And so it begins…
One week.
No television.
No Internet.
No cell phone.
I’ll admit I am daunted by this. Possibly a touch scared.
In some ways I’ve picked a perfect week to do this. I’m away from home and my regular routines.
In some ways I’ve picked the worst week to do this. I’m away from home and my regular routines.
There are also some things happening with writing, my book and our television appearance. While I have let the folks concerned know I will be offline, and even given them the land line phone number they can reach me on, it’s not ideal.
We live in a connected world. Expectations have changed. We’re supposed to check email multiple times a day and be available to take phone calls at any hour.
And we’re suffering for it. The easy access and connection that was touted as the new way to create work life balance has, instead, stolen the life part out of the equation.
Leave work early so you can watch your kid’s soccer game but then… you’re on your Blackberry the whole time so you barely see them play.
Take off at noon on a Friday so you can get out of town but then… you have to check in every few hours on your work laptop to see if a client has emailed you.
Where is the real rest? Where is the break? When do you get to turn off so you can turn on to what’s in front of you and what’s next to you and what’s all around you?
Wifi is overrated.
Cell phones are overrated.
3G is overrated.
So I’m taking a big break from it. All of it.
Will you join me?
You don’t have to do the whole week or completely disconnect. That’s not feasible for everyone.
But I trust you know what you can do. Be it a few days completely off or a week with just your cell phone and checking email once a day. Challenge yourself. See what trying something new brings you.
You can sign up over there on the right and pledge for a week of less screen and more living.
Bake a cake, paint your garage door, read, play a board game, sleep, sew, knit, clean, make a mess, write a short story by hand, give your full attention to the people around you, instead of checking your email on your phone while in a line up, talk to the person next to you.
It will be fun.
While I’ll be without cell phone, without laptop and without television, I will have the screen on my Kindle. If I weren’t on the road I would have cut that screen too but I didn’t want to lug a lot of library books around with me. If you have a similar hurdle, make a small exception and then join in on the challenge.
Have a lovely week and I’ll be back on April 10th.
Cheers,
Rachel
I’ll be offline from midnight April 3nd to midnight April 9th. If you leave a comment or email me I will try and respond the following week.
I recently purchased your Minimalist Mom book on my Kindle. I have been enjoying simple living books and blogs for years. I am 55 yrs old with no children at home now. I have been looking into minimalism this past year. Your book held my interest all the way through. Matter of fact, I was reading Hunger Games at the same time and I would read yours over it. I like your honesty and the pictures of your journey. So now, I am subscribing to your blog. Thanks for the inspiration!I have not had T.V. all my adult life. We live way out of town and I only have internet at Church and work. I just recently got a cell phone for travel. After losing money on not using it, I set it up for automatic payments. Right now I could use it for a year or more and not have to add any money. All this to say that it won’t take me much to join you. I’m in.
I’m planning to disconnect and have even set a date at the end of the month (just so that I won’t “forget” like last time). I won’t be able to do it for a week, but even a few hours in the afternoon/evening would be enough of a challenge for me.
Good luck to you! I had kind of a “technichal sabbath” for a weekend, I was only aloud to check my bank and mail. It was really nice! Lots of time for mor interesting stuff! Our computer just broke down and I´m thinking we can do without, but we´ll se. I hope you have a really nice time this week!
I completely agree with you. Misused, technology has stolen time from us, not made us more productive. Now, we are slaves to everyone and anything that wants access to us wherever and whenever. We’ve lost moments to just be. I make a conscience effort not to take my phone out while at my kids sporting events, after realizing exactly what you said, and watching my husband check his phone 15 million times. Imagine how our kids feel, looking up to see if we just saw that last kick or basket, and all they see is our heads down, checking email or playing an app. Kind of sad and really the wrong message.
Good luck! I need to do this when I’m in Costa Rica this summer.
I’m in. The internet will be on just for my kids to do their homework. We homeschool and some of their schooling in online. But other than school…..no cell phone, computer, internet etc. I really don’t watch much tv (except what my kids do for their homeschooling, we sometimes watch educational movies that go along with science or geography etc.), nor do I use the cell phone (we only have a, use as you go Tracfone), however, I do use the internet quite a bit. So, that will be the challenge and I am looking forward to it!!!
I’m making sure all of my bill and internet “stuff” is done so that I can beat this challenge!!
I’m in. Announced it on my site this morning. ….I am a little scared too 🙂
Good for you!
But will I join you? In a word: no. 🙂
Sounds good to me, I’m in. Since we don’t have a land line I will be keeping my cell phone on, but I very rarely use it as it is. Just to get in contact with my husband if I need something since we have 3 kids, live out in the sticks and only have 1 car. Good luck to the rest of you on your version of the challenge!
I signed up and I am all in! My minor exception is I haven’t had a landline, ever. We had one growing up of course, but I haven’t had one since college (I graduated in 2005 and got my first cell phone in 2004). So this lack of landline means I will be keeping my phone on, but I’m going to flash back to life with a landline and no caller ID. If the phone rings I’ll answer or let it go to voicemail. But nothing else, no texts, or games or whatever. I think that’ll be the hardest part. I also have to figure out how to play music around the house (we currently use pandora.com or iTunes) and my nearly 3 year old LOVES music. We may just do a lot of singing. 😉
I tried this last year, but did each individually for a week. I choose not do to all 3 at once as I often need at least one outlet when home with two small boys for over 24 hours. I actually told my therapist about this notion that I “shouldn’t” be watching TV, on my phone, or online so much. Her response is what is making me not partake in this challenge…basically, she said why should I give up that which gives me a true break, allows me to feel human, decreases the stress, and gives me connections to adults when I feel overwhelmed with children. It’s not to say I should engage in these activities all the time, but in my case, they are often the outlet I need to NOT go to the deep end.
I’m cancelling the internet this week, which also kills Netflix. It’s sort of 2 birds with 1 stone — less tv screen time and less computer screen time. I will keep the cell phone, which is a smart phone, but I don’t sit and browse on the 3″ phone the way I do on the computer so it doesn’t worry me that I’m keeping that.
I know this will be a challenge, but it will be a good challenge.
I wish you good luck in your endeavor!!
Ann
Good luck to you too. No Internet permanently is a huge challenge. And, no Netflix? I am impressed.
Good for you! It is sad how dependent we’ve become on screens and I hope this week you find true rest. My husband is a pastor and our goal is to have one day a week when we’re not available to the “outside” world. It’s hard to do with phone calls and text messaging and emails all available all the time.
Thanks, Steph. Going to be a challenge but I am excited for it.