9 Insane Reasons Why the Internet is Too Stressful to Handle (Number 6 will blow your mind!)

I've been into making lists recently and it seems to be the internet's favorite format so I guess that's not necessarily a bad thing. What is necessarily a bad thing is just how stressed out I have been lately and just how much the presence of the internet in my life has contributed to that stress. So in order to express that I've made a list on the internet. Feel free to comment on that.

1. It's always there.

I have a smartphone. It's not a very good one but it manages to give me the two basic functions I need: GPS and Facebook. As much as it is useful to constantly know where I'm going and who liked whose status it can also be incredibly tiring. I'm constantly getting tweets and messages or notifications and it's not so much any one of those things so much as that there always is one more thing to look at that tires me out. Even without my phone the internet is a constant presence. I go to work and there's a computer in my office. I come home and I have my computer. No matter what I do the internet is always there with one more thing for me to think about.

2. Everything wants you.

Whether it's friends inviting you to like their page (how many amateur photographers can I actually like?) or Facebook suggesting that you add this friend, join that group, or go to that event there is always something that wants you and your click. In the war for my time and attention I just feel torn between things that I really, really don't care about. This feeling of all these little things tearing at me is extremely stressful to me and has me avoiding reading Facebook messages or notifications just in case it's one more thing trying to pull my attention it's way.

Check these CWR guys out.

3. Constant controversy.

Like it or not I'm a Christian. And I mean whether I like it or not, not you. Sometimes I really, really don't like being a Christian and this is a large part of why. I think a large part of it is just the friends I have (socially conscious revolutionaries and such), but I am constantly bombarded by information about some big church embarrassment (see right) or some big argument. When I see these things it is impossible for me to avoid a blood pressure raising gut reaction, whether anger or sadness or disappointment it always happens. I'll go from happily clicking through pictures of cats in boxes to stuttering in rage over the shameful behavior of the world. It really just stresses me out.

4. If I'm online I can't be "off the clock."

This particular point is more applicable to me personally than your average internet junkie. I'm a youth pastor and I'm Facebook friends with many of the youth I work with as well as most of my adult coworkers. I spend all day trying to plan good programs for them and worrying about the well-being of these people and when I get home I just want to shut off and not think about those things for a little bit. But with Facebook that's impossible. I see their updates, and even when I'm not in the office, I still end up being "at work." I don't really think there's any way around this, but at the end of the day it's just exhausting.

5. The badness of the world is overwhelming.

A little while back Facebook added a "trending" section showing the most posted new stories and topics. It's a pretty good idea, and if I'm honest it's where I get a lot of my news, or at least find out what people are talking about. But what I hate about it is just how upsetting a lot of the topics can be just because the world is such a bad place. On the left is a screenshot of  the trending things at the time of writing. Apparently there was a possible suicide at a Navy hospital. Now I'm sad and stressed about something I can do nothing about. Some days almost every single trending item is depressing, scary, or upsetting. I just get so overwhelmed. Again, this is only made worse by the friends I have. My wife's passions include fighting human trafficking and sexism, both of which are extremely daunting opponents. Almost every day I hear some new thing about trafficking or gendercide or how women are oppressed and it just reaches a point where I don't feel like I can take anymore.

6. Click bait.

As you've probably noticed I am intentionally mimicking the style of those many"click bait" articles that overwhelm Facebook newsfeeds. "Oh, if only I knew what number 6 was. I mean, they said it's mind blowing..." No. It never is. This coincides a little bit with feeling grabbed at by all those pages wanting my clicks. I just feel so manipulated by these articles that exist solely to get clicks. The internet was full of fluff articles before, but now people have made an industry out of it. Not only do I get tired of this stuff filling my news feed but I also get tired of this terrible cycle I get stuck in when I do give in and click:
1. Okay, just this once I'll click.
2. You moron, what a waste of time. Why did you click that?
3. Okay, I'll never do that again.
4. "12 pictures of children in war torn villages. NUMBER 4 MADE ME CRY" What, number 4 made that person cry? Well, I guess I can click just this once...
I. Hate. Click bait.   

7. I constantly feel the need to impress people.

The problem with social media is that other people exist there, and they can interact with what you post. Maybe it's just a personal flaw of mine but I constantly find myself trying to figure out how I can get the most likes. Not only that, but if I post a status that I think is really good and it doesn't get many likes I get upset about it. Again, this might just be a major flaw of mine that no one else shares but it's actually something really stressful for me. Facebook and Twitter give me performance anxiety. I'm like, "Look, I'm funny! I'm smart! I'm a good person!" and if no one affirms that I just get bummed out.

8. It reminds me how lonely I am.

This is a big one for me because, well, I have no friends. Really. I have people who I am friendly with and I have friends who are far away (when I say friends I mean the other authors of this blog and that's almost everyone), but in my area I have almost no one. What the internet does that makes that worse is remind me that not everybody else is spending as much time on the internet as me. Other people post pictures of themselves with their friends, or share things on each other’s walls, or invite each other to things. People update their status about going out and doing whatever. It just reminds me that I go to work and I come home and I do very little beside that. Now, that just may sound whiny so here’s something a little more specific. What really gets to me is when I see interactions that I could be a part of that I'm not. I see events I could have been invited to. The internet reminds me that the burden of making friends rests on me and me alone. Nobody will reach out to me and even when I reach out to them it's not guaranteed to pay off. It's okay for me to be lonely and it's okay for me to not have tons of friends or be invited to everything (or anything) but what really gets me down is that it's rubbed in my face. Thanks internet.

Replace "Research Paper" with "Literally Anything" and it still works.

9. It's distracting.

I saved this point for last because—Excuse me, this Buzzfeed article requires my attention.

As I was saying, I think this is the big—Sorry, did you see this video? I have got to share this.

Okay, seriously, I’ll stop now despite the fact that Facebook just pinged and this point would look better with some kind of an image and—I’ll be right back.

There, see that comic? The internet provides for my every image need. I think that this point is probably the most universal of any that I've listed. This is just the nature of that kind of work and work environments the world has now. The internet is an ever-present, ever compelling force. That distraction is to me the biggest stressor of all. Why did I run short on time? I got distracted. Why can't I focus? I'm distracted. Why am I so stressed? I'm distracted by all the stressful things in the world.