Sleepers, awake

I disabled my Facebook last week. I feel much more alive, attempting to live my own life instead of always reading about other people. Honestly, leaving Facebook, which is a real addiction of mine, is like a breath of fresh air. It only took a few days to rid myself of the nagging need to always be checking my Facebook every 5 minutes. It was like going outside at noon after spending months hiding in a dark cave. Or an even better comparison would be to sobering up, letting the anesthetic wear off and shaking off continual numbness.

After my eyes adjusted, I realized that I've been asleep at the wheel, passively letting life happen to me; not putting serious thought into who I am, what I believe, and where I am going. I won't return to Facebook until I get my life in order and on the right track. It's a distraction and it took over my life. I think that happened because for all intents and purposes, I had no life. There was a gaping void that Facebook came along and filled. This isn't my first FB sabbatical and I have always worried that even though I might get away from one distraction, others will just take it's place and I will never be more productive. Television in particular is my primary concern when I leave FB.

So as I realized how much time I have when I'm not looking at FB all day, I began to read more. After seeing part of Prince Caspian on tv, I decided I would rather reread the book (the deviation from the plot is upsetting). I also reread The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. I was furious when I watched the movie version of Dawn Treader. They effectively destroyed the plot and lost the point of the book. I couldn't even finish the movie. Besides those two and LOTR which I finished a few weeks ago, I have also read Searching for God Knows What, by Donald Miller (author of Blue Like Jazz), and started The Courage to Create, by Rollo May, and Kierkegaard's The Sickness unto Death. I was inspired to write my first poem since I left Vienna, and grabbed the long poem Paterson, by William Carlos Williams. I am done with two of the five books. It is wonderful, though a chaotic mishmash of poetry mixed with letters and historical stories of the city of Paterson, NJ.

However, I can only read so much at a time. I am alarmed when I do not want to read at all. I think it requires too much mental effort and I tire easily. It's my opinion that just like my social skills, if I want to increase my capacity for mental labor, I have to exercise my mind (as well as my public speaking skills). *I am meaning to write a blog about this.*

I think that if I want to live a life without an obsession like Facebook or television ruining any chance of productivity, I have to replace it with something positive. I need to stop clutching FB like a security blanket and face life like a responsible man. The bottom line is, I obsessively FB because I want to be loved. It's a basic human desire, but it's silly to think that I'm making myself important to my friends by clicking a button that says 'like' or writing comments on their posts. Of course communication is vital to any relationship and to that end, FB is a wonderful tool. But it's no substitute for real life.

"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit." - Aristotle.

The more I am an FB, the more I am just another facebooker. We are more than our actions; our thoughts and beliefs also shape who we are. Feeling powerless to fill the void in my being and take control of my life by sheer will power, I turned back to God. In a loving relationship with the Creator, I feel validated as He guides me and shapes me to become the person He created me to be, provided I listen to Him. FB isn't an arena where I try to attract people's attention so that I feel important. It's just a useful tool for keeping in touch with the friends who already care about me enough to miss me.