In a world filled with distractions, it’s easy to find
things that keep us from being connected with what is happening “right now”. Unfortunately, I must admit that I have spent
a lot of my life being distracted and often distant from the things that really
matter. In 2017, a series of events occurred that caused me to challenge myself
in this area and begin a journey towards what I call “intentional living”. I am quite sure the term intentional living
is not
an original term, but I am not certain where I first heard it. My
personal interpretation of this phrase is: “intentionally making choices that
allow me to fully experience the wide range of opportunities that life provides,
by letting go of anything that unnecessarily distracts from or inhibits that
goal”. This process includes
giving space for feelings of sadness, anger, loneliness, boredom, grief, stress
and other emotions that we might consider negative, for too often I have found
that we distract ourselves in a myriad of ways from these feelings. Even what we consider more “positive”
emotions such as joy and peace can be cut short when we allow things to
distract us from allowing the emotions the time to reach maturity. In other
words, we develop habits of distraction that keep us from intentional
living. Being creatures of a critical
nature, we are quick to point fingers or talk about people we know with drug or
alcohol addictions, but these are certainly not the only ways we dull our
senses, dodge reality, and keep ourselves from experiencing life fully and
while we are critical of others, we often are dealing with our own issues that
are just as addictive as drugs or alcohol. While I could make a list of things
we use to distract us, I really don’t think that’s necessary. When life gets difficult (or mundane), just
pay attention to the choices being made during those times. Ask yourself questions like “When I am sad,
angry, or bored what do I do? How do I
occupy my time, or to whom or for what do I reach?” The answers to these questions can be very
revealing. What I really want to address
in this personal essay is one of my own greatest distractions, how I came to
walk away from that distraction, and the lessons I have been able to apply to
my own life from that experience.
Towards the end of May 2017 there was a situation that
occurred in my personal life that caused me to take a step back and reconsider
my use of Facebook. In the past, I have
taken relatively short breaks from Facebook but was always eager to return and
reconnect. (My short-term break often coincided with Lent for a season of
personal reflection.) My most recent break from Facebook was a sudden, two-fold
decision to offer some security for our family during a time of transition as
well as to offer greater security and less interference in the life of an
elderly family member. Did I lose anything when I shut down my Facebook
page? Of course, I did! I lost direct contact with a lot of people
and the convenience of an application designed to make keeping in touch an easy
part of daily life on the go. Probably
the most significant impact was that by completely deactivating my personal
page, we no longer were able to maintain our business page for the farm. No one can argue that running a successful
business requires constant advertising and social media provides the perfect
way to keep the farm and farm products on the minds of the consumer. At the
time, even knowing how not having a business page would affect our means to
communicate with the general public, it seemed the best way to protect our
family.
What I have gained from leaving Facebook, however, has far
outweighed any loss. I would like to
just share a few of the benefits:
1.
Greater
Peace
There is of course the simple truth that
one witnesses a certain amount of negativity on social media, but the peace I
experienced once I made a break from social media was more than just shielding
myself from negativity. Once I began to
quiet my mind from the constant barrage of information, I began to experience
an inner quietness. This, in turn, has
opened many doors for me to address areas of my life that I needed to address
which promotes even more inner peace.
2.
More Time
A glance here, a glance there, and a few
minutes on Facebook was evidently adding up to a lot more time than I
realized. The time I have saved by not
looking at Facebook has meant more time to do other things, many which I had
been neglecting. One example is that I
never had time to sit down and journal or to keep up with my blog. Now I find that on most days I have plenty of
time to find a quiet place and write to my heart’s content. For me, writing something on Facebook was
like a diet of mostly fast food. It gave
me a quick fix , but a constant diet of it wasn’t healthy. Giving myself the time to sit down, digest my
thoughts, and write them for a week at a time before publishing them on my
blog, has meant that the process has been a lot more satisfying to me.
3.
Improved Relationships
We can use social media to encourage a friend,
to comfort the grieving, to promote a cause, or to become aware of political
situations that need our attention. In
this manner, we do a measure of good.
However, when actively using Facebook, I found that my time and attention
had been spread too thin. I was giving
attention to a lot of matters, but I was not giving enough attention to the
things that matter most. Spending less time on the internet has helped
me build stronger relationships. Unfortunately,
I am limited in the number of friends and family that I can reach on a regular
basis. Compared to a Facebook post that potentially
reaches hundreds of people, my outreach efforts are minimal, but the
connections I have been making have been more meaningful for me and I believe
for my friends and family as well.
4.
Personal Growth
By being more focused and having more time,
I have seen personal growth in areas that I had been neglecting. This falls back to what I mentioned at the
beginning of this essay when I stated that we often use things to distract us
from the business of life, especially the things in life that we consider ugly
or painful. Facebook was one of my
biggest distractions that kept me from personal growth. I really turned to social media after my
son’s death as a way to distract me from the pain of his loss. Whatever the situation is that we find
difficult to handle, distracting ourselves from it is not the way to handle
it. I realize that grief (and other
issues) are ongoing and that there are times when we must step away from the
pain and a little distraction is not a bad thing. However, when the distraction becomes the way
we handle our life, then we are no longer dealing with the things at hand.
5.
Less Room for Interference and Misunderstanding
We think we are being clear,
precise, loving and that there is no way that anyone can misunderstand our
words or our intent. We believe that
everyone on our friend’s list understands our heart and knows that we only want
what is best for our friends, family, and even the world in general. We think that there is no possible way that
anyone would use what we have written against us or use information they glean
to try to interfere in our lives. It
just wouldn’t happen to us.
