What I Learned While not on Facebook

I decided to take a break and not look at Facebook everyday. I was getting a little razzed at home about it; my husband thinks it's ridiculous and serves no purpose. I had been running through it, checking up on people and overall "staying in touch" with what the rest of the world seemed to be doing.

Until I figured out how much time I was spending on it.
Depending upon my mood, I'd click on a friend's profile to see what they were up to. I started doing this at work, too. 15 minutes then goes by, and everything that I'm responsible for has been ignored, neglected, dusty.

At the water cooler, the topic of "what to give up for Lent" came up, and a colleague asked me if I was giving anything up. I blurted out, "facebook!" without understanding the strong will it would take to succeed. But it was due. I had just been harassed by a "friend" over Facebook email about a comment I put on her neighbor's photos -- this harasser had a terrible incident with him (who happened to be one of my husband's best friends) and she was horrified that I was still speaking to him.

It was degrading and humiliating -- my anger was hard to control. She actually had the nerve to tell me how I should live my life - and who I should or should not be friends with. I could have reacted in a different way which I won't go into here; instead I backed off and reported her. Then I shut 'er down.

In the field of marketing and public relations, us nutballs tend to put everything in phrases or name everything, so I designed this as my FacebreakTM. I thought it would be cute and funny to trademark my vacation from the social networking site, as I was totally Facebaked. (TM)

What I learned on my break from the site:

• How to train, and prepare, for a half marathon
• That the commute to work and home gives me a solid 15 minutes to call a friend or family member - connecting the real way
• You can teach young children to play Uno
• With Keith Richards on my lap every night, I listen to Rolling Stones CDs with a totally different perspective now
• Learned Maggie May on the acoustic

Once my 40 days were over, I decided to click back over and take a look around. And guess what? Nothing changed. It's a shrine for yourself; complete with photos and places you've been, events you attend, status updates, and seeing if people "like" you. Honestly, it's totally selfish.

Depending upon your insecurity levels, you could either care or not.

As for me, I believe a permanent Facebreak is in order.