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Use Facebook’s ‘Favorites’ to Calm the Chaos of Your News Feed
I am a member of 170 Facebook groups. I’m following 1,476 Pages. I have 1,763 friends. I can’t even count how many articles, videos, and recipes I’ve “saved” for later. (Why did I bookmark a $9.99 plunger and that meme from the ‘I Hate Grandpa Joe From Willy Wonka and The Chocolate Factory’ group again?)
I never meant for my Facebook feed to become an abyss of disjointed chatter and empty distractions, but that’s what it is after 14 years of clicking on things. Recently, though, I came across a tool that can help: Facebook Favorites. The feature, which began rolling out on Android and iOS this fall, allows you to filter your reading experience to a maximum of 30 friends and pages that you designate (you can’t add groups yet, unfortunately). There are more details here, along with instructions for setting it up. You can always return to your feed with everything in it, if you wish.
Think of it as a clean slate, a way to see only what you want to see (for me, that’s mostly stuff related to my job). It’s a chance to, as Mark Manson describes in his guide to getting your attention span back, “apply the law of Fuck Yes or No to your social media connections” and handpick only the people and pages that add value to your life. (Sorry, random Facebook person I met at some event five years ago that became Friend number 1,172. It’s nothing personal.) Scrolling should now feel calmer, and finite. Once you’ve reached the end of your updates, you know it’s time to tuck your phone away.