Unfortunately, I found that attitude to be very naïve. There are people who want to hurt us and who
will hurt us intentionally and there are people who don’t intentionally want to
hurt us, but who do. And, we
unintentionally hurt others as well at times with the things we say and
do. That’s true whether we use Facebook
or not, but it only stands to reason that the more we post and the broader our
audience, the more likely we are going to hurt or be hurt by something that is
written. There’s a time and a place to share information and to share our
hearts. However, sometimes, it’s just
better to step back and take a break.
6.
Learning to Live life with less validation
Did you ever stop to consider that every
time someone “likes” a post on Facebook that it’s actually a form of
validation? One of the things I have
been working on since I left Facebook is learning to live without the need for
validation from others, living my life as I see best whether anyone
understands, cares, or agrees with our choices.
Validation is nice but freedom from needing validation is even
nicer.
7.
A Better
Night’s Sleep
With all the positive affects of less
screen time, it only makes sense that I found my sleep to more restful. I really began to recognize this when we
would travel to our home in South West Virginia where cell phone service is
very poor and where we did not have any internet for about six months. (We now have internet service in Laurel Fork
but it’s about as reliable and fast as the old dial up service we had 20 years
ago and our cell phone service is even worse than internet service.) Getting online is almost more trouble than
it’s worth when we are there and I have found that I put my phone down for half
a day or more without even missing it.
That’s simply not the case when I’m in Staunton, as I have my phone with
me every second in case someone calls or texts or I need to retrieve
information. It wasn’t long before I
began to wonder if leaving my devices alone when in Laurel Fork was actually a
key element in my sleeping more soundly.
After I began to see the affects that less internet time was
having on my well-being, I began to do a little bit of research and found that
scientific research actually backs up many of the things above that I have
learned from taking a social media break.
Rally Health has this to say:
- Vision. Staring into a screen for extended periods of time can cause “computer vision syndrome.” You’re probably familiar with the symptoms: strained, dry eyes, blurred vision, and headaches. Poor posture can also cause neck and shoulder pain.
- Sleep. Studies link heavy computer and mobile phone use to more sleep disturbances. University of Gothenburg psychologist Sara Thomée, one study's lead researcher, says the blue light from digital devices suppresses the sleep-promoting hormone melatonin, keeping us from having restful sleep.
- Addiction and reward seeking. Dopamine, the “feel-good hormone,” is part of the brain’s pleasure and reward circuits. Playing video games turns on similar brain regions as those linked to cravings for drugs and gambling, Ditto for social media — every time we see a new post or get a reaction to ours, it’s like a hit of brain candy.
- Weight. Even two hours of TV a day can increase the risk of weight gain, diabetes, and heart disease in adults. (Computer use doesn’t seem to have as strong a link.) There are probably several factors to blame, including less active time, less sleep, and seeing more ads for unhealthy foods.
- Overall health. Most of the time we’re on our screens, we’re sitting down. Sitting for hours at a time boosts the risk of obesity, heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and some types of cancer. One study found that spending more than four hours a day in front of a computer or TV more than doubles your likelihood of dying or being hospitalized for heart disease — and exercise won’t reduce the risk.
The following article from Huffpost provides
additional information on the affects screen time has on our sleep habits:
Screen time at night keeps adults from
falling asleep and sleeping well due to cognitive stimulation and sleep
deprivation. Your brain’s electrical activity increases, neurons race and
divert you from calming down into a peaceful state of mind for sleep.
In addition the physical act of responding to
an email, text, or video increases the tension in your body which results in
stress. Your body then produces the stress hormone cortisol released by the adrenal gland aversive to sleep.
Fuethermore, the brain naturally creates the
hormone, melatonin, that regulates the sleep-wake cycle. Too much light from video screens at
bedtime affect the melatonin production giving the body the impression you
aren’t ready for sleep. In addition the screen emits light that suggests to the
brain that it is still daytime which contributes to insomnia and sleep
deprivation. Holding a device such as a smartphone close to one’s face
increases this effect giving the brain the wrong signal as if it’s not time to
go to sleep. The best advice is to stop watching TV or using smartphones and
other screen devices an hour or two before bedtime to give your brain a rest
and the correct signal that it is time for sleep.
Harvard Medical School scientists concur that specific wavelengths of light suppress the sleep-inducing
hormone melatonin in the brain. The National Sleep Foundation in Arlington, Va
surveyed 1500 randomly selected adults in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Germany,
Britain, and Japan showing that at least two-thirds of those people who watched
TV in the hour before bed didn’t get a good night’s sleep on work nights. The
circadian clock, the body’s biological time keeper that is synchronized to the
24-hour day is thrown off by this interference with the light -dark cycle. This
light exposure delays the melatonin that should surge forward.
So limit your screen time and get a good
night’s rest. You’ll be happy in the morning
If you have stayed with me on this essay and
have made it this far, I want to stress that I am not judging anyone for their
use of Facebook or any form of social media, nor am I trying to convince anyone
to make changes they don’t want to make.
I am simply sharing the benefits I received unexpectedly with my time
away. I intend to return to Facebook at
some point in the future but I hope that this blogpost will serve as a reminder
to me to do so with moderation and not to forget the things I have
learned. Most of all, when Facebook or
any other distraction keeps me from living fully and embracing all aspects of
life that make up “intentional living”, I hope that I have the wisdom to step
back, take a break, and focus on the present.