Another social media break and looking to the rest of June

Yep. Here I go again. I’ve started another social media break, hopefully a month or so long. Every time I do one of these, I make it sound like I am addicted to social media and never off of it other than these breaks. That isn’t true, but I do sometimes find myself mindlessly scrolling way more often than I should on sites like Facebook and Instagram (I don’t do Twitter so I don’t appear to be a bigger twit than normal.). I also find myself mindlessly looking at news sites and becoming more and more anxious and sick to my stomach.

The bottom line of social media is that it gives most of our brains too much information, even if some of that information is good. We get overloaded and overwhelmed because our brains were never intended to process so much information at one time.

As Pastor Steven Furtick once said, “We were not meant to carry the entire world on our butt bone.” He was talking about our phones being in our back pockets and being constantly connected to the world through news sites and social media and other people.

God didn’t make us to process everything all at once. We were built to slow down, to contemplate, and to have times of rest and relaxation. Were meant for times of peace, not for constant chaos and voices in our minds, and not for being bombarded with ideas and opinions.

So, for the last week, I have been spending my days focusing on things other than social media and I hope I can start my days with a devotional this next week instead of picking up my phone to try to wake up. Since I have removed all apps that will tempt me to stumble down depression-inducing paths, I end up just checking my email, but it would still be better if I started with a verse, so I am trying to remember to open the YouVersion Bible app instead. I usually like to be a little more awake when I do a full devotional but I can at least read a verse or two.

Little Miss’s little friend visiting last week helped keep me away from social media because I mainly only had time to keep an eye on them and walk with them while they played on their scooters. This week we have a few homeschool lessons to finish and I also have to put together their portfolios to present to the homeschool evaluator so that will give me something to occupy my time.

June will be a month where I don’t have any school events planned, but I do hope to do some in July. What I will be doing in June is researching homeschool curriculum, as I do every year.

During June, I also hope to work more on Mercy’s Shore, finish Anne of Avonlea, decide if I am going to do a small garden or not, take photos of the peonies I expect to bloom this week (since it is my brother’s birthday and they usually bloom around or on his birthday), and maybe I’ll actually do some housework since I completely stink at that.

At the end of the month, The Husband is off work for a week and we are looking at the possibility of visiting a beach in New Jersey or taking a train ride on one of the trains near us. We will see how much the rising gas prices affect our plans. If worse comes to worse we will simply splash around in the little pool our neighbors gave us (and we still have to put up), read on the back porch and have a couple of cookouts at my parents to fill up his vacation week.

How about you? What are your plans for June? Is a social media break in there somewhere? If not, think about it, rest your mind, which in turn will help rest your soul.