It all started 20 years ago when I watched a friend take a photo of her food with her new flip phone. What? A camera on a phone? And why would you want to take a photo of your food? She said “To send to a friend." I mused why would her friend need to know what she was eating? Now, we are all trained to see every detail of what everybody is doing—on our phones.
Looking around now, phones are everywhere. A smartphone in every hand. Some taking video, photos or selfies. People looking down on their phones lost in their own world scrolling through social media or the internet. I am guilty of this. Too much time on the phone, texting, reading emails…whatever. Not participating in the world around me.
For me, I had replaced alcohol with another addiction. My phone.
Definition of Addiction:
"An addiction is a chronic dysfunction of the brain system that involves reward, motivation, and memory. It’s about the way your body craves a substance or behavior, especially if it causes a compulsive or obsessive pursuit of “reward” and lack of concern over consequences."
This describes my phone. Social media became, not only a time drain, but a distraction from the moment and living each day as fully as possible. After all, this is what I got sober for, right? To be present with you and with me in the moment. I don’t drink anymore, but my mind is still obsessing. Social media easily became another distraction from my routine of engaging with life and others. Connecting and being present in the moment.
I can justify my behaviors of texting and answering tough emails and then going on social media to see what everybody is doing—this becomes an addiction just like my drinking was for me. I took it too far and spent so much time wandering around there in social media obsessing on how many likes I was getting, watching others post their picture-perfect lives and comparing them with mine, ignoring my own life and what was happening in the moment or avoiding actual LIVE contact with another human being.
Four years ago, I decided to get off of social media. My withdrawal was only a few days long and I realized that I can survive in the real world without it. Just like not picking up a drink to check out, I had to RETRAIN my brain to another way—Each day.
To this day, people say to me, “You can see my vacation photos and videos on my social media.” Then, they look at me like I’m crazy when I say, “I’m not on social media, but I look forward to seeing your photos next time we meet face to face?”
Today, when I think of picking up my phone to “look and see what’s going on…”
I need to be present in the moment with what’s going on—
Go outside, breathe the fresh air, take the dogs for a walk, pray and ask God how I can be used to help another person today, go to a live meeting and hear God talk to me through others’ stories of victory in their lives.
I am grateful for being able to retrain my brain to connect with others in-person today.
"And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.”
Hebrews 10:24-25
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