Social media has been rather interesting the last few weeks…and by interesting, I mean a train wreck.  I’m sure you have seen all the bickering, family members unfriending each other, meme wars, etc. etc.  One side will want unity today and the other a recount.  Tomorrow we’ll have another item to argue about.  Over the past few weeks I was often reminded why I stepped away for 3 years to begin with.  I walked back into the chaos of social media just one year ago after accomplishing several things I sought out to do while on my break.

Overall, the experience was great.  I fully recommend a social media sabbatical if you’ve never taken a one.  Social media was a brand new concept  less than 15 years ago.  There was no manual on how to use it.  Our expectations of social media did not include the negative aspects that we’ve seen along the way.  I believe there is value in stepping away for a prolonged period of time, maybe permanently.

I left social media in October 2016, approx. 3-4 weeks before election day.  I had been scaling back prior to this time, taking several week-long and month-long breaks.  It wasn’t the politics themselves that drove me away, it was the behavior of several folks.  I don’t mean that to disparage anyone—I think they had good intentions.  Those good intentions unfortunately revealed a side to those people I did not want to see.  Sides of people I would never see without social.  On top of that, we all tend to collect many “friends” we barely know or have not talked to in decades.  I was less interested in their world views.  This was the tipping point.  I enjoyed civil discourse and political debate online in years past, but the time online became too mean spirited.

I always enjoyed keeping up with friends and family members out of town. Facebook does bring people together in ways I found valuable, such as sharing event information. Without Facebook, I would not know when/where local group runs would be held. Social media has its positive uses–heck, its the reason Rachel and I began dating many years ago. The problem was, the negative outweighed the positive. Social media became “digital junk food”. I was consuming too much of it. It was as dangerous to my mind as sugar is to my body.

I considered a social media disconnect prior to this time for time management purposes.  I felt too much time was spent on these apps (and this was before “screen time” apps had surfaced).  I really didn’t need to know so much about folks outside of my regular cycle. I found the constant notifications and desire to check was becoming a distraction.  Money will accumulate in the change jar when I save a penny, nickel or dime here and there.  I felt I could gain productivity back by saving my time, even those 2-3 minute chunks of mindless scrolling. 

I was also less interested in news.  It’s not that I don’t care about current events, because I do.  Before the internet, we’d have a couple of news stories to discuss each week.  The information cycle is much louder and faster than any other era in the history of mankind.  I’m curious if human beings are built to process so much information each day.  Social media blasts several big stories and dozens of medium sized stories as they occur on a non-stop basis.  From there, you have to sift through opposing viewpoints from people who aren’t really subject matter experts in most of the topics discussed.  It’s overload.  My brain has a limited amount of time and bandwidth but it was occupied with noise pollution.  Not only was I quitting social media, but I also quit watching any news on television.  I also scaled back visiting news sites by 90%.

During my absence, I realized the following benefits:

• I noticed the extra time for productive activities.  I was able to get more done each day.
• I lost the final 15 of 92 pounds and achieved my best fitness level (at that time)
• I joined Orangetheory Fitness to diversify my workouts
• Ran my personal best half marathon and 5k races
• Communication between my wife and I improved.  She ditched Facebook as well.  We spent more time talking to each other and very little time staring at screens.
• Conversations with friends became more meaningful.  I didn’t know what they had for dinner during date night last Saturday, I didn’t know their stance on the 2^nd amendment and I hadn’t heard about any recent life events.  Running into someone at the grocery store felt like an old-fashioned conversation.
• All of a sudden, I had more time to read the Bible and devote time to prayer.
• I began learning to smoke meat and improve my grilling skills.  This evolved into a productive hobby.  My friends and family have benefitted from my back-yard creations. 
• My wife and I began collecting vinyl LPs while enjoying music discoveries. 
• We spent less time messing with our phones on vacation.  We took fewer pictures since they were only for us, not our social media accounts.
• More time was spent in self-reflection.  During downtime moments, I could reflect on the current day or days and years past.  What would be goals be for the next day?  What could I have done better today?  What will I do better tomorrow?  You need silence and downtime to really make self-reflection effective—much easier to do without the cell phone distractions. 
• I ditched podcasts focused on current events.  I became more interested in hearing stories from successful individuals from all walks of life instead of “topics of the day” debates.  Replacing the media intake led me to many inspiring stories.
• I was reading on a regular basis again.  Most of the time it was a book on leadership or a biography of a successful business leaders and athletes. 
• My wife and I both noticed less anxiety when a major event was occurring.  In fact, we’d joke about “I’m so happy we’re not on Facebook this week” when a hot topic item was the talk of the town.

I’ve been back for a year.  It’s been interesting to say the least.  I don’t discuss politics and don’t go deep on current events.  Why bother?  I’m sure the tone of any conversation would be much different face to face, so why waste all that time typing?  I’m not going to sway you; you’re not going to sway me…not online anyways and not in any argument.  The time could be used for something productive.  I don’t want to miss growth opportunities or lose productivity because I was too busy asserting my point on the election.  Social media could often get me emotionally invested up to the point of wasted energy, but that doesn’t occur any longer.  Facebook’s “Unfollow” feature is my favorite link on the whole platform.  I can still be friends with people, without seeing their posts.  The “unfollow” button is clicked when I see someone going to heavy on political messaging or content that doesn’t interest me.  It doesn’t mean I dislike that person; I’m streamlining my consumption of daily information.  Think of it a subscribing to the local newspaper back in the day.  Did you really read it cover to cover, or just read what you wanted to read?  Without unfollow, you’re reading the whole dang paper, including classifieds and editorials.

I’ll probably take this break again, sometime down the road.