I took a 7 Day Social Media Break between Christmas Day and New Years. I debated about doing just 5 days, 7 days, 8 days or even extending it to a full 10 days. In the end, I went with 7 days.
I have been asked several questions around this, so I thought I would share them with you in case you have had them and just didn't have guts to ask them, along with my answers. It might help you to look at your own life and think about how you want to live.
Question #1: Why didn't you just temporarily delete your Facebook Account instead of leave it up during this 7 day escape?
Answer #1: My goal in every aspect of my life is to think about my actions and who I want to be. In my opinion, suspending or temporarily deleting my Facebook Account only is an action of drama and attention getting. It makes people panic that something happened to you. It makes people concerned that they can't get a hold of you if Facebook is their primary forms of connecting and messaging. It makes people assume things are wrong, bad, ugly. To avoid this, I simply did a post about what I was going to do and those that stay connected would see it. If someone was missing me, or didn't see the post, this would give them a chance to go to my wall to see the last post I made before this break and see why I was not on. And it would answer their questions.
Question #2: What made you decide to do this Social Media Break?
Answer #2: I felt a need to have some intense quiet time. To do some internal reflections and seek clarity on some answers I want. I look at my mind and body as a computer that is hard wired and deeply connected to many things. I live it in high gear a lot of the time, and sometimes it just needs a reboot, a control alt delete move that resets and unplugs everything. Literally. I felt that I needed to take action on a method to enforce that. I felt a longing for quiet and to step away from everything. Completely. I wanted to take a key lesson that impacted my life from the #MinimalismFilm where one of the people interviewed said: Just Stop. Stop. I took this advice and applied it to another area of my life.
Question #3: Is this the first time you have ever done a Social Media Break?
Answer #3: Yes and No. The only times I have been away from Social Media was when I went on my Singles Cruise November 2014 for 5 days. I have gone on Vacations since where I didn't check my Instagram or Facebook News Feed, but still posted what I was doing. This was different because I wasn't posting (other than the business pages I manage each day and have to post to and sending Facebook Birthday wishes to each person, I never checked my Facebook Feed). This was different because it was a choice to be intentional about not being on Social Media. So in many ways, yes this was my first time of doing something like this. But I can promise you it will be something I do again.
Question #4: What did stopping Social Media do for you?
Answer #4: It allowed me to focus on being quiet, spending more time writing Letters to God each day, praying, meditating, spending time thinking, writing out ideas and plans for 2017, and sleeping extra. It made me spend time thinking about some questions, think more about the very thing I ask of you: How do you I want to create my life? Am I living intentionally? What do I want from my moments on Social Media? Am I getting out of it what I am putting into it?
Question #5: How did you have the discipline to take a Social Media Break when you clearly love it?
Answer #5: It is like other things in life. When I make a commitment to myself, I go all in. I don't do anything halfheartedly. I want to honor this break and keep my word. I want to follow through at it at 100%. I didn't want to feel like I was cheating, because if I did, the only person it would hurt was myself.
Question #6: How did you ensure that you didn't on Social Media?
Answer #6: I removed the Folder I have on my home screen on my Android phone that has all Social Media Platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, SnapChat, Periscope, etc. I moved it to another screen on my phone. In fact, I removed all apps from my home screen. This forced me to not see any alerts or details at all when I picked up my phone which helped me to stay committed to my break from all these platforms. I also left my phone on silent the entire week. I didn't want to feel the need to respond or connect with anyone until it was something that I felt I wanted to do.
Question #7: What are your nuggets from this Social Media Break?
Answer #7: I have three of them.
7a: The world will go on without you. When I make this following statement, it is not for sympathy or attention or to make you feel any quilt, it is simply is the facts. Only 2 people reached out to let me know they missed me. Do I believe that only 2 people missed me? Not at all. I have too much engagement on here for me to believe that, but at nearly 2000 Facebook Friends, this made me realize that the bulk of us are not being intentional in our relationships, friendships and connections, on or off line. I get it and I think I understand why. But I want to be different. And when I say I want to be different, it is more then just a statement about what I want but more of a commitment to how I will live. I do not just want to be putting more noise out there. I want to make sure that I am creating the relationships, friendships and connections on all levels that matter to me. It allowed me to reflect on what these would look like, what key elements are needed, how I can help them to increase my growth, and what and how I will make them different in this New Year.
7b: There are no words to what unplugging completely and doing a reset does for you. Removing all noise. All distraction. All busyness. All steady streams of connections. I highly recommend it!
7c: The reality is that a reset forces you to reassess what your priorities are and how you will achieve them, even when you feel you are intentional about doing this every day. It made me focus on how I need to live to take care of me, first. It made me remember that life is short, really short, and time flies but it is up to me to make time stand still. The quality of our life comes from our simply daily choices.
