,
10 tweets,
2 min read
Read on Twitter
Honestly somewhat amazing living alone how a morning of not checking social media (or news directly) on my phone (or TV) can lead to me living a completely different morning than had I logged on immediately.
This was an advertisement from the National Coalition To Get People To Regularly Take Time Away From Their Phones When They Can.
Seriously, though, I have done a few things to make my relationship with this media era a more healthy one.
1. I try not to open my laptop one day a week. I can still work on my phone, but opening the laptop is a Pandora’s Box: If I open it, I find myself doing random stuff for at least an hour.
2. I take a social media-free weekends when I can. It doesn’t mean I won’t look (or even won’t tweet when I want to), but the aim is for social media to be of reduced importance. Particularly Twitter and Facebook, for me, since those are so news-heavy.
3. One week a year (ideally two!), I actually remove most social media, my email, my laptop outside of streaming services, Slack, etc., from my phone and/or life for vacation. It’s a vacation! I try to mean it!
4. Finally, these are setting goals, not rules! I’m going to break them; that’s OK. It’s a process!
(To be clear as to number 2, I’m not saying I take every weekend away. That’s not going to work for me. But, as longtime followers know, I do try it like once or twice a quarter.)
All of these things, over time, have gotten me to a place where I’m relying less on constantly being on here — where I’m able to regularly take time away from my phone without even thinking about it.
This is a really good one. For me, turning off push alerts for a vacation made me realize I didn’t need most of them at all. Made the more general ability to step away regularly much easier.
