Giving up Social Media for Lent

 Lent (Latin: Quadragesima: Fortieth) is a solemn religious observance in the liturgical calendar that begins on Ash Wednesday and ends approximately six weeks later, before Easter Sunday. The purpose of Lent is the preparation of the believer through prayer, doing penance, repentance of sins, almsgiving, atonement, and self-denial. In Lent, many Christians commit to fasting or giving up certain types of luxuries as a form of penance. Many Christians also add a Lenten spiritual discipline, such as reading a daily devotional or praying through a Lenten calendar, to draw themselves near to God

So for a while I’ve been pondering killing off all of my social media, from Twitter, to Facebook, to Instagram, all of it has become too damn much. I wake up in the mornings and check it, I scroll through my timeline before shutting everything off and going to bed and all it’s doing is stressing me out. So I’ve decided instead of going cold turkey and killing it off all together I’m going to take a break. I’ve decided that I’m giving up Social Media for Lent.

I’ve created this very social thing that has recently been used to tear things down, to bitch about things we can’t control, and to complain about it all. I recently went through my follow list on Twitter and killed off some of the negativity but it’s still very powerful and all in my face more than I’d like. Yes before you send me a thousand messages there is some positivity on the net right now, like the hospice worker who sings to his patient, free music, free food… and kids, kids are always adorable. However right now the negative aspects of Social media are out weighing the positive.

So I’m walking away. From March 1^st through April 15^th I’m done. I’m turning off all notifications, I’m deleting the aps from my phone and I will see you all on the other side. My life is not to the point where I can't not check my e-mail so if you need me and know that address …. Feel free to contact me.

This is truly a sacrifice because I mostly use Social Media to keep up with people, like Golden and my favorite musicians, sports figures and my family but I just …. Need a break from everything else. From the republican VS democrat BS … from the media vs the President BS....., from my cause is more important than your cause...... and of course the Presidential BS in general. I just need to walk away.

I’ve never really “given up” anything for Lent, so here’s hoping I can make this work. I hate it tho cause on March 10^th I’m going to Auburn for a Gymnastics meet with a friend of mine, my nephew will be inducted into the National Junior Honor Society, and some things at my new Church that I hope to help out with like the annual Easter Egg hunt and Bible School for the little ones. These are all things that I would post about, but hopefully by doing this “break” I’ll be more present in these things and enjoy them more. I have recently been told that I often overlook how my actions affect the people around me, and part of that is that I’m more connected to the people who live on my social media feeds than the people who live in my everyday world. I’ve decided that focusing on my everyday world people more would make my everyday world better cause there’s not a lot about my social media world that I feel I can control anymore.

So I’ll see you guys on the other side, maybe I’ll put that social media energy into this blog, maybe I won’t… frankly I’m looking forward to unplugging and see what happens.

Have a great few weeks and take care of yourselves out there and if someone could … check in on @theonlygolden every once in a while for me!

Thanks

Marcy (@beaslma)