The Trade-off

Two posts in one day. What is going on Kerry? Well, I have a slow work day and a hell of a lot on my mind, I guess. When I decided to leave social media two months ago I hadn’t given much thought of what I would do with the huge void of time it would leave me. Those apps racked up a huge chunk of my time. It was my top distraction and a wicked killer avoidance tool to turn to when I didn’t want to do what I should be doing.

My hope was I would fill that void by being more productive and getting stuff done, and I have, just not as consistently as I had hoped. Axing social media didn’t quite slay the dragon I thought I was slaying. I cut off the head, yet still find myself staring deeply into that little 6″ x 4″ time sucking screen. I traded one distraction for multiple others. Some being micro-productive and othering nearly just as toxic as my daily dose of Facebook I so eagerly left behind.

I have my new ritual now which consists of obsessively checking my email, clearing out junk for a quick boost of endorphins, feeling like I accomplished something while in my robe sipping my morning coffee. But since I’m hovering over that task like a an overprotective helicopter mom shielding her fragile children from rogue gluten, peanut butter sandwiches, and the dreaded infiltration of CRT in our schools, the task takes mere seconds and leaves me hungry to tackle more. “What else can I do from this comfy, cozy couch?” I know! I’ll check the news!

Yeah, like three or four dozen times before noon. Over and over, many times reaching the bottom of the page. Which is scary considering this is the news and there’s seemingly endless news. When you reach the bottom of the news, all that’s left is a small sentence that says “Hey buddy, you have a problem! Go do something else for a while…” But I don’t wanna do anything else. I need to see the second that Donald Trump is indicted! I can’t miss that! Besides, it’s good to stay informed, right? Right? RIGHT!?

When I run out of news, I can always resort to playing solitaire or Mahjong, and if that’s not doing it for me I can always watch countless hours of YouTube videos to be come an expert on some new topic to obsess over. I honestly should have seen it coming because it’s happened before when I used to take breaks from the social scene. There was always something else on my phone I could turn to, which leaves me thinking maybe the problem isn’t just social media, but my phone addiction. Something to ponder.