Greetings friends,
I’m back into the full swing of things and boy does it feel good! I took the month of August as a Sabbatical, and it was simply wonderful. Around mid-July, I felt the Lord’s prompting to step away from social media for awhile, and decided to take the entire month off. To be honest, giving up social media for a whole month felt nearly impossible. But I knew that if it felt like an impossible task, I needed to do it all the more. Those feelings were an indication that something in my heart was awry.
Several friends have asked my thoughts on what it’s been like stepping away for a month, and I thought I’d share here. I hope it’s edifying and encouraging.
Let me begin with a disclaimer, I’ve failed several times and got on social media. In the moment, I caught myself, and quickly hopped off. But I want you to know that I wasn’t perfect on my social media Sabbatical.
Without further ado, here are seven thoughts on stepping away from social media.
1. Revealed My Idols
I was surprised by how often I found myself reaching for my phone whenever I was bored, longing for affirmation, or trying to distract myself from the task at hand. Before I decided to step away for awhile, I can safely say that my phone had too big of a place in my life and in my heart. I’m embarrassed by how much I was glued to my phone.
One of the main reasons I decided to take time away, was because I’d been struggling with jealous this Summer. All of us have fleeting moments of jealous, but the feelings that I was wrestling with weren’t going away easily or quickly. I hated feeling that way, and I traced the source back to social media. I realized that I was coveting someone else’s….
- Clothes
- Appearance
- Experiences
- Travel opportunities
- Knowledge
- Network
- Productivity
- Etc
That’s not the type of woman I want to be – I want to encourage and support others, not be envious of what they have.
2. It’s the best thing I could have done for myself.
I removed social media from my life and wanted to replace it with something. I decided that memorizing Scripture would be a worthy thing to fill my mind and my heart with, instead of the constant scrolling of social media. If I’m being honest, my mind naturally doesn’t jump to Scripture when I’m struggling; that’s why I wanted to fill my soul with God’s word, so that my automatic responses would begin to be Christ-like. I recently read The Power of Habit, and it had a lot of really powerful things to say about developing new habits!
In the month of August, I also wanted to focus on learning what taking care of myself well looked like. I have a lot of thoughts on this topic, and have a blog series coming soon discussing this in more depth!
3. Rethinking my approach to social media
While I was on my break, I read an article by Andrew Peterson entitled Wrestling the Giant – Why I Deleted Instagram – By Andrew Peterson. I encourage everyone to go read it – seriously, it’s worth your time! He said something that caught my attention.
“The murmur of the Holy Spirit in my heart has grown over the years into a clear voice; don’t thoughtlessly share pictures of yourself or your loved ones with people you don’t really know. Don’t play a game that inevitably leads to envy or dissatisfaction, for you or anyone else. Don’t manipulate children of God for your own purposes. Don’t compare your own gifts to what God has given to others. Be content with what you have. Pay attention to where you are. Be present.”
I’m in the process of rethinking how I approach my social media, and I’m so very grateful that other Christians are publicly wrestling through this too!
4. Social media is not the enemy!
While I love an all or nothing approach, I think that’s taking the easy way out, because it doesn’t require careful and wise thinking about how we should handle social media.
Anything can become an idol if we allow it to. John Calvin is famous for his quote stating that the human heart is an idol factory. We’re prone to take good things and make them into great. Social media is a neutral tool that can be used for great things – such as sharing the Gospel, encouraging one another, keeping up with faraway family and friends, learning from different view points, etc. But we all know that it can be used for evil.
I’d encourage you not to view social media as the enemy, but rather, examine your heart for how you’re appropriately using it. Everyone should have consider their approach to social media, and put parameters in place so that it doesn’t become a stronghold.
5. I was able to truly enjoy the moment.
My generation is perhaps the last that remembers life before cell phones, and before our lives were displayed all over screens, for the world to see. I remember enjoying social events without having to snap the perfect picture and quickly share it with the world. Life before cell phones is familiar to me! One of my favorite things about my break, was not fighting the desire to share on Twitter or Instagram. I could simply be in a moment and enjoy it for what it was
6. Excited to write again.
I didn’t share widely, but while Longing for Motherhood was releasing, I was also in the process of job searching. I started a new job in May, and was exhausted on every level imaginable. I tried so hard to keep up my writing, but was weary and felt like I had nothing to give.
August has been spent refreshing my spirit, and I genuinely feel so stinking excited to create again.
Thank you for sticking with me on my journey. Sometimes, it feels like I have more downs than ups, and my knees feel bruised from fail so often. I want to hear from you!! Please let me know what topics you’d like to see, what things you like, and don’t like!
Leave a Reply