Disconnecting the dots

Faced with the challenge of disconnecting myself from a feed for some time, I knew I could have played it easy by pulling myself away from something like Myspace or Livejournal for a few days or so, but that would have been too easy. Given my habitual use of various feeds as distraction from homework and all of those academic things that I should be doing, I decided to hit myself where it hurt: No Facebook or AOL instant messaging use for at least 24 hours.

My trial began shortly after I was finished with class on Thursday, around 1:30pm, as I checked Facebook one last time in Helen C. White library before working to finish up an English paper that was due in section by 4:35. It was my one last taste of Facebook's procrastination-rich flavor before pulling myself out of the loop for some time.

As I sat and typed the paper, occasionally reaching stopping points and attempting to battle writer's block, I found incredibly tempted to type in the facebook web address to see if I had any new messages from friends, and it honestly was difficult to avoid doing it. As it turned out, I finished my 4 page paper within about two hours, which is probably the fastest I have ever thrown a similar assignment for a class together.

After some downtime visiting friends and handing in the paper at class, I headed home, and again felt tempted by my main other vice -- AIM. As it turned out, I decided to just call a friend and leave the house for the evening to keep from being tempted. After a few drinks, later in the evening upon my return home, I actually went to log on to Facebook as a matter of habit, and had to close out of it immediately before going to sleep. It was harder than I thought.

The next morning, I worked a three-hour shift at the front desk of a dorm, and again, I fought boredom and temptation to keep from turning 6 inches to the left and checking out the latest Facebook updates. I made it through, went out for lunch, and came home to discover that I had forgotten to call a friend about a meeting later that weekend. In my continued avoidance of AIM and Facebook, it took four phonecalls before I got a hold of someone who had the number I needed, when it probably would have been found instantly on Facebook.

Later in the day, I was scheduled to staff another shift at work -- from 7pm to 1am, a shift that I usually bring my laptop for, in order to serf on the UW Housing wireless to pass the time during dead periods... I caved around 7:30pm and logged onto AIM, going straight to Facebook afterward.

In the end, I lasted 30 hours, during which I felt a mixture of freedom and a bit of anxiety that I was missing out on something and somewhat disconnected with friends. Now living out of the dorms for the first time this semester, Facebook and AIM have been great utilities for remaining connected to friends that I formerly saw daily and now rarely see, and it felt a little bit lonely to be limited in my interactions.

Despite this, I did feel like I got more work done during the time away from AIM, in particular, and that I felt generally more calm. The time spent with friends seemed more relaxed and less interrupted, although I feel like I cheated a bit by still using my cell phone and e-mail throughout the time. I honestly am not sure how long I would have lasted had I not included these two additional tools.. but I'm guessing it would have been pretty ugly.

Conclusion: Dang, guess I'm pretty technologically dependent after all.