My Lenten of Disconnect

I gave up FaceBook and Words With Friends for Lent.  It was easy to say I would do it.  Actually going cold turkey was the hard part. My daughter asked me to and so I did.  I think she was as tired of my head bowed to the iphone as I was of hers.  It was about time I bowed my head to more important things. 

I set up ground rules so that I wouldn't be accused of cheating. (More on that later)

1) I needed to stay connected to work and industry social media.  My success in my career is part and parcel social media so I could not just stop enhancing my skills or marketing my fabulous company.  My family knew that I would be continuing to surf, read, post, repost, tweet, retweet, square off, Link myself in, and more - but that I wouldn't be reviewing my personal Facebook site. 

2) I have many mediums connected together so if there were posts on my page that I wasn't aware of, I was given dispensation for the unintentional lapse of connection.

At the time of my start date in the game Words With Friends I had the maximum amount of games going and was ahead on all but 2.  To ensure I didn't play the game, I totally deleted it from my Iphone and Ipad.  This was the smartest solution because I didn't receive any "push" notifications telling me I was resigning.  This would have been an unbearable sight for my competitive spirit.  And the whole point of giving something up for Lent is to embolden your spirit, not break it.

 (read the other tips for disconnecting here:  http://mojocmo.posterous.com/my-roi-for-giving-   up-facebook-and-wwf-for-len)

My friends and colleagues asked me to write about 'what I missed the most' and to answer the question, 'was it worth it?"

Words With Friends,  What I Missed The Most:
I missed one or two people who made me Laugh Out Loud with the messages they would send after playing a particularly difficult word.

Words With Friends, Was It Worth It?
The time away from the game truly did help me see how I had formed a habit of checking the game at least 10 times a day.  I learned you don't have to use your brain to throw up letters on a screen.

I enjoy connecting face to face playing scrabble - or yahtzee - or farkle much more.  I now have 3 Words With Friends games going and only play once a day.  I feel reborn and it's a great feeling!  My WWF truly taught me WWJD and I am proud of that.

Facebook What I Missed The Most:
I missed my kids posts and my FB Friends who make me smile from the inside out.  I'm not about to tell you that I felt sad not being on Facebook.  I didn't.  I did feel "out of touch" when people around me would say "did you see on facebook?" I liken that to listening to someone talk about the TV show I missed.  You stare politely at those talking through you and you move on.

I happened to read a fascinating article,   Is Facebook Making Us Lonely?  By Stephen Marche
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/05/is-facebook-making-us-lon...  days following the end of Lent.  Take time to read this article and much of how I felt hits the nail on the head. 

In the article Mr. Marche writes about a Carnegie Mellon study of 1,200 Facebook users which concludes the effect of Facebook depends on what you bring to it: 
 

'Everybody else looks so happy on Facebook, with so many friends, that our own social networks feel emptier than ever in comparison. Doesn’t that make people feel lonely? “If people are reading about lives that are much better than theirs, two things can happen,” Burke tells me. “They can feel worse about themselves, or they can feel motivated.”  '

I have always been a very social person.  Giving up Facebook allowed me to connect socially in other ways.  I read quite a bit more and I attended more events.  I also connected with friends I hadn't connected with in a long time.  My life is a full one and I found that I enjoy the personal connection of laughter with someone vs., laughing at a screen. Yet I don't feel Facebook is the big bad time waster or that I was "on it too much."  I realize now that I enjoy seeing, learning, hearing, laughing, crying, and communicating with others all of the time and Facebook is one tool to allow me to do that. 

I did replace group texting with facebook posts.  My son could not wait for Lent to end so he would stop getting awakened with my inane group texts,  An example is "Good Morning Family! I Love You!"    Those texts surly put the surly in my kids at times!

The stories that I did miss were the ones that were very personal.  Finding out a friend's wife has cancer was not easy to learn about second hand.  Yet, what is Facebook if not the ultimate in second hand news?  Just knowing my family kept me up to date on the posts that mattered deep to your soul made me realize how important connecting through Facebook can be.

 
Facebook, Was It Worth It?
Giving up Facebook was not as difficult as I thought.  I often was given elaborate explanations at the dinner table when the family started talking about "what was up" which was always about Facebook.  I also cheated.  My loving husband and daughter would text me updates they knew I would want to know about.  I would text my "conspirator"  a photo I thought no one could live without so she would post and tag me in it.  (Guess what - they could have lived without that photo!)  I wasn't proud of the fact I cheated. But I am human after all.   I am proud of the fact I admit it.  (WWJD)

My Lenten journey had me questioning not IF I should use the different applications, networks or games but HOW I should use them.

Matthew 21 includes the following verse:
"....And Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who sold and bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you make it a den of robbers.”

My Lenten of Disconnect gave me pause to realize I choose to make my house a prayerful one and turn away from those who wish to bring harm, negativity, or a disingenuous spirit to my life.

We can make Facebook and all of the other Apps, Mediums, Networks into what we choose and we can be better people because of how we use the tools in our life. 

Learning these facts and living them daily tells me my Lenten journey was a success.  (well except of course for the human moments of just a wee bit of cheating)

 

Posted via email from MoJoCMO

Flying High in Seagrove

Posted via email from MoJoCMO