You Have to Choose

I agree with you Joe. I too have an addic­tive nature and have spent so much time on the com­puter and social net­work­ing stuff that I got sick — lit­er­ally, phys­i­cally ill. My wife says I kiss my com­puter more than her…

So, I made a choice almost two years ago to quit Facebook and to stay off the com­puter and eschew all things elec­tronic for an entire day. Sometimes I stretch it to sev­eral days when I need to get domes­tic projects done.

Life is more than tap­ping keys mes­mer­ized by the dig­i­tal magic on a com­puter monitor.

Great arti­cle, thanks.

Hi Joe,

I com­pletely agree with you here. Everyone, no mat­ter what job they have, needs at least one day off to have a chance to catch up with other peo­ple and things. My day off is Saturday and occa­sion­ally Sunday.

We also need time off for reflec­tion and to fill up our cre­ative well, so to speak. Time off pre­vents burn out and exhaus­tion. No won­der peo­ple feel like giv­ing up on projects if they never allow them­selves a break.

Good on you Joe!
You're doing good work and you have a good heart. Take care of your self, then take care of what you care about.
Read a good post today on the per­spec­tive of qual­ity vs quan­tity, slow blog­ging
http://www.problogger.net/archives/2012/01/08/mastering-the-art-of-slow-blogging/
Love ya man!

One day a week off — I don't think I can do that. I have babies. And unless they want to get much of their eat­ing and atten­tion crammed into my free day, then I have to space it out. Seven is too few days in a week as it is.

William Doonan
http://www.themummiesofblogspace9.com

I dis­agree some­what with choos­ing a day. I worked the nine-to-five for 25 years and left to write full-time, with one of my goals being that I worked at my leisure, although full-time. If at home, I'll touch the com­puter each and every day, for no other rea­son than to remain in touch with edi­tors and read­ers. It might be for thirty min­utes if the day is filled with fam­ily or friends, but it's a cer­tain peace of mind to have met the needs of my cus­tomers. Then there are days I'll work 10–12 hours in order to buy time off for a trip, or a day out, or shop­ping and the movies. Sure, I have respon­si­bil­i­ties on cer­tain days, like Mondays and Fridays espe­cially with my busi­ness FundsforWriters.com , but for the most part, I like to keep things flex­i­ble so I can drop things for a lunch out with the neigh­bor or din­ner with a friend or a one-day drive to visit chil­dren. Love, love, love my flex­i­bil­ity — maybe it's because I didn't have it for so long. To each his own, but I fully under­stand your point. We have to have "away" time from the com­puter. I do … I just plan it, and it's not nec­es­sar­ily the same day or time each week.

Hope Clark
http://www.fundsforwriters.com

At the begin­ning of 2011, I too set a goal to stay off the com­puter one day a week. I didn't always suc­ceed, but I suc­ceeded more than if I hadn't set the goal. It really was refresh­ing to break myself of the habit of going right to the com­puter first thing in the morn­ing. Instead, I spent that day read­ing books, watch­ing TV, play­ing with the dogs, nap­ping, and gen­er­ally clear­ing my mind. The expe­ri­ence opened my eyes to how tied to my work I am! I felt like it helped restore some bal­ance. Thanks for this reminder, Joe.

Hear, Hear!

Wow. This ALMOST made me turn off my com­puter — but I CHOSE not to today, hav­ing made com­mitt­ments to others.

Now I am think­ing about which day will be my com­puter fast. I think I was already com­ing around to this. Thanks for the trigger.

L