Media Week

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Summer of 7 Media week has been my best week in years.  Years.  Last Friday night when I shut the TV off, walked away from my computer and deleted all my iPhone apps I was sure, I mean SURE, I would be counting down the hours last night until I could get back on the Internet.  

I was wrong.

I was counting how many more hours of the quiet I could savor. 

Media week was so good.  Like, so good.  I felt as if a weighty fog had been lifted from around me and I was left with life.  Just simple life.  I could do what I want and think what I wanted without filtering it through 1,000s of other people. 

Social Media

Now, don’t get me wrong, when I woke up on Saturday I had no clue what to do with myself.  Like, literally, I did not know what to do after getting out of bed. 

What do I do next when I can’t tell someone what I’m going to do? 

What do I do when the view doesn’t have to be just-so so it makes a good Instagram picture? 

Where is Facebook to tell me all the cool things going on today?

I did not realize until that moment just how influenced my day to day activities were by YOU.  And even more than that, by COMPANIES trying to tell me what to do with my time.

By day two or three it felt like 1994 again.  And I don’t mean I was wearing Birkenstocks.  I mean, I just did life and it didn’t matter what people thought.  It didn’t matter what it was going to look like.  It didn’t matter what I was wearing.  It didn’t matter when I left or when I got back.  I just did my thing and enjoyed it. 

And more than that, I felt like a super secret spy doing fun! things! that no one knew about.  I went to a picnic and a baseball game and an outing with my daughters and a bloggy meetup out of town! Someone had to buy Facebook event attendees at Social Media Daily so that the place would get full.  And I know it sounds weird but I got to hold them all close to my heart and they were all mine.  You have to understand I’ve been on Twitter answering “what are you doing?” for 5 years.  I’ve been blogging now for 11 years.  For eleven years I’ve been airing nearly my every move.  I had forgotten what it was like to just BE.

I felt free as a bird.

And don’t even get me started on how much I enjoyed not seeing the phrase Chick-fil-A all up in my face.

But I did miss the people.  I love to hear when you’re happy and mad and frustrated and I just love sharing life with people online.  But you pay for it.  You really do.

 

The Internet

I also restricted myself from the Internet as a whole.

Can I just say you don’t really need the Internet as much as you think you do?  OK, *I* don’t need it as much as *I* think I do.

I mean, it’s nice to look up recipes and the weather and what movie that guy was in 1996 but really?  You don’t NEED it as much as you assume. 

I didn’t look on the Internet for one single thing.

I looked up recipes in cookbooks and talked to people when I had questions about my garden.  I looked at the sky for the weather report and called a phone number for my bank account balance.  The rest just fell away.

I did miss reading blogs and dearly missed writing here but ya’ll, the break from it was just so good.

 

TV

And TV? 

I didn’t miss it at all. 

I mean, I sort of hate I missed seeing the great Olympic moments this week.  I did.  But I enjoyed my time so much in the quiet that I would not trade it for a single second of a high dive.

 

What’s Next?

So am I writing it all off? 

Nope.  I still believe there’s value in connecting with folks online.  I really, really do.  But there are some things that have to change for me. 

You know what I did Saturday morning when I had no clue what to do?  I stayed in bed and opened my Bible and cracked open a notebook and I read and I prayed and I listened and I wrote.  And I did that over and over all week.  I realized that I need more of that and less of media. 

I’ve been batting around ideas on how to do that.  Do I fast the first 3 days of the month?  Do I only allow certain hours of the day?  The last thing I want to do is be legalistic about it but I do know I want something different now.  I need margin.

These details are just the tip of the iceberg.  I have pages and pages of things I could share of what happened in the quiet.  I’m leaning on the Spirit to lead me on what to share but initially I just want to say God is good and faithful in our sacrifices.  He’s there just waiting on you to give Him some of your time.  I’m here to say it’s worth it, so worth it, to click that little “X” and listen to the quiet.