The Great Break Up

     Everybody has been a part of a social network at some point.  Whether is was Myspace, Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook.  The facebook that has become so popular that they make halloween costumes out of it now.  Well I have joined several of those sites but never became attached as much as I had with facebook.  It started off with some photos, couple status updates every so often and that was that.
     Then my junior and senior years rolled around and I had become a part of multiple clubs and other activities and I was constantly on facebook.  I had good reason.  So I thought.  I needed to update others and gather information and create events so my friends knew what was up next weekend.  It started to become my excuse. "I need facebook to keep in touch with people".  With this excuse I was always on facebook... every night.  If I was doing my homework I would leave it up so I could let people know I was online and looking for a conversation.  I became a little obssesed with the social network, but it didn't pull me away from my education too much.  I still graduated, earned an honors cord and received a fairly nice scholarship from my 80 hours of community service that year.  I was proud of myself. 
     Now I'm a quarter of the way through my freshman year in college and the relationship I had with facebook became even worse.  I had no more reasons to be on facebook everyday.  I was no longer a part of clubs and groups.  I did however end up deleting about 200 people who were my "friends" when in reality I've never spoken a word to them.  Yet, I always was worried about my profile picture and my cover photo had to match.  I needed to find something everyday to update my status.  I still left the page open while I did homework in hopes that someone would start chatting with me.  When I did my homework, which was always online, I would frequently get stuck and imediately I would switch to my facebook tab to "give myself a break".  I thought I would "clear my mind" by reading some statuses and chatting with a friend.  I found out the hard way that none of that helped me what so ever. 
     Last night I got home from an evening of hanging out with my best friend.  We decided to wait on our homework which is usually due at midnight.  So we got on skype afterwards and started working on the assignments when I realized the one and only assignment for the semester was due two hours ago... I was late and could no longer turn it in for credit.  I felt like I screwed everything up.  I mean, I'm still easily going to pass my classes this semester but I needed something even higher to hold onto my grant money this year.  It hit me then that I spend to much with my social life and worrying about what's up with everyone else that I haven't been focusing on myself.  I worked on some other homework and couldn't get the thought that I screwed up by making a very silly mistake.  I know I'm smart.  It's somewhere in there.  I used to be a straight A student and now I average between C's and B's.  I felt so much stress collect on me in those several hours that it drove me to change.  So I took my first step last night.... I ended my relationship with Facebook.  I went through my settings, found the deactivate button and ended it.  Now I may have put that I will be back so at any point I can set it back up and get all my pictures and what not back, but I knowing that it's a whole process to get it back up I just don't even want to bother with it.  Plus I feel so free to do what I want now.  I feel like I have all this time in my day just sitting here.  It's what I've always wanted!  Time!  I sat in my bed last night really thinking and I thought I can finally start reading books again, and blogging, and making youtube videos and finish writing my story!  I was so estatic that this morning I finished some more homework and immediately started some outdoor chores without hesitation and now I still have all this time so it feels.  It honestly feels like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders.  I now just have my phone, skype and letters in the mail box to stay in touch with friends.  Which I am honestly fine with.  Everybody who was truly that important to me are already added on my skype and most of them are away at college right now so I get letters from them in the mail. 

      Take my story and think about how you're life has been.  Do you wish you had more time for other things in life?  Try avoiding social networking sites for a day or two and you will begin to realize how much of your life has involved these things.  You will feel like you have accomplished so much more in that one day than you have done so in a week.  Comment below with your thoughts and let me know if you have tried this and if it worked for you.