How I quit Reddit

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This article is written in response to a public request from Brad in the comments section of this article on quitting Reddit.

THE MISSION:

You want to quit Reddit because it is wasting your time. You feel there are better things to be doing.

SOLUTION:

There are 4 ways you can do this:

  • Growing out of it.
  • Wean yourself off.
  • Just drop it.
  • Supplement with another activity.

Quickly running through these then:

Growing out of it – This is the most natural option. It is highly likely that once you move to a different friend crowd/interest base you will naturally move “out of love” with Reddit, since the content will no longer appeal to your tastes. Given the variety of subreddits, this is unlikely to happen unless you move away from computers. It is uncertain when exactly you will grow out of Reddit, but it is guaranteed to happen eventually. Looking at the current age base of Reddit and doing a quick straw poll, 25 if you don’t play games, 32 if you do.

Wean – This is the cut down slowly method. Once a day, to once every 2 days, to weekly, fortnightly you get the idea. This doesn’t really work as any dieter will tell you as it keeps “food” on your mind constantly.

Instant drop – You will immediately see the free time you suddenly have when it’s not idled away on Reddit. But, you’ll find you have nothing to fill it with. You’ll probably sit around bored out of your mind for 30 minutes-1 hour arguing with yourself about politics and atheism before returning to Reddit to check for new posts. This method won’t work alone and needs…

Supplementation – This is the key to quitting anything. You need to get the bad and supplement with the good. Why is Reddit bad? because it wastes a lot of time. Why is wasting time bad? because you have other better things to be doing? what better things? Answer that and you find your cure. Maybe a hobby, learn a language, exercise, cycle, hiking, jumping on the spot, basically just do something that interests you and is useful. Then, use reddit as a resource to further your aims rather than as idle chat and for spaghettis sake downvote all imgur posts and save us all some time.

Summary

Either:

  1. Grow out of it naturally, or,
  2. Supplement with an activity that is worth your time (or exercise if you can’t think of anything).

Personally, I guess I grew out of it like I did with games. I just didn’t see the value anymore of looking at mario cake for 3 hours a day. I’m down to about 15 minutes twice a day.

Hope that helps,

Your Friend,

Answerhat 😉

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9 Responses to How I quit Reddit

  1. Pingback: How to Quit Reddit for the Weak | NERDr.com

  2. My solution was to remove the main feed from reddit homepage and instead only have a small list of sub-reddits I actually care about. Like /r/haskell, /r/edmproduction, etc. Now I can get my ‘fix’, but with a much better signal-to-noise ratio. And, because there is far less content coming up, I don’t accidentally lose hours of time browsing it. So, in this way, reddit is its own supplement.

  3. Found monitoring where I spent my time was highly useful. Something like rescuetime gives just pure stats on how long you’ve been on a website / in an app or game. Makes for shocking reading at times. Seeing the actual numbers helped me to cut back.

  4. I use Chrome Nanny to allow only 5 minutes of Reddit per hour: https://chrome.Google.Com /webstore/detail/cljcgchbnolheggdgaeclffeagnnmhno.

  5. Do you guys really have that big of a problem with it?? I love Reddit, but there is so much trouble to get into on the net that one site getting a hold of you is goshdarnit crazy… you guys should seek counseling.

  6. Yeah, I finally realized that all my time wasted on Reddit could have gone to work, hobbies, and education. Sure Reddit was educational, at points, but I just grew weary of reading all the news taken out of context, warped viewpoints of ignorant 25 year olds, the ridiculous amount of repeat posts/comments/bad attitude. I know so many professionals that get on there thinking they can help the community and posting great knowledge, only to see it downvoted in favor of some douchebag who’s uncle knew a guy that knew a guy. Not to mention 85% of the stuff is just garbage filler and cats. Bleck…

    Reddit has a place in the net, but I’ve just grown tired of it’s insipid waste water flavor.

    • True. One of the saddest realisations is all the great informative Reddit posts that are lost forever because no one is backing anything up and users delete their accounts. There’s been some real gold on Reddit, but it’s lost forever.

  7. Having read this I thought it was extremely enlightening. I appreciate you finding the time and energy to
    put this informative article together. I once again find myself spending a significant amount of time both reading and commenting.

    But so what, it was still worthwhile!.