Monday, July 20, 2015

How Social Media Affects Work

I love social media. Instagram is my favorite (@delighting_days) and I'm really enjoying the facebook page that I recently started for the blog. But I've learned something valuable. Social media has to be my last priority when I sit down to work. 

Social media has the potential to kill my blog. And not only my blog. Social media could kill all my dreams for all my projects, current and future. How, you ask?  Could a sociopath find us on the internet and murder us in our sleep? Ok, it's a possibility, but probably not. 

If I spend time on social media that I need to spend on other things, I'm killing something. Social media could kill my blog if I spend my time scrolling instead of writing or editing blog posts. If I don't spend my writing time, well, writing, then I'm wasting that time. Social media is constantly updated. But you have to live life not just look at everyone else's. 

If I spend my time scrolling you know what I'm not doing? I'm not writing. I'm not drawing. I'm not practicing the piano. I'm not editing blog posts or collaborating on projects. That means I'm not blogging. I'm not adding words to what I've written this year (from January-June I've written over 96,000 words). I'm not actually living; I'm just watching other people live. 

If I spend my time scrolling instead of working on my skills, then I've killed my dreams for future work because I won't be any better than I am now. I am handing over my options for the future. 

To step outside of work, if I'm scrolling I'm not kissing my husband, playing ball with my boys, or kissing my baby's face. I'm not making dinner, talking to friends, or cleaning the bathroom counter. There are very few things you can do while you are scrolling through social media and even fewer that you can do well at the same time. 

Am I against social media? Of course not! But they can take over. How often do you look at social media during the day? Are you checking out everyone else's lives when you should be checked into your own life? That's when you have a problem. 

There's a give and take with everything. I want to know what I'm giving up when I take up social media one more time. I'm having to draw lines again. When you start new things it's easy to be a little infatuated. Who's looking at that facebook post? What was that message about? But I have times to check social media and I need to stick with them. They are best for our family. 

Maybe you wonder how I blog or draw with three young kids? I'm very careful with my time. I'll go into that more next week. If I waste all my time on social media, it's gone. I don't have all day to do these things. 

Time is precious. How do you safeguard yours? 

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