Removing all restraints, I used Twitter for 187 minutes. I logged 94 minutes in my web browser. And 93 minutes on my cell phone.

This morning, of course, the first thing I did was check Twitter. Sure enough, I had hits of dopamine waiting for me. Three hours and seven minutes is excessive usage. Certainly, nothing I can sustain, but is probably more common than I realize.

It showed me how much spare time is fragmented throughout the day. I used it in between meetings or between sentences at the dinner table. A habit I have no intention of keeping. I did it to observe when my time is spent on Twitter.

The majority of my time went to three pages; notifications, the “feed”, and my profile.

The All tab on the Notifications page is by far the most damaging. It provides a constant stream of dopamine. I found myself retally the total like counts. Worthless. The only thing of value on this page are the notifications of accounts I’ve subscribed too.

The Mentions tab on the other hand is a means of conversation. Sadly, out of the three, it’s where I spent the least time. I’d rush through replies to get back to my new notifications.

There is a reason they call it a feed, it’s feeding you. There’s just too much. I just kept scrolling. Paralyzed by choice I rarely contributed. Instead, I meekly like the tweet in my decent down the feed. It adds little value but is the default of my lazy and novice understanding of Twitter.

My profile. It’s my profile’s fault that I don’t have 50k followers. So I obsess. Building an audience is a goal of mine, but this obsession must be dealt with.

Next: Refusing to be fed, getting rid of the feed.