Day 18: tired, but happy

Day 18 - 4 hours of usage. What did I do? I tinkered with pictures, sent more emails to people, made research for someone else and listened to a one of my archived materials. (Quite interesting info about the intellect!) The urge to use the iPad is stronger in the evening when I'm tired and I want a distraction for my mind. I'm so tired right now, that I' barely keeping my eyes open.

Day 17: my best self

Day 17 - I was full of lovely, positive energy. I don't know if the lengthy walk did it or simply me being in a good, thankful, playful mood. Or possibly being in an accepting mode. Or not being on the net so much and being focused only on current tasks. I connected with a lot of people in a very short time and was radiating. Some interesting ideas where coming to me. I loved myself today so, so, so much and if I knew how to access this energy at all times, I would simply be in a good mood all the time. I felt fine all the way up to the point when I was cooking and cleaning and playing with my child, but my brain was craving for some info! I so badly wanted to sit down and get lost in some interesting article! I felt that urge and had to do it, even if for 10 min.

Day 16: there's life outside the IPad

On Day 16, I tried to keep my IPad interaction to a minimum. With the exception of a few emails, reaching out to people ( which is the best way to use the internet) and looking up a few recipes, I was pretty good. The jigsaw puzzle game was successfully deleted. I wrote a bit in my journal and simply enjoyed my Sunday. Total usage was for 2 hours. Still pretty crazy. The blog is not functioning properly and now my words are getting all jumbled together. Looks pretty bad, but I don't want to spend time yet figuring out what's wrong. I'll need to do it soon though if I want a pretty looking post. Not that my posts are something out of ordinary, but at least the content is readable. But now, that's not the case. Oh, well. I'll deal with it soon enough.

Day 15: a step, maybe two back

Day 15 - I'm ashamed to admit that I spent 9 hours on my iPad playing the jigsaw puzzle. Yes, I wasn't mindlessly perusing the net, but I put a great deal of strain on my eyes. This I'll be very short in my post today, to give myself a break from the device. I could give myself all sorts of excuses for today: too cold to go outside, family visiting, a simple lazy day with nothing much to do...still, how ridiculous of me. Tomorrow is a new day and I hope I'll be able to get back on track.

Day 14: I had a scare!

Day 14 - boy, did I have a scare today! My screen went blank for a couple of minutes and I completely and quietly freaked out. As I was watching the screen, black and unresponsive, I thought to myself, hey, you were the one complaining about too much screen time and the technology heard you. Now there's going to be no screen time. What was I going to miss the most? All my writing notes and the puzzle I started and didn't finish. Yes, I'm still playing the game. You know how it is, the brain wants to finish what it already started, especially if it's something of interest. I couldn't peel myself off the game and when I finally did, I could feel my muscles in a very unpleasant way. They were stiff from being in the same position for a prolonged time. That was scary to me too, because staying in the same position for hours is not natural to the body. That's why I want more movement throughout the day. One thing is interesting to me: when playing the game, it became the most important thing for me and all other activities faded in the background. I had chores to do too, especially because I was pressed by time, but I kept delaying my chores for another couple of minutes of game playing. Didn't like that part, of course. In the end, I did my chores and everything else on time, minus a walk in the park, because I decided I was too cold. No dancing or exercising either. It's crazy that after a couple of days of good, fun movement, I tend to roll back to being sedentary. Gotta watch for that. Also, I want to bring real stats about my current total hours of usage of the screen. I'll try to remember to get my app working on that and include the info in the blog entries. For fun, or for scares. When I was able to restart my device, I was very happy and grateful for having technology. Yes, I need to monitor my usage, yes, I need to curate the content, be more specific about the result I'm seeking, but in the end, I'm glad to live with technology. I'm still glad to do my experiment because it only shows how badly I need it.

Day 13: detour

I continue my experiment of no mindless net surfing and this is day 13. I listened to my favorite radio show and played the jigsaw puzzle game. One step back for me. But my brain is happy. I can live with one day of my experiment playing the game, even though it's not what I put my mind to do. This experiment is not about following rigid rules, but more about learning smth about myself. I know if I constantly bend my rules like that, I can just end this experiment right now. But even from bending rules, there's discoveries to be made. For example, what triggered it? Why? Can it be avoided? What can be done to get back on track? In real life, we need to be flexible once in a while. I've been in situations where I had to learn to be more flexible. Learning how to be flexible and not loose sight of what you're after, constantly tweaking and correcting the course, that's the skill I'm after.

Day 12: signs

I was busy today and only had time to post my blog entry, check emails and read a few pages of my book. My child wanted to play a game and I downloaded for her an app with jigsaw puzzles. Of course, I got sucked into it too. Before I knew it, one hour went by. I like playing all sorts of games and if it would be a physical puzzle, I'd say good for me, but this one only added to my screen time, which I'm trying to limit. Plus, it makes me attached to the IPad. Later on, an article came through email about how too much information without any specific goal in mind makes us less smart. The analogy was, wait for it...that our brain is trying to make sense out of all the info we get during the day like a jigsaw puzzle. If it's too much, during sleep all of it is getting dumped away. By morning time, it's all forgotten. Is it interesting that somehow I was getting a very important message and I got a clue ahead of time? I find it fascinating. It's not the first time I get things like that, but I used to brush these coincidences off. Now, I'm trying to pay attention. This article is a good motivation to keep doing my experiment and be even more stingy with the info I pick to read. I sure could skip opening certain emails that I know are not of any importance at the moment. But I like to read them because that's my way of staying connected to what I feel is of interest to me. But is it really important or am I looking for distraction? P.S. The browser, before me even looking up anything, showed a whole list of news and a lot of interesting links to things that I like. I never saw this before. If I was thinking that it's hard to avoid going on certain websites before, how am I supposed to do it now, when it's handpicked and put right in front of me without even requesting it?