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Saturday, June 21, 2014

Might As Well Face It, You're Addicted to....

SOCIAL MEDIA!!

Forgive me Father for I have sinned. It's been 6 hours that I've been on this computer looking at pictures of cute babies and cats, tweets that don't concern me, "selfies", quotes, cartoons, disturbing videos, tutorials, Life Coaching posts, defending and explaining my Faith to strangers, giving unrequested and unheeded advice, playing games and following other people's lives.  I know waaaaayy too much about some people and what's happening in their lives. It's become like watching a serial soap opera. What do I do??! A day that I'm given can disappear like a snap through loss of time-awareness. I can't imagine if I were more mobile with this on a phone and able to stay 'connected', I'd never get anything done! Thank GOD, I only have a text and call phone! What is wrong with me?

There's nothing wrong with me...or you.

We have been absorbed by the black boxes offered to us for our pleasure. And that's what we want, right? Pleasure?

As long as we're receiving some payback of pleasure in the activities, we'll continue to buy, sign-up, listen, and pay. Which pleasure it is remains an individual choice. It may be competition in a game and winning. It may be learning info that's new and valuable to you or trying to find it's usefulness in your life. It may be the positive feedback you receive or merely the attention. It may be a replacement of direct human interaction. It may be a physical pleasure through pornography. It could be to fill the boredom of the day. It could be the laugh you need that day or the 'nosiness' in us all. It may satisfy a need to feel like a part of the world and everything in it yet not be in it.

The only problem is that it's a false pleasure we're getting.  It's actually pulling us farther apart from one another. You can stand in any space, indoor or outdoor, today, with others all around you and feel alone and ignored. Why? Because everyone is looking down at a device and not at you...or the car coming. You could be that cute guy trying to get the girl's attention but she's busy texting that she never meets anyone nice.

What happened before we could immediately call or text every single thought we had throughout the day? We kept our mouths shut. We used all of our senses. We noticed our surroundings. We looked at others. We talked to strangers. We didn't over-share but to those closest to us. And, we had people who were close to us. Everyone was our brother or sister, but everyone wasn't our friend or follower. We were content to wait to call someone when we got to a phone, we called them back if they didn't answer, if it was important. We didn't work ourselves up into a frightened, perceived insult because they didn't answer or call us back within a certain time. We just thought, "Oh, they must not be home or must be busy. I'll try later.".

Being fooled by that pseudo-pleasure can lead to emotional ups and downs and instability of emotions in every area of our lives. That adrenaline builds up and doesn't come down for a while and we remain in an almost constant fight-or-flight state. We feel anxious and jittery and may lose sleep. We actually believe we can start, build, and maintain healthy relationships across the Internet like that. Think about that and whoever you may be having problems with right now.

I don't know that I'm satisfied with that in my life. In fact, I know I'm not.

We should be focused on a REAL LIFE. I have REAL friends, REAL human beings, that I want to keep in my life. They are the ones I know and have met in person, have known for years, trust, and enjoy their company when we are together. If we are not together, we can 'keep up' with what is new in our lives through these tools, which is great! My pleasure comes from that and seeing their accomplishments and successes in life. I also enjoy seeing the progress people are making in their businesses, with education, with their faith, and growth of any kind. It's inspiring and uplifting and I stay open to meeting new live friends. That is what I should seek more of in my web-time.

My pseudo-pleasure sucks me in with YouTube videos like Bubzvlogz watching her and her husband go through their first pregnancy together. I watch new parents DearNaptural85 and their little one. I get a kick out of that. They are young and it's such a big change to their lives. It's just...nice. But it's become a daily look-out! I don't KNOW these people! It's beginning to feel voyeuristic!

My other is the games. Sigh. I can play for a VERY long time while multi-tasking! So wrong!

So, the upcoming reboot will be limiting the amount of time I'm online to checking email accounts, Facebook and Twitter for updates ONCE PER DAY (I'm not even signed into the other ones!). Games will be limited to 20 minutes, and not daily. I'll set a timer! I'll give myself once per week to check in to YouTube (just to make sure the families are doing well without me, sniff-sniff).

Is there any rebooting you need to do this week?

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