Good question.
I did a lot of things that I normally don’t have the time to do. I made a dinner the night before. Mark and I sat on the couch and talked. We played Battleship. (!)Â I got all sorts of work done. I sorted junk recipes out of my recipe file. I got my hair coloured. I wrote a letter. I reorganized by cookbook shelf. I brought a pair of my favourite slippers down to the shoemaker to have repaired. I ran errands. I picked up some very sweet vintage children’s books at the SallyAnn. I took long walks. I went out (“MUMMY HAS A PLAYDATE!”) with a few very fun fellow blogging chix. I worked on a few lines of Kubla Khan.
It was wonderful.
My head felt clearer than it ever had before. And I felt happier, and less sluggish. I was suddenly living at a different pace. And more importantly, I had more time.
By Friday the weather had improved. It became even easier to spend unrushed hours outdoors.
Even though I cut the media out of my life for such a short time it is still interesting to look back and see what kind of things I can change and how I can benefit.
Other than bits of playoff hockey I didn’t watch any television or films. I didn’t read any books. Where I off track: I read some trashy magazines at the hair salon (what else was I to do while I sat under the fan?) and almost subconsciously slipped into Facebook. It’s sad, really. I would have done okay but I received multiple “friend” requests during that week. It would be rude to keep those people waiting, right? So I’d dash in to accept, and dash out again. But by Friday I was scanning the headlines and checking out new groups. Aaaargh. By Saturday I was reading the paper. I couldn’t avoid it, it’s my favourite part of the weekend!
Other observations:
-Â TV is easy to cut out if you know your favourite show is being recorded for later and also removes the temptation to channel hop the whole evening away
-Â going for a walk is a better way of spending time than idly surfing the WWW.
- I missed reading. I like to read before I go to bed, but since I wasn’t reading I ended up going to bed earlier… which isn’t necessarily a bad thing!
-Â I wasn’t as motivated to clean up the basement as I had previously thought. Only one corner of the basement got tidied, but that also includes the defrosting of an old fridge. We’ve decided that we don’t really need it anyway, which I’m glad about because it buys us more space and will probably result in a lower hydro bill.
-Â Facebook is opium for the masses and takes significant chucks away from the already-limited amount of time I have in front of the computer. And it’s making me dumb. I’ve adjusted my email settings so all FB-related emails go into one folder. I’m going to try to reserve my FB time until after the girls go to bed. Ha. Wish me luck with that one.
Anyway, I’m rushing now. I have a few writing deadlines to meet this week and I need (a) eat breakfast and (b) get back into work mode.
p.s If you’re interested in reading more about the concept of a media fast, I do recommend this post over at zenhabits.
And here’s another thing I’ve been thinking about. I’ll leave this with you: Beach reading (you know what kind I mean, light, non-literary type of fare) good, bad, or downright harmful to your brain? Discuss.
