When you are hopelessly undisciplined like I am, you eventually have to remove the distractions that you have clung to so desperately. So, today I unplugged from Facebook and Etsy and the games on my iPhone. I decided that it is time for me to stop living through the lives of other people via social network and to start writing like I have been promising to do for years. I keep telling my husband that I am going to get my poetry collection done and my memoir written and instead all I do is disappear into Facebook and sit in a bath of futility hoping that if I wait long enough, I will eventually arrive.
I feel good about my decision to untangle myself; the truth is that Facebook often just felt like a reminder that I am living in a silent and darkening cave, pretending to be someone who I wish I could be instead of being the person that I actually am. I am a writer who has forgotten how to write, how to see and how to live. Today, I take steps that I hope will create positive change in my life and get me doing what I know in my heart I am supposed to do.
May 1, 2013 at 6:39 pm
That’s so interesting – I just started to write a post about my decision to go on a Facebook fast as well! I just deactivated my account a couple of days ago to clear my mind and truly go on vacation. It is such a time suck, and now that I’ve been off of it for a few days I don’t feel like I’m missing anything at all. Good luck with the writing!
May 1, 2013 at 7:18 pm
I feel really good about letting go of it. Glad to hear that it worked out for you!!!
May 13, 2013 at 12:08 pm
Hooray for clearing your mental space for writing! Glad to see that you’re taking steps. 🙂
July 17, 2013 at 1:24 am
You wrote ” hoping that if I wait long enough, I will eventually arrive” – that’s a very familiar feeling but I’ve never seen it articulated so perfectly. Keep writing!
July 17, 2013 at 7:38 pm
Thanks Moe! I so needed this today.
February 5, 2018 at 7:17 pm
Good for you…devout anti-FB’er here…in fact anti-social media of any kind except for blogging. FB and its ilk are black holes.
February 6, 2018 at 3:28 am
Haha – I agree – I also got back on facebook, but mostly it is an easy way to keep in touch with family who live in different countries. I started a facebook page for the blog recently, but I found it useless and stressful, so I closed it. Twitter is another story, but I am figuring it out.
February 6, 2018 at 6:07 am
Good luck….I do still avoid them all but WP.
March 2, 2019 at 1:54 pm
I keep telling myself to jettison Facebook. It seems that fewer of my “friends” post much or maybe I turned them off with my political commentary. It’s become a trite time suck. I mostly use it to try to promote my blog but that’s yielded limited results.
I guess the reason that I’ve held on to it is that it’s still a good medium of communicating with family and some people that I’ve become acquainted with on Facebook. And then there are the friends from the past who I find now and again or who find me.
The times that I’ve deactivated my account have been a relief but I’m having trouble pulling the plug. I imagine that once you do it must feel liberating.
Someday. Maybe.
March 2, 2019 at 1:58 pm
I actually didn’t officially pull the plug until last month, Paulie. I stayed for the same reasons as you, keeping in touch with family and promoting my writing, but Facebook just got way too intrusive and I don’t miss it at all. I will support you fully in your decision to leave, whenever you are ready to do so.