The Facebook Experiment.

As far back as middle school, I've tried to give something up for Lent.  I'm not Catholic, nor was I  raised in a house/with a religion that really talked about, much less strongly encouraged, the idea of forgoing something for forty days.  The idea of participating likely came when I was in middle school, when all of my school friends who were Catholic would sit around the lunch table talking about what they'd be giving up for Lent.  Chocolate, Bubble Gum, and Soda were usually the top three items listed and inevitably during these conversations someone would turn to me to ask what I was relinquishing.  There were a few years when I remember shrugging my shoulders, explaining that I didn't have to do that...but more often than not I joined in, listing my own sacrifice; the thing that I would miss from Ash Wednesday until Easter. (Even if there were some early years there where I wasn't entirely sure why any of us were giving up anything in the first place.)

For the most part, the habit has stuck, and almost every year on Fat Tuesday I think to myself about what I should let go of for the next forty days.  Some years it has been shopping, some it's been candy or ice cream or some such sweet tooth guilty pleasure.  One year I unsuccessfully tried forgoing the snooze button.  (I recall that resolution lasting a single day).  Another year, back in high school, I gave up soda and found I never really went back to drinking the stuff as much as I used to before those forty days.

This year, after mulling over the usual suspects, I decided to try an experiment of sorts and have given up Facebook.  I will admit, I have logged on once - just yesterday - since Ash Wednesday, though I promise I didn't even scroll through my feed for a second.  Not wanting to shun my newest Facebook friend, I accepted her friend request that had come in the week prior and I quickly sent a note back to  one other friend who had private messaged me about something.  Other than that, I've been "clean."  Ultimately, I chose to drop off of Facebook for these forty days because I wanted a break from the constant updates and social media connections we all seem to have all of the time these days.  Prior to calling it quits for Lent, I had lately been catching myself logging on to the site multiple times during the day - never mind that I had literally just been on the damn thing two minutes earlier. Facebook had become this weird habit or crutch of some kind.  When I started adding up the minutes I was spending on the thing, I was dismayed.  

Truth be told, I don't think I'd actually classify myself as the biggest Facebook offender/over user. I have never been that big on posting my own status updates.  There is a large part of me that cannot stand the idea of the Facebook "check-ins" so I already avoid those.  I have never uploaded the Facebook app to my phone (not interested in the least) and very rarely do I let myself log in even once during the course of a weekend.  However, what convinced me to take a hiatus was the fact that I realized, as someone who spends a lot of hours staring at their computer screen during the average work week, that I had fallen into a terrible habit of logging in on autopilot.  I had this epiphany a few weeks back that whenever I was "stuck"  - either trying to solve a problem at work or even when working on my own writing or blog posts, I would just automatically log in as a way to procrastinate for a quick minute.  Even when my challenges were welcome ones, like digging into a piece I'd written or hammering down into some sort of work document, I would find myself logging in without even realizing it. 

I still have several weeks to go with this great experiment but here's what I've realized so far.  This break has been, overall, a good thing.  There are moments when I miss Facebook, sure.  I like seeing photos of my friends and my friend's kids.  I like knowing what my friends that are cast far and wide around this planet are up to, definitely.  Yes, I have moments where I feel a twinge of being disconnected; of worrying that I'm missing something huge by not regularly checking in on my personal Facebook feed.

But here's the flip side.  Thus far I have found that I am rolling my eyes at the computer screen far less, I've all but stopped muttering to myself about seeing someone's request to play Farmville station or Candy Crush Saga or whatever the game du jour is.  There have been no political posts that get me riled up, I haven't dealt with any of those ads that pop up in my feed, the ones that freak me out because they're always for whatever item I was just researching online.  I've got two more episodes left of the amazing and captivating HBO show, True Detective (Do you watch it? So flipping good, right?!) and I haven't worried too much about seeing or reading a spoiler.  And while, yes, of course, I still have friends flung far and wide, I'm thankfully still pretty much in the loop about what's going on with them - because (and I think this is the key) that I've realized we are all already working hard at staying in touch with or without social media.  Of course we rely on emails and texts and the like to keep in touch - I'm not saying we should all forgo all electronic interactions by any stretch.  And I don't think I'll abandon Facebook forever.  But I do think this break has been a good one so far, for my sanity and the time suck that the interwebs can be for any of us.  And, really, if for no other reason than it's been nice to curb that automatic typing reflex of reaching for the "f" "a" "c" keys on the keyboard whenever a moment of boredom or the urge to procrastinate strikes.

Oh, and then there's that extra added bonus of at least thirty minutes of "found time" thrown back into my weekdays.  Just imagine the things I'm getting done around here.