This is my second purging, but this one is significantly larger. The first time I did I only deleted 32 people. This time I intend to do a real purging. It took my 3 years to get to 1000 friends.
Several things came together to help me do this. A) i really didn't know that many people on facebook actually and the more I thought about it the more ridiculous it became. B) I'm a packrat. I keep so many things "just in case" or for memories. I was the same with people. I hate defriending people. even people I hadn't seen for years. I was scared of the possibility of running into them "just in case". C) I kept people mostly for networking purposes. I liked the fact that I had a network of people extending everywhere in most states and many countries. I always thought that at some future time I could call on them for help. But then I became aware that if I didn't have any relationship with these people the possibility of doing that was probably slim. D) More people stay updated on my facebook status than I thought, so everytime I thought about deleting someone I never knew if they were actually following me on facebook. E) Let's face it. Seeing 1227 people on your facebook friends gives you sense of pride, even if it doesn't mean anything (even right now I miss that feeling haha). But I realized that that number didn't have any bearing on who I felt I was. "Being popular is not cool" - Lights yesterday. So. BAM!
The way I determined to keep someone
1) Have I seen you recently? No? Out, unless
2) if we saw each other would we say hi?
3) Do we have history together? I did not delete any people from R3, nor older friends from longer ago. Mission was also something else.
4) Were you married? If you were, you were harder hit.
5) Did I add you first? If I did I had no qualms about defriending you. But if you added me, for some reason, I feel obligated to keep you.
6) Were you a girl I used to crush on? BAM. You're gone. Held on to you too long.
As I started defriending people I actually started becoming obsessed with deleting as many people as I could. I started defriending at a faster and more ferocious pace and soon, even if we hadn't talked for just a short while, I was defriending you.
Still I feel I was a little too lenient on some people. I might go back for a second round sweep. What surprised was how easy it was once I started (though again. looking at my somewhat decimated friends' list dismayed me a bit I will admit). There was one girl who I looked at our mutual contacts and just completely obliterated that link. I deleted her and EVERY mutual friend. I was also surprised by people I could not recall AT ALL where I had met them or even recognize their faces. WEird. Those went fast. But at least no more "i know that person from somewhere....facebook..."
What surprised me even more though was how many people I could actually say I know, and are friends with. I went in hoping to reduce my friends' list to around 300, but it wasn't like that at all.
Done with the first round. Took me over an hour. Sheesh. But in total, 249 are gone with more to come.
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