My Social Media-less Life

Today while going about my normal day I was thinking about how “out of touch” I feel with trends. Especially with the kids that are about 16 and younger and their weird slang.

But then I remembered I feel out of touch because I am.

I wasn’t supposed to stay in touch once I left social media. I knew that would be a “drawback.”

However…

I don’t hate it as much as I thought I would. Back at the end of August when I pushed “Delete Account” on all of the sites I had, I really thought I would hate my life and would feel as though I had been left out.

And sometimes I do if it’s a big life event of someone I know (I’ve found out days later that people I see in church all the time had their baby because people forgot to tell me) and with the Asbury thing I felt a bit left out (but the Spirit will catch you up quick if you’re willing to be led)… so yes, FOMO* is real, but it’s not something that I put all of my stock into.

*(FOMO = Fear Of Missing Out)

The Lord gave me a gift (and maybe it can also be a curse if I use it incorrectly) to pick up on things very quickly. Things like new words, new trends, new information in the form of news.

Which… is part of the reason why I don’t need to be so engrossed in the news like some others might need to. I can draw logical conclusions that maybe some others can’t see or need to be led into.

That’s not to say I shouldn’t listen to or watch things that might be more educational than “doomsday”, but I have to be careful how much I listen/watch or else I will start to get very depressed.

Since depression is not Godly… I “lessen my evil intake”, as a friend of mine said recently.

Sometimes learning a new language (specifically Spanish since that’s the one I’ve been “learning” on and off for a long time) is easy… but also hard. I’m rewriting parts of my brain so it’s different than learning when I’m younger, but I also can extrapolate what words mean. Especially once I’ve seen them in context or the rules have been explained to me and I’m able to grasp what is required for syntax and verb conjugations (why are they always different than English? Why is English so hard, even for an English speaker?).

In regards to current English lingo, I learned what a “sweat” is today and to be honest, I was a teeny bit surprised it has nothing to do with the action of sweating. So… that was interesting.

Aside from these thoughts…

I really don’t miss being on social media. I spend a few hours on YouTube on Saturdays to stay caught up on videos with those I subscribe to, but I really try to keep that intake down during the week too if I can.

Once I got over the hump of those withdrawals and stopped coming up with witty one-liners that may or may not be good social media posts, I felt such a freedom to be…

Right where I was created to be: in the moment.

I may be beating a dead horse with this post for the ones who have been around for my whole journey so far.

But the reminder is good for all of us.

Being fully outside of it, I see social media as an addiction to just about everyone and that requires someone to be much less present than they think they are… but that’s ok.

Why we have it is completely understandable. Just try to work on being more present during those times between social check-ins, and even that is more than most of the world is doing these days. 😉

Have a great weekend!