Goodbye, Facebook and all my "dear" friends. It had to be done. Last night, in a moment of insanity - or sanity - I deactivated my Facebook account. Oddly, I felt a sense of peace and calm knowing I had shut the door on a lot of noise in my life.
I joined Facebook about 2 years ago under the urging of friends and family that it was "so great" and you can keep up with everyone so easily. So, I thought I would check out what all the fuss was about. It took me a few weeks of Facebook consumption to be hooked and loving to find and reconnect with old friends from my near and distant past. How cool, right? For awhile.
It was fun to chat and share pictures with people I hadn't seen in 20 years...few I had much in common with anymore and most...well, I could tell why we weren't friends anymore. The few gems I did find, made it worthwhile to continue to visit the site and keep the conversations going.
The problem with Facebook for a person like me, is that I could not easily disconnect from people and ignore people. I felt obligated to comment on pictures, posts, and birthdays. It became part of the things I needed to do for the day...check and see who I needed to wish "Happy Birthday" etc.
I had an enlightening talk with my husband last night that lead to the deactivation of both of our accounts and the subsequent celebration and liberation from Facebook. I was talking about all the people that I was worrying about and thinking about and how much I cared for them - and here is where the honesty hits - I felt like people weren't caring about me back. It was my sense of internet social network etiquette that I felt was not being followed properly and it was honestly causing me heartache. Isn't that so middle school. My husband - praise the Lord! - lead me to the realization that I could eliminate some of my stress if I just closed my account and said "Good-Bye" to 200 of my "closest" friends. After all, he pointed out, the ones that matter and that are PRESENT in my life will remain and the rest will fall back into the storage closet of my mind where they really belong. I need to focus on the PRESENT and the people that are PRESENT in my life only. That is the only thing I have the energy for. I cannot effectively help and care for all the people that I have ever known as well as be actively PRESENT in the lives of those closest to me.
I find it humorous that an Epiphany of sorts had to happen in my heart for me to realize that Facebook was poison to me. While I have enjoyed rekindling friendships with people of my past and organizing social functions with my current friends, from now on, email me or call me....I have logged off for good.
1 comment:
I found out that deactivating your account does nothing...it is still there, but no one can see it but Big Brother at Facebook. I learned how to delete it now...they are real tricky and hide it on the 5th window of a help screen.
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