I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling like I’m already burnt out toast after one month of 2023. I’m not complaining, but, well, I’m tired. (And looking wide-eyed at the next 11 months like a deer in front of a freight train).
But, when I’m tired, I’ve fallen into a pretty crappy habit. And I share it with you in hopes that if you have a similar habit that you might join me in stepping away.
It’s 7:16 am. I have put out all the fires in my inbox for the day, scheduled a play date, talked to my mom on zoom, and I’m a little tired. What do I do?
I’ll just take a minute and see what such-and-such’s mom is up to on her Instagram to see if they’re in town for said play date.
Ten minutes and an emotional bombardment of massively tragic world events, terminally ill friends of friends, overall outrage, a shriveling planet, and a cute baby platypus video later…I’m more exhausted than I had started.
And I feel guilty for wasting five precious minutes of my quiet morning. And I am reeling from my acute stress response to the triggers on my feed. And also? I never even made it to such-and-such’s mom’s feed to see if they’re in town.
The point is that so many of us scroll when we’re tired. It feels like a leisure activity.
IT ISN’T.
Not even remotely. It’s emotionally exhausting and (unless your job is a social media manager), a massive waste of time and energy.
I’m not saying that social media is the devil. Trust me, I have seen the fantastic things it can do. But, when you’re exhausted and you want to decompress, it’s not the place to be.
So, I’m tired, I grab my phone, I scroll, I’m more tired, I scroll some more, and I spiral into an internally stressed/outwardly placated zombie state.
I’m going to be real here. My daily average of screen time last week was 2 hours and 37 minutes. That’s a lot of screen time. I hereby pledge to try this week to reduce that number by at least an hour.
Because I deserve to have peaceful downtime.
And so do you. Happy Monday, friends.