Confessions of a Facebook addict: Part 1

My name is Kristy and I am a Facebook-o-holic. *gulp

At the time of writing, I am 20 days Facey (or Fancy!) free.

Maybe you’ve noticed (or not!), over the past year I have committed a significant chunk of my spare time to Taekwondo blogging and building a buzzing community around that blog.

The miracle of social media, or my particular brand of poison – Facebook – has been a massively valuable tool in finding the right audience. People just like you to connect with, bounce off and share my later-in-life journey into the martial arts with.

It’s been exhilarating.

But it’s also been exhausting.

Somewhere between yoga tree challenges, pink belts and fighting for change, things got kind of hectic.

When something you’re passionate about takes flight, your natural instinct is just to hold on for dear life and run like hell to keep up.

Hang on tight!

All of this momentum is a good thing, right?

It’s what I hoped for.

So keep calm and run like heck. “It’s kinda crazy but you’ll get used to it,” I said to myself.

The fact there were more and more nights where I just could not sleep (at all) was a passing phase.

Must have had one too many coffees today.

Or too much sugar.
Or exercised too late.
Or need more magnesium.
Or it’s too hot, too cold.
My pillow’s too flat, my room not dark enough.
My bed is pointing the wrong way.
My husband’s snoring too loud (ok that’s actually a thing!)

The amount of joy being sparked all over the place by my new blogging adventures must have been deafening and blinding too since I didn’t at first notice I had become handcuffed to my phone, or more specifically, the Facebook app on my phone.

Anyway. So what? Handcuffs are hot right now ok!?

Reality sets in

At least that was my attitude until my darlin’ husband suggested putting one of those apps on my phone that records how many times you check it in a day.

My blood. Ran. Cold.

How about you? Does that thought give you a little chill?

Hubby might as well have asked me to string a line between the trees at the very front of our home on washing day and hang all my smalls out there to dry for the neighbours to inspect while enjoying their evening walk.

A truly terrifying level of exposure.

It was in this moment something clicked. I had quite unintentionally set up camp in a place where my brain had not a single moment of peace.

No wonder I couldn’t sleep. *facepalm

Always on the hunt for top quality content to share, ideas for my writing, remembering to write birthday messages on the walls of people I probably wouldn’t recognise if I passed them in the street because Facebook told me to, scrolling past ads and more ads, signing up for webinars that looked interesting, screenshotting pages I wanted to visit later when I had time to look at them, staying engaged with my growing audience by responding to comments and messages pronto because, well…they’re awesome and they deserve that!

Aaaaaand kabooomy.

Suddenly, I had to stop.

Take a breath.

Reflect on what I was doing.

Because all of this noise was the product of my side passion project.

All of this I was squeeeeezing in around family, friends, work and training.

I didn’t fall into a heap entirely but I had an express ticket headed in that direction with no clue where I was going. It wouldn’t have been long I’m sure before passion turned to poison.

The turning point

So I decided I had better take that breath before I started turning purple or something.

“Facebook, I love you still but I just need a little space. You know, you can be kind of a controlling bastard sometimes and I don’t like it!”

I sent myself on a 30 Day Holiday from Facebook. I was really hoping this Holiday would be like regular holidays and there would be gin and tonic.

I’m happy to report from over here on Spacebook there IS gin. Chocolate too!

Best of all, there is sweet sleep.

And now that my brain has found some time to breathe I have discovered something else amazing.

What makes this discovery just so wonderful, is that this thing is to martial arts what icing is to a cake.

Stay tuned and I’ll fill you in on it soon…

Other blog posts you might enjoy in the meantime: