Journaling about the days.
Social Media Abstinence The Journal #2
March 5, 2022
The first day of the challenge, today it was easy to resist because it is the start of the challenge. I woke up at 5:45 am from the sounds of a rooster, who likes to sing his songs very early in the morning. Instead of taking the phone in my hand and pine for information and news, we decided to finally drive to a place and enjoy the sunrise. By accident, we found a coast were a lot of walking and sports was going on. That was very inspiring to do some sports there. Today it was worth it not to pick up the phone first thing in the morning.
March 6, 2022
Woke at 8am today on a Sunday. No scheduled work or appointments. My right hand reached for the phone, the relaxing, comforting phone. Then I remembered I put a challenge on myself. Why did I have to do this? Why on a Sunday? I felt sad that I couldn’t get my fix. I stayed in bed for one more hour, feeling incredibly bored and a bit irritated. It was hard today, and I had to use willpower to resist. I also downloaded a new YouTube add-on named: Unhook for Firefox. It is able to hide distracting things like recommendations or comments. So far so good, day 2 is over.
March 7, 2022
Day 3 of the challenge. Today, it was surprisingly easy to not use social media before 6pm. I noticed the pattern, when I am not busy it’s a habit to click on social media apps. I almost clicked on the app icons just out of habit today, like a programmed robot. When the urge to scroll came up, I did something different, simple stuff like sitting down and drinking a coffee or handwash my socks. With some freed up time, we finally managed to hike up a hill and enjoy the view.
March 8, 2022
Day 4 of the challenge already. Today, It was hard to say no. I noticed some patterns when I like to automatically click on a social media app. When there is some boredom coming up, it feels like a good solution to enjoy some scrolling. The more dangerous part of the pattern is the urge to run away from unpleasant tasks by letting the algorithms take over. Still, I made it till 8pm with no scrolling. That is a win.
March 9, 2022
Today I made a power nap, it’s hot in Curaçao, so I need my Siesta. Normally, I lay down and start scrolling the apps. Not today, what to do instead? I wrote down these lines instead.
Just laying in bed seems boring, reading a book seems boring. How nice would it be to jump from App to App and scroll some content. Maybe I am missing out on something, for example on the 4 golden tips how to become a millionaire fast. What if I am coming to late for this content?Luckily, I just fell asleep in the meantime. Mission accomplished, day 5 finished.
March 10, 2022
You know what is the hardest part of the challenge? Writing something on Medium and don’t look the whole day if somebody reacted to your story. At 4.30pm it was bad, I wanted to take a little look so hard.
Journal: 4:30pm I want to click on Medium badly just to see if the little magic green dot has some new information. How short term focused are we really? I bit on my lips 3 times and went away from the computer. At 5pm we drove to a beach, there was no need for social media there.
March 11, 2022
No social media till 8pm today. Again, there were some moments that made me want to take a look, but it was manageable. At 1pm, I felt bored while approaching my Siesta. I just laid down and let the mind wonder on its own. That way, I came up with two text Ideas. That was great and a benefit for the efforts.
March 12, 2022
It is 3pm, today I want to start earlier with my text. I am experimenting with using an external editor to write stories for Medium. I use languagetool.org, it has a spelling-check and a punctuation check build in. That’s great. Today I clicked on the Medium tab accidentally, I realized it fast and looked away because of the challenge. Still I saw that the green magic dot was active, for a short time a strong desire and craving rushed through me. Maybe I should work with LeechBlock again to block all unwanted sites till 6pm.
March 13, 2022
8th day already, I am starting to get some momentum. Sunday is my lazy day normally, and I am used to binge a lot on this day. Still, somehow I was able to let the time pass by without entertainment from 100 channels. I noticed a positive effect of staying off media consumption today, you start to get bored so much that work that seems monotonous normally gets more exciting all of a sudden. I would rather wipe the floor or do some learning instead of doing nothing the whole day. Could this be very beneficial for focus and productivity? I will find out. Stay tuned, my friends.
March 14, 2022
Today was my one-year sober birthday celebration. No discipline was applied today. I eat a big cake for breakfast, cruise around the island and looked at social media how I wanted to.
March 15, 2022
After all the fun activities all the sugar and all the binging yesterday,I was happy to apply some discipline today. Mission accomplished- no social media till 6pm.
