I do it.
You do it.
We all do it.
I'm talking about looking at social media first thing in the morning. It's nasty habit that we should stop and remove all together.
This isn't another guilt-trip article to make your feel bad. Instead, I'd like to share a journey that I started a few days ago.
My question was simple:
What would your life be without social media in the morning?
A quick road map of this article:
- Inspiration
- Know your enemy
- Action
- The journey so far...
- What's next?
Inspiration
My buddy Pavneet from Coding with Empathy twitted the following:
Pavneet Singh Saund🚀@pavsaund
I’ve noticed I have a greater sense of presence and calm when I avoid social media and email in the mornings.04:37 AM - 10 Apr 2018
1
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I gave it a try next day and got almost immediate results:
Jose Gonzalez@josegonz321@pavsaund Aye. Avoided it this morning because I was late for my run. I do feel more present and peaceful 🙂
(I also mediated for over 30 minutes last night, so that may have helped as well)13:23 PM - 10 Apr 2018
And continued with the next day
Jose Gonzalez@josegonz321hey @pavsaund, today I continued the practice not looking at email or social media first thing in the morning. It works wonders 😄14:49 PM - 11 Apr 2018
Know your enemy
The obvious answer is: That person in the mirror.
My daily morning poisons (AKA my social media checks) are:
- News Feed (default in iPhone)
- Personal email
Ah, I bet you weren't expecting that last one. I included it because I noticed a big chunk of my morning time going to check emails that weren't urgent.
Note: I never check work email unless I'm in the office. I'm not that important.
Good habits on my side already
- I don't have Twitter or Reddit app installed in my phone. No, alert app distractions and/or temptations.
- iPhone news feed is easily ignored.
Action
My morning routine goes something like this.
Turn off alarm. Only time I touch my phone.
-
I continue with my usual morning routine without my phone.
Shower, dress up, eat breakfast, drink tea, say goodbye to my boys, talk to my wife and head to work.The mornings when I run, I use my phone for Runkeeper and the iPhone music app. Nothing else. This one really tests your will :)
You'll be surprised how much time and focus your phone sucks away from you.
As I'm ready to leave my house, I grab my phone. Sometimes I put it on my backpack (less temptation), but mostly I keep it out only to listen to my audio book.
No social media checking until 10am. But I decided it was too easy, and pushed it to 11am.
Continue on the weekends. (OK, I start checking at 10am)
The journey so far...
Here are some of the great benefits I have noticed so far.
More...
- present
- aware
- ready to start my day
- positive
Less...
- stressed
- worried/anxious
- rushed
- distracted
Jose Gonzalez@josegonz321@pavsaund I've done this for 10 days now. Feeling less anxious and stressed out in my mornings allows me to be more present.
Simple change with big rewards 🙂
#FridayFeeIing twitter.com/JoseGonz321/st…15:08 PM - 20 Apr 2018Jose Gonzalez @JoseGonz321Don't look at your email or social media first thing in the morning. Thanks @pavsaund #WednesdayWisdom
It's been a great journey with unexpected and great immediate results.
It started with a simple tweet, decision, plan and action. It wasn't easy and every day is a struggle as muscle memory is still pretty strong.
The good news is that I started to see improvements on my behavior. Today, it's much easier than on my first day.
What's next?
If you made it this far, let me tell you this isn't about me or my journey.
The reason why I'm writing this is to help you!
How? By helping you cut down on your social media consumption first thing in the morning.
For the next 7-days, I'll make a short journey-like articles to chronicle my daily journey.
Join me and rejoice on the great benefits on no social media on your morning routines!
Stay tuned.
Update:
Top comments (4)
Couldn't agree more with all of this. I try to set a time in the evening where I log off but I could definite benefit from this in the morning. Something else I do that helps is disabling all email notifications.
Thanks for reading, Jess!
Personally, I struggle with both mornings and afternoons. I've decided to start this "challenge" because my bud Pavneet tweeted about (as said in article). But my plans is to expand it to evenings.
Great tip on the email notifications. I never had email notifications on. I use a browser in my phone to check email. Never installed the Gmail :)
I don't think we all do it :)
Good, those who don't do it, they won't need to struggle like the rest of us :)