By skyforbes 
What happens when every 7-second video makes real life feel way too slow.
I haven’t finished a YouTube video in months.
Not even a short one. If it doesn’t hook me in the first five seconds, I’m gone. Next. Next. NEXT.
Same with TV shows. Podcasts. Even conversations, sometimes. If my brain senses a pause, it starts reaching for my phone like it’s on autopilot. Like there’s something out there — probably a 12-second clip of someone making ramen with ASMR voiceover — that’s more important than whatever’s happening in front of me.
I think TikTok broke my brain.
And I wish I were joking.
I did not intend to download it
Honestly, I only downloaded TikTok “to have some fun.” (Such famous last words.)
This was early 2020. The world was weird. I wanted something to kill time. Instagram felt stale. YouTube felt long. Twitter was a dumpster fire. TikTok? It was quick. It was funny. It was easy. I was laughing at frogs wearing hats. I learned to make whipped coffee. I was following creators that made me feel like I had internet best friends.
But I also started to notice something that I did not anticipate.
Time lost all meaning. I would open the app to kill five minutes (just five) and then look up later to realize that 45 minutes passed. I would try to study, but my brain would itch after three pages of notes, wanting that dopamine hit — that little spark of randomness, of movement, of something new.
My attention span did not diminish.
It disappeared.
The algorithm knows me better than I know myself
The really scary thing is… it does it too well.
My “For You Page” isn’t just about the things I like — it’s about the things I’m feeling, before I even realize I feel it. I’m sad? Here is a video of someone being comforted by their dog. I’m anxious? Here is a calm aesthetic morning routine with lo-fi music. I’m spiraling? Here is a creator literally narrating my inner monologue as if they were inside my skull.
It’s comforting — until it isn’t.
Because at some point, I stopped choosing what I wanted to see. TikTok was just feeding it to me. All day, every day. I didn’t choose what I wanted, or think, or wonder, or explore. I just scrolled.
And in that scrolling, the portion of my brain that once craved depth began craving speed.
Why can’t I just delete it?
Because it’s still fun.
It’s funny. It’s creative. It’s weirdly therapeutic. It makes me feel less lonely. It teaches me random, random things that I didn’t know I needed to know. (Like how to do your taxes or that capybaras are just so chill.)
But at the same time, it’s actively altering my brain chemistry.
That’s the paradox I’m in. I want to love the app, but I hate what it does to my attention span. I want to be more present, more patient, more… human. But like, one more scroll.
Just one.
I’m not offering a solution. Just a screen time tracker.
I wish I could say this dramatic ending story ended differently. Like: I threw my iPhone in a lake and instantly became some genius monk who reads three new books a week.
But I’m not.