Going Off The Grid

The last few weeks have been more stressful than usual so I decided to do something very out of character for me. Go off the grid, unplug, attempt to live in a world for 48 hours without texting and emails and social media.

I know…crazy talk.

As soon as I found out I had the weekend free of kids and my fiancé I started planning how I was going to spend my alone time. As most moms know alone time is a rarity. In fact, it’s been about 18 months since I last had an entire day and night to myself.

I knew right away I wanted to actually take the time alone I had off. Being a blogger means I work almost every day in some capacity and am on social media constantly. Not to mention the tons of emails and texts I get every day.

I started thinking it might be nice to completely unplug and while the mere thought of it made me anxious I couldn’t help but get excited at the prospect. As I’m sure you can all relate, the constant barrage of incoming stuff makes you feel like you should always be doing something. It can get overwhelming at times.

As scary as it was I decided I needed to do it so I could recharge myself. From 5pm Friday to after breakfast Sunday (which ended up being 10am as I took advantage of no kids and slept in) I shut my phone off, turned the WiFi off on both my laptops, and went cold turkey.

Friday evening was the hardest. I kept finding myself wanting to check Facebook and see what everyone else was doing. Saturday morning was hard too because my normal routine is to check my email the minute I get up and then prioritize my day. Once I got passed that though, it wasn’t so bad. Quite the opposite, I found it freeing. I was able to get my hair done, do some shopping at a consignment shop, and go to the grocery store without constantly checking my phone. I then came home and listened to music while I cleaned the house and just hung out with myself.

I felt so much more relaxed because my phone wasn’t constantly buzzing. I didn’t realize how I must constantly be in a minor state of anxiety every time it goes off and I have to check it. There were a few moments when I got nervous that when I did turn it back on there would be something important I missed or I would have so many emails I would feel overwhelmed and regret it but that wasn’t at all the case. There were actually 2 emails that I’m glad I hadn’t seen when they came in as they would have caused some stress over work needing to be done. The work didn’t have to be done until today so it was one less day of worrying about it or just interrupting my weekend to do it so I wouldn’t worry about it.

All in all, I had a glorious weekend (though my diet did go out the window) and I can’t wait to do it again.

I suggest you try it.

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