{"id":7949,"date":"2020-09-30T08:21:56","date_gmt":"2020-09-30T13:21:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/?p=7949"},"modified":"2020-09-30T08:21:58","modified_gmt":"2020-09-30T13:21:58","slug":"the-return-to-social-media","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/2020\/09\/30\/the-return-to-social-media\/","title":{"rendered":"The Return (To Social Media)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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The annual social media break is almost done — tomorrow I return to it all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It started years ago when I mentioned I was considering stepping away a bit, which quickly escalated to dares from friends committing me to 101 days off of all social sites<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The September tradition continues each year for me, with a good friend dubbing my annual break The September Silence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Good and Bad<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Some years, the breaks are wonderful. Other years they are harder. A couple times over the years, I have even broken the silence to help promote things friends were up to during the month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s easy to say social media is inherently terrible, but I don\u2019t believe that. It\u2019s allowed many people a voice where they would otherwise be silent. It keeps people connected, which is what I miss most each September.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But some years\u2014like this one\u2014the break is great.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Good September<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

While it\u2019s been a very busy month at my day job, I finished several short stories. Not only is the next episode of my fiction podcast, Not About Lumberjacks<\/a>, roughed out, but the November story is completely done\u2026and several of the shorter stories I do in December are written.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In fact, the November story started as one of the micro stories for the December episode. Why does that matter?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This September, when I felt the urges that trigger me checking social media (mostly breaks during the day and during commercials while watching TV), I started writing stories on my phone, instead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While I write most days regardless of how busy life gets, I can directly attribute November\u2019s and December\u2019s stories to this year\u2019s social media break.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Good Side (of Social Media)<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I don\u2019t hate social media as a concept. It allows me to share what I\u2019m up to and things I find interesting. I\u2019m able to easily stay in touch with friends in other states and countries who aren\u2019t fans of email or letters. But that\u2019s not to say social media never affects my mood or attention span. (Especially in an election year.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The break is always nice, and this year\u2019s has been nicer than usual. Still\u2026it\u2019s great going back and seeing what friends are up to\u2026especially this year, when I\u2019m not able to visit with people I normally see because of the pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Return<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m fortunate that I can shape my social feeds to nurture my interests. I know I\u2019m lucky that I can step away and not have it affect my everyday life (too much).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s easy to say we should all quit social networks, but it\u2019s where some people make a living; it\u2019s where some people who can\u2019t get out have their only contact; it\u2019s where the voiceless can find a voice and where new ideas can be shared.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Each September, I\u2019m reminded of the role social media plays in our lives. There are many reasons to vilify Facebook, Twitter, and other sites, but there are also many reasons to embrace them and change how they\u2019re used.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, until next September, I\u2019ll see you online\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

* * *<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Image: Michel Stockman<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Also, full disclosure: I did stay on Instagram<\/a> this year because it doesn’t have the same effect as other social sites with me.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The annual social media break is almost done — tomorrow I return to it all. It started years ago when I mentioned I was considering stepping away a bit, which quickly escalated to dares from friends committing me to 101 days off of all social sites. The September tradition continues each year for me, with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7949"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7949"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7949\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7953,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7949\/revisions\/7953"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7949"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7949"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7949"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}