Almost a year ago, after going through seasons where I’d temporarily delete Facebook from my phone, I read what Cal Newport had to say about setting boundaries for social media usage in his book, Digital Minimalism, and made the decision to permanently delete the app off my phone. While in the grand scheme of things this sounds like a minor decision, this change has instead altered my life for the better. Here’s how.

Change 1: Scripture Before Scrolling

When I used to have the Facebook app on my phone, I had a bad habit of either checking it as soon as I woke up, or right after doing a short devotional on the YouVersion Bible app. A lot of times, doing this would put me in a bad mood, which is one of the things social media is best at. Since I was already having a tough year, starting my day off with a poor mindset only made things worse, and I knew something had to change.

Once I deleted the app, I fostered the habit of diving straight into my daily devotional in the morning and then checking other social media apps. Surprisingly enough, I often don’t linger on other accounts, except for Pinterest on occasion, so my mornings haven’t felt as full of “doom and gloom” as they once did. At the beginning of 2026, I also started doing individual Bible study in the mornings like I did a few years ago. By swapping the time I used to spend on the app for uninterrupted time reading God’s word, it’s become easier to invite God into my mind before anything else. Regardless of whether you’re as addicted to Facebook as I was, if you’re a Christian, I highly recommend making this change to your routine. Invite God into your morning first thing, and I promise you won’t regret it!

Change 2: Improved Mental Health

Even though I went through the worst year of my life to date in 2025, I know my mental health would’ve been much worse if I had still allowed myself constant access to the Facebook app.

Why? For a while, in the months preceding the app’s banishment from my mobile device, Facebook would show me random posts by pages I didn’t follow that heavily related to what I was going through at the time. That’s all fine and dandy, but the truth is that these posts often made me feel worse after reading them and caused me to ruminate on my problems more. This is embarrassing to admit, but I’d share those posts and feel a sense of smug satisfaction because sometimes the posts addressed an issue of something someone had done to hurt me. Then I’d linger on the app, scrolling and scrolling to find another post like the one I’d just shared for another dumb attempt at a dopamine hit.

I realize this was insanely immature and hate that I was caught up in that cycle. The good news is that now that the app is off my phone, the temptation to search for posts when I’m mad or upset is no longer there, and I can work through my feelings in a healthier way, like prayer journaling.

Change 3: More Time for Things I Actually Care About

One of the best things about deleting a total time waster like the Facebook app off your phone is that you soon realize how much more free time you have to dedicate to things you’d rather spend your time doing.

Since deleting the app, I’ve found I’m more likely to read during times when I used to scroll, especially in the evenings. Instead of checking the app on my lunch breaks, I’m either spending the hour reading, working on my current work in progress, or writing a blog post. At home, if I don’t feel like doing anything productive and just want to relax, I’ll play Animal Crossing: Wild World on my old Nintendo DS or other video games from my childhood. Occasionally, my husband and I will get in the mood to put a puzzle together, which allows us screen-free time to bond.

The point is, without Facebook tethering me to my phone, I’ve rediscovered how much fun hobbies can be, and why I ever picked them up in the first place!

Before I Go, I Want to Expand on a Couple Things:

1) No, I haven’t given up Facebook completely. I still log in about once a week on my laptop to make sure I haven’t received any event invites or haven’t missed any updates from close friends or family. I just don’t get on Facebook anywhere near as much now, and I’m loving the change. 🙂

2) No, I don’t think deleting the Facebook app from your phone is a change everyone should make. If you’re not addicted to it like I was (that’s still so embarrassing to admit!) or need it for work or your kids’ school updates, I understand staying active on the app. This is just a boundary I felt led to enforce for myself so I could overcome the hold it had on my life. Because it helped me, I wanted to share this information with others so that if you’re in a similar place as I was a year ago, it may help you too.

Talk to Me, Arrowheads!

Have you ever had a similar experience with a social media app where it was taking over your time and ruining your mental health? What steps did you take to remedy that? Let me know in the comments!

Aim high, stay strong, and always hit your mark.

-Allyson 😀