Without Digital Media Project

I have to say it was pretty difficult to give up all social media and the use of my phone for almost 12 hours. Before this experiment I would have told you that social media doesn't have much control over my life. However, I can now say that my phone is a way bigger part of my life than I would've ever thought. I started off fairly well, I was hanging out with friends and we were watching some college basketball on the TV. I got almost 45 minutes in and I was really wanting to get on my phone and scroll through social media. I almost felt like I didn't know what was going on in the world and felt like I was missing out on something that was going on. What made this experiment a little bit easier was the fact that we could use traditional media still like TV. If I wasn’t able to watch TV I think there would have been absolutely no way that I would’ve been able to complete the 12-hour social media detox. Another thing I noticed about myself is that after a couple of hours, you start to get really creative on what you try to do. Instead of just grabbing my phone and scrolling on Instagram for like 20 minutes, I was like let's go outside instead and just do something. It’s amazing how instinctual grabbing your phone and using it has become in our lives. You really don’t even realize you’re doing it. It feels like it is just an extension of your body at this point. I actually had my friend look up things to do if you can’t be on your phone too and he showed me a pretty good article by the Huffington Post that had some good activities to do instead. I did end up making it all the way through. I can’t say that I had a good time doing it. My phone is a way bigger part of my life than I ever thought and I will hopefully never have to do an experiment like this again.

**Cover image courtesy of Business 2 Community**