I'm almost 2/3 of the way though quitting social media for 30 days. The weather finally cooperated in Chicago (as close as Chicago weather comes to cooperation, that is), and I got to enjoy the outdoors a little.
I'm starting to miss it.
This week was really when the compulsive part of my social media habits started to clear out, and I started to miss the interaction. I found myself wondering what was going on with friends and industry peers, and I regretted not being able to share a couple of things or help people promote good work.
That's the ongoing challenge (for me) – there's real value in social media, but how do you drill down to the 20% of your usage that really taps into that value and cut out the junk?
I don't miss everything.
Even being off social media, I heard about the Royal Wedding (is that capitalized?) and Bin Laden being shot. We're constantly afraid that we'll miss something important, but somehow we heard about the big news before social media, and we'll keep hearing about it when social media becomes the next thing.
Meanwhile, I'm not sad to have missed 1000s of Tweets about Kate Middleton's dress and whether Bin Laden is really dead or hanging out in Peru with Elvis and Hitler.
Is anyone still with me?
Of course, being off social media makes promoting a blog a lot harder. I never pushed these challenge updates that hard, because they feel a bit self-indulgent. Is anyone else taking a break from social media or tackling some other 30-day challenge? Let me know in the comments.
