

As the new religion, social media is failing miserably. Why? Because the Twitter gods don’t really care about who is chewing up who and so they slip in a ban or takedown as a cover-up once in a while to prove that they have rules and you are protected.

Over the years I have been working on improving my awareness, observation skills and mindfulness before I did something I really regretted. To this day I thank the Heavens I never tweeted about my dates, jobs or bowel movements. This type of info can and will be used against you leaving you in a nail chewing frenzy as to how to get your status back. Better hurry up so you can keep up with the feed. To hell with eating and sleeping!

Donning my super-hero cape (I allow myself some ego indulgence) I became Anti-Twit. The trick was not to quit Twitter and close my account there because Twitter never lets you die and performs resurrection really well, but to brave the social perils and change my behavior when tweeting. This sounds honorable – right? It should be but in today’s world misery loves company and when I changed my tune people flat out hated it. I was named called, sworn at (some of those words I am sure are still hanging in the atmosphere in a green cloud of doom) and even threatened. I did report some of these incidences but nothing significant was ever done about it. Eventually, I became wise to all the tricks, schemes and other economies and other madness broadcast on Twitter. I began to manage my time more efficiently and re-engaged my life outside of “Twitdom.” My perspective was restored and I am doing fine and even enjoying the folly of others which I now easily dismiss without a care. Maybe the rest will catch up soon. Hope still springs eternal and maybe internal.

So, my friends, as the saying goes: “Never underestimate the power of a tweet.”

The question is what kind?

Tippin’ my hat to ya!

Holmes