I recently decided to take a 5 day social media fast.
Let me tell you, in the beginning it was hard. So so hard. Sometimes I don’t think we realize how much we are actually on our phone. Almost everything we need is at our fingertips and can be accessed on our phone. I think a lot of times, as parents, we also use social media as a break when the screaming and fighting gets too much. For me, I also use it as a means to keep up with friends and family. Sometimes with 4 kids, my job and just everyday life, it is hard to keep in touch with everyone that I would like to. At the end of the day I find myself so exhausted, its easy to just grab my phone and scroll through everyone’s posts and see what’s happening in their lives.
So when I decided to commit to this social media fast, I knew it wasn’t going to be easy. Day 1 of the fast was probably the hardest. I found myself constantly reaching for my phone, so I finally decided to put it in the other room, to hopefully help curve the need to constantly reach for it.
The next day the boredom began. Which is so weird to say. With all the things I had going on how could I possibly find time to be bored, and what was I going to do with that time. I decided to fill it with playing games, on my phone. Eventually I found myself wasting just as much time playing games as I was doing before on social media. So then I made it a commitment to try to stay off my phone all together and be in the moment more.
The more time passed the easier it became to stay off my phone, I enjoyed more time with my kids and visiting with family. While I think the social media fast was overall good, I did miss keeping up with my friends and family online. I kind of felt like I was lost, if that makes any sense. Social media can be used for so many things, good and bad. I love social media for staying in touch, and sharing our special moments with friends and family. But at the same time, I am the first to admit sometimes I can get sucked into the hole of social media.
This challenge reaffirmed for me that social media truly can be a blessing and a curse. I am now more aware of how I am spending my time, and try to make sure that I limit my scrolling in the endless black hole. If you haven’t done a social media fast yet, I strongly encourage you give it a try, and see what you learn from it.
