Social Networking Hiatus

John and I recently took a two week Facebook hiatus. Originally, I don’t think either of us intended to return to Facebook for about a month, but during the two weeks we were absent from the social networking site, we achieved what we wanted through the hiatus. I don’t want to speak for John, but for me, I was able to take a step back and not feel like I have to read everyone’s update.  I didn’t literally read everyone’s status updates, but I would scroll through what was on the main page whenever I logged in. I think it was also just a big time drain. Whenever I didn’t know what else to do, I’d log into Facebook and piddle around.

Being away from Facebook allowed me to reevaluate what I really want it to be used for, which ended up being focused primarily on family. I have a group set up so I can just view family updates, and that’s my favorite to check and the thing I missed the most about not being on Facebook. There are a few close friends that I like to pop in on from time to time as well, of course, so I use it for that as well.

Technology is often meant to simplify tasks, but as is the case with Facebook, it cluttered and complicated life for me. I do not know why it took me having to take a two week break from it to reevaluate how to use it, but I’m glad I took a step back and did that. There’s only so much time in the day, and I don’t need to be wasting 30 minutes on Facebook…not that it will even be an option once Monkey arrives!