#LifeLessons #ADifferentPerspective #ThePowerOfChoice #TheReasonBehindTheWhy #SocialMediaBreak #CreateTheLifeYouWant #LiveIntentionally
I have been asked several questions around this, so I thought I would share them with you in case you have had them and just didn't have guts to ask them, along with my answers. It might help you to look at your own life and think about how you want to live.
Question #1: Why didn't you just temporarily delete your Facebook Account instead of leave it up during this 7 day escape?
Answer #1: My goal in every aspect of my life is to think about my actions and who I want to be. In my opinion, suspending or temporarily deleting my Facebook Account only is an action of drama and attention getting. It makes people panic that something happened to you. It makes people concerned that they can't get a hold of you if Facebook is their primary forms of connecting and messaging. It makes people assume things are wrong, bad, ugly. To avoid this, I simply did a post about what I was going to do and those that stay connected would see it. If someone was missing me, or didn't see the post, this would give them a chance to go to my wall to see the last post I made before this break and see why I was not on. And it would answer their questions.
Question #2: What made you decide to do this Social Media Break?
Answer #2: I felt a need to have some intense quiet time. To do some internal reflections and seek clarity on some answers I want. I look at my mind and body as a computer that is hard wired and deeply connected to many things. I live it in high gear a lot of the time, and sometimes it just needs a reboot, a control alt delete move that resets and unplugs everything. Literally. I felt that I needed to take action on a method to enforce that. I felt a longing for quiet and to step away from everything. Completely. I wanted to take a key lesson that impacted my life from the #MinimalismFilm where one of the people interviewed said: Just Stop. Stop. I took this advice and applied it to another area of my life.
Question #3: Is this the first time you have ever done a Social Media Break?
Answer #3: Yes and No. The only times I have been away from Social Media was when I went on my Singles Cruise November 2014 for 5 days. I have gone on Vacations since where I didn't check my Instagram or Facebook News Feed, but still posted what I was doing. This was different because I wasn't posting (other than the business pages I manage each day and have to post to and sending Facebook Birthday wishes to each person, I never checked my Facebook Feed). This was different because it was a choice to be intentional about not being on Social Media. So in many ways, yes this was my first time of doing something like this. But I can promise you it will be something I do again.
Question #4: What did stopping Social Media do for you?
Answer #4: It allowed me to focus on being quiet, spending more time writing Letters to God each day, praying, meditating, spending time thinking, writing out ideas and plans for 2017, and sleeping extra. It made me spend time thinking about some questions, think more about the very thing I ask of you: How do you I want to create my life? Am I living intentionally? What do I want from my moments on Social Media? Am I getting out of it what I am putting into it?
Question #5: How did you have the discipline to take a Social Media Break when you clearly love it?
Answer #5: It is like other things in life. When I make a commitment to myself, I go all in. I don't do anything halfheartedly. I want to honor this break and keep my word. I want to follow through at it at 100%. I didn't want to feel like I was cheating, because if I did, the only person it would hurt was myself.
Question #6: How did you ensure that you didn't on Social Media?
Answer #6: I removed the Folder I have on my home screen on my Android phone that has all Social Media Platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, SnapChat, Periscope, etc. I moved it to another screen on my phone. In fact, I removed all apps from my home screen. This forced me to not see any alerts or details at all when I picked up my phone which helped me to stay committed to my break from all these platforms. I also left my phone on silent the entire week. I didn't want to feel the need to respond or connect with anyone until it was something that I felt I wanted to do.
Question #7: What are your nuggets from this Social Media Break?
Answer #7: I have three of them.
7a: The world will go on without you. When I make this following statement, it is not for sympathy or attention or to make you feel any quilt, it is simply is the facts. Only 2 people reached out to let me know they missed me. Do I believe that only 2 people missed me? Not at all. I have too much engagement on here for me to believe that, but at nearly 2000 Facebook Friends, this made me realize that the bulk of us are not being intentional in our relationships, friendships and connections, on or off line. I get it and I think I understand why. But I want to be different. And when I say I want to be different, it is more then just a statement about what I want but more of a commitment to how I will live. I do not just want to be putting more noise out there. I want to make sure that I am creating the relationships, friendships and connections on all levels that matter to me. It allowed me to reflect on what these would look like, what key elements are needed, how I can help them to increase my growth, and what and how I will make them different in this New Year.
7b: There are no words to what unplugging completely and doing a reset does for you. Removing all noise. All distraction. All busyness. All steady streams of connections. I highly recommend it!
7c: The reality is that a reset forces you to reassess what your priorities are and how you will achieve them, even when you feel you are intentional about doing this every day. It made me focus on how I need to live to take care of me, first. It made me remember that life is short, really short, and time flies but it is up to me to make time stand still. The quality of our life comes from our simply daily choices.
#LifeLessons #ADifferentPerspective #ThePowerOfChoice #TheReasonBehindTheWhy #SocialMediaBreak #CreateTheLifeYouWant #LiveIntentionally
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