It was a few nights ago that I decided I would stay off of Facebook for an entire week. The subject came up when I started a conversation with my friend, Ed, from college. We were talking about the technological advances we've made and how it has made so many people dependent on them. I began reminiscing with him about the good ol' days when we didn't have Facebook or cell phones or all these fancy gaming systems, and it was at that moment that I decided one week spent without the most popular social networking site wouldn't kill me. So here I sit, 4 hours into this goal of mine, and I'm already having withdrawals. I know, horrible, right? I mean, after so many of these fancy gadgets and wonderful ways to stay connected are presented to us, it feels wrong to have them taken away. Why? Because our generation likes to be connected. We like to talk to each other and share our thoughts. We like to have that feeling of security where if we feel unsafe or uncomfortable, we aren't alone, because the power of talking to someone is a click or text away. We like to feel like others are listening to us and acknowledging us. It's hard to think that there were times when people didn't have laptops, cell phones, computers, video games, televisions, portable video gaming systems like Nintendo DS, iPods, touch screens, etc.
I was upstairs only two hours ago chilling out with my brother and his friend Josh, and we were having our usual random conversations. We were telling jokes, talking about music, Pokemon, Yugioh, Invisible Children, Youtube videos, etc., and I was really enjoying the time that I was spending with them. So many funny things were said, and I kept thinking about how badly I wanted to share those funny things with my friends, but couldn't because I made a decision to stay off of Facebook. And now I'm thinking about it and can't believe that I was so focused on posting things to the internet instead of enjoying the moment for what it was. Although it isn't bad to think about sharing funny things that have the potential of brightening someone's day, it's almost impossible for me to go throughout the entire day without thinking, "I'm going to post that on Facebook." Ed told me the other night that by not going onto it 24/7, it would be a release for me because I would not have to constantly feel a need to see if anyone liked my post or commented on my photo. I'm hoping that realization is stage one of this temporary experiment, and that by the end of the week, I won't feel as eager to log on anymore. But I am also afraid that as soon as I start using it again, I'll go crazy and post a week's worth of content all within an extremely short amount of time. I find that when I don't use Facebook as much during certain days as I normally would, I always manage to catch up with the time that I would have spent posting things by posting three or four statuses within a twenty minute period. It's so unhealthy to feel like I have an audience that is expecting to see my posts, so I need to catch up with myself. What is there to catch up with? How many people care about what I post anyway? I doubt that the internet world will miss me much. Heck, my friends are probably rejoicing right now and thinking about how great it is that they won't have to see me clogging up their news feed for an entire week. Haha. Still, there are some people who have been asking me how in the heck they're going to communicate with me while I'm gone. I guess I've never realized just how often I depend on Facebook for day to day communication. But I do depend on it very often.
I think that quitting for a week will be healthy to do. I'm so tired of being distracted by the social networking site when I could be doing better, more productive things. I don't know why, but even if there is nothing to do and I get bored with Facebook, I find that staying logged on and not doing anything is better than getting up to find something to do. I just don't wanna have to feel like that anymore. I want to be able to force myself to read, paint, do homework, write, etc. The internet has been swallowing so much of my life that I'm already dying, in a way. I'm not living every day like it's worthwhile, and I want to do that. So, this experiment is going to hopefully get my mind out of the cyber world and into the fresh air of mother earth.
Well guys, I'm getting pretty sleepy. I know this blog is short, and I would love to type more, but if I continued to do so, you would most likely end up reading a long sequence of jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjdddddddddddddddddkkkkkkkkkkvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhsssssssssss due to my head falling onto the keyboard and hitting random buttons. Who wants to read long strings of letters that don't spell anything? Not this girl.
So, Goodnight, and thanks for taking time to read this. I'll try to keep up every other day with an update, but it's no guarantee considering my week is pretty packed.
Love you all.
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