Alleviate Your Stress From The Most Toxic Tech

Along with some of the wonderful things we get from the Internet and any variety of social media apps, there can also be a darker side.

Removing social media, much less the Internet as a whole, from our everyday lives, is not a realistic possibility. Unless you live in an Amish area or on the remote edges of the most undeveloped places on the planet, it's just not going to happen. And it really shouldn't.

The problem is that all this tech can come with massive side-effects. While we have long warned about things that deal with physical health like posture, vision, weight-gain...we are now becoming more aware of the impact it can have on our metal wellness as individuals and as a culture.

In many ways social media has become a toxic environment. At the same time, it is an ideal way to stay connected with other who don't live close or are hard to reach. So, how do you balance things? One way is to seek out new options aside from the mega apps that have dominated for years. These apps, and even the major search tools, have found so much power in our lives that we have to step away and see what's best for ourselves.

My first suggestion would be to look into a new search option. Most of us are familiar with the big ones especially the big G and its browser. I was recommended the browser Brave and gave it a try. It's well worth checking out for yourself.

They automatically block many of the trackers on the web and save you both time and bandwidth. The only adds they display are the ones you give them the right to send by notification. And you can even make a few bucks clicking them if you chose but it's all up to you, you have control.

Then there is the search engine DuckDuckGo. They recently hit a milestone reaching more that 100 Million searches a day. This tool does not filter your results based on the whims, opinions or politics of their executives and that in itself is a great help in terms of keeping your mind less stressed.

As for social media, you have probably noticed that the tone has gotten increasingly nasty over the years. Some of it is about politics, some is about people bullying, some is about narcissism and the tendency to be conceded and self-absorbed. It can really run you down.

But, there are some great alternatives to the big names who seem to have so much unwanted influence over our lives. Little tech, as I call them, is really bringing about a revolution.

Some options I suggest are as follows:

App names shortened so as to not specifically call out the guilty, ha ha.

One way to get away from one we'll call FB is to join another community like MeWe. If you like the idea of having groups, pages, chat and all of those things, this might be a good spot. All the fun, very little drama unless you go looking for it.

Then there is TW that has been sliding for years but still remains one of the most publicized apps. One very cool option to replace it would be Telegram. This tool is much more open in terms of topics and the sharing or ideas and doesn't bombard you with ads. It recently reached a userbase of more than 500 million subscribers.

When it comes to photos and video, we have IG which is owned by FB. It started out good but has become so egotistical that another option might be a good way to proceed. I suggest Vero. This one is gaining popularity among creative types and artists and again has no ads.

Last but not least, YT is still tops among video apps but has become a bit too focused on regulating everything lately. One of the best options out there to replace this is Rumble. It is a little political in nature but that doesn't have to be how you use this tool. You can post or find pretty much anything other than mature content there. I've seen some great stuff with cute animals, hyper-realistic cakes, jokes, music and more for example. And one really cool part is that you can make money off your videos or liking other videos without doing anything extra.

So, if you are looking to remove the toxic factors on the Internet in terms of search and social media from your day, these can help. At least I think they can as that they've done wonders for me. It's worth a try, right?