One of my biggest pet peeves is when someone says they “don’t have time” to read. “Oh, I love reading – I just don’t have the time anymore! I’m so busy.” And to a point, I get it – work, kids, having a household, marriage, and all those other adult responsibilities can really get in the way of our enjoyment. But there comes a point where you have to look at all the wasted minutes throughout the day that, if you combine them into one block of time, you’d have plenty of time to read.
By wasted minutes, I’m referring to time on social media.
No, I don’t mean networking time. That’s different. But the times when you’re mindlessly scrolling Facebook or Instagram, or engaging in a comment-war with someone you’ve never met about politics or their exact phraseology and how it offended you.
About a year ago, I timed my husband’s “scrolling sessions.” At the time, we were both still on Facebook, and every night after our son went to bed we’d unwind on the sofa. While I watched television or read, he’d sit and scroll. From the corner of my eye, I’d watch him just scroll. He’d rarely stop to read a full post or click on an article, and almost never commented on anything. In the course of one work week (four days in our house, at the time), he scrolled for more than six hours combined. Six hours!
And I get it – he was working at a very physically-taxing job and came home to a toddler and exhausted pregnant wife. He was beat by nine o’clock every night. But when I pointed this out to him, we started talking about social media. We had mostly the same “friends” on each of our accounts, but only saw a half dozen or so in the course of the first two years we were married. Although geography was a factor, we realized we didn’t text or call those people – we only knew what was happening in their lives because of what they posted online. As a couple, we decided that wasn’t a friendship and ultimately moved away from Facebook entirely.
We also decided to run an experiment. I was still in my first trimester of my second pregnancy, and we hadn’t told many people we were expecting yet. So we decided not to tell anyone unless we saw them or talked to them directly. Now, a year later, we’ve run into people we were Facebook “friends” with who had no idea at all that we were expecting!
Does anyone else see the problem with social media here?
Its made us lazy in our relationships, less intentional.
But it’s also made us lazy in our personal lives.
Rather than spending time doing what we love – like reading – it’s become this things we “have to do” to keep up with our “friends.” It’s given us a false sense of community and connection, especially Facebook, where I saw so many “Look at my family at Disney!” pictures and very little conversation (which is why my husband and I are on Twitter now, where at least we can connect and talk to people) between “friends” in real life.
In our household, we’ve implemented a new rule: Time to scroll? You’ve got time to read.
My husband and I both have at least a dozen books on our To-Be-Read lists. Our nightstands are stacked high with about ten books each (don’t even get me started on the piles on my desk, under my nightstand, in the dining room…if it’s a flat surface, it’s got books on it!). Admittedly, our kids are in a very bedtime-demanding phase right now, but we’re trying to implement a new policy that when the kids go to bed, we each try to read at least a chapter in one of our Currently Reading books, to use Goodreads terminology. Call us old-school, but we want our kids to grow up with books in their hands, not technological devices (and yes, I know I’ve sung the praises of my Kindle, but it’ll be years before either of our kids touches one of those!).
I understand that a lot of people use social media to keep up with friends from college or past jobs and other long-distance relationships, but I have to ask: How often do you take the time to really talk to these people? How often do you have a heart-felt conversation with this person not in the comments section of a post?
I know, I know – I’m stirring a pot here. But I do think it’s important to examine how we spend our minutes each day, because our minutes ultimately add up to a lifetime. If we are checking social media the first thing in the morning, again on the train to work, again on lunch, again at our midafternoon break, then again when we get home, and finally again before bed, how many minutes is that? How many hours a week is that? How many times are we logging on to see that nothing really “new” has been posted, but we scroll mindlessly anyway?
And then how many times are we lamenting not having enough time to do the things we enjoy, like read more?
Like I said – if you’ve got time to scroll, you’ve got time to read. After all, what are you doing on social media if not reading memes and posts by “friends,” anyway?
The Pensive Bookworm 