social media break
My average phone screen time is about 3 hours per day. If I continue to spend 3 hours per day on my phone for 365 days, that’s 1,095 hours per year, which is about 45.62 days. That round up to 46 days out of the year staring at a phone. And here I am thinking that I don’t have time to grow a business while I work a full time job. Welp, I just got 46 more days per year.
Time is one thing that we can’t get more of. 46 days out of the year staring at my phone is time I won’t get back.
I decided to take last week off from social media.
I mostly just use instagram, @thebettercoach, but I also did not check any of the other social platforms that The Better Coach, myself, or Otto have.
What happened?
I felt a lot better.
I’m not saying that I felt bad beforehand.
I’m saying that I don’t think we realize what putting so many messages into our brains at such a rapid pace is actually doing to our brains.
I’ve had a meditation practice for a few years. Sometimes, I feel like my thoughts calm down towards the end of a meditation session. Towards the end of last week, I felt like my thoughts were calming down outside of that meditation practice.
I felt like my thoughts were my thoughts again, too.
What I mean by that is I used to be scared of my thoughts. When I lived in Colorado while I was going to graduate school, I actually could not be alone with my thoughts. I was anxious af.
Since I moved back to the Dirty Jerz, I’ve done some work on myself, and enjoy being alone with my thoughts today. But what I did not realize was how my thoughts can easily become the thoughts of people I follow on social media. And even though I am very careful who I follow to make sure that only good vibes cross this brain barrier, those messages are still not me.
If social media is having that effect on a 33 year old woman with a fully developed brain, then what kind of effect is it having on a high school student whose brain is still developing and will not finish until about 25 years old?
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I imagine it can’t be great.
At first, the social media break felt uncomfortable. The first few days, I felt myself wanting to mindlessly reach for my phone. I had to stop and ask myself why. Was there something I am trying to avoid? Do I not want to focus on this task anymore because it is becoming challenging? Am I lonely? After I would answer that question and then acknowledge the answer, I would ask myself what can I do instead that is more productive? In fact, I was about 1,000 times more productive. For instance:
I spent more time taking action on ways I can better serve the clients I do have
I got more work done for that teaching job I do
In case you were wondering if I was obsessively in love Kya beforehand, that line - who are we kidding? That line was crossed a few years ago, instagram or no instagram. But, when I would sit down next to her, rather than sit down next to her and scroll, I would sit down next to her and 100% be there with her.
My apartment is cleaner
I made moves on an online course I have been working through since February #blindspot #theartofcoaching
I stretched and explored movement more
I read more, and I realized that sometimes I read to avoid/procrastinate doing something else that I actually need to do.
As productive as I was without it, social media is here to stay. It’s going to keep evolving and changing from facebook to instagram to tik tok to snapchat to whatever comes next.
I would love to tap out. And at some point, I might.
But as I continue to grow and figure out what The Better Coach is going to look like in years to come, I’m going to be more intentional with how I use social media.
If you are interested in becoming more intentional with how you use social media, or having me help your female youth athlete navigate social media, please use the form below to get in touch with me. I work with athletes in the Central Dirty Jersey, but I also have remote programs if you live outside of the area.
