threads

I wouldn’t say that I’m addicted to the internet, necessarily. But I might say that I am addicted to social media. And by addicted, I mean that I’m fairly certain I kill about 4 hours a day (interspersed with meaningful information accumulation that does not involve YouTube videos of kitties sneezing or making sure the masses are sated by constantly uploading pictures of my child). And that’s probably being generous.

Isn’t that crazy? Think about that. I waste nearly 17% of the day. Factor in 8 hours of sleep (leaving 16 waking hours), and I waste 25% of my day.

Things I started to notice and wonder if they were related to social media feeds:

Anxiety. I have suffered from anxiety since I can remember. I think I got a fairly ok handle on it about 10 years ago after therapy, breathing exercises and a lot of work on myself (and actually understanding that I was experiencing anxiety and wasn’t just “weird” or “sensitive”). Over the past few years, as more and more social media sites gained prominence, I felt compelled to join in because I love to waste time and check up on people who used to be in my life I have a music career. I began to notice an increase in my anxiety levels that seemed directly related to the amount of information coming at me, especially bad news, ie the news.  We tend to follow sites that we are interested in, right? So I follow a lot of Twitter accounts that deal with children and women’s issues, especially human rights violations. I also follow a lot of local accounts, music accounts, music business accounts, kid stuff accounts, general news accounts, and funny accounts. And Steve Martin, who is all of those things. I end up following (I think – I’m not allowed to check right now) about 1,300-1,400 accounts on Twitter. And the accounts that are the most prolific tend to veer towards local news or women’s rights/children’s rights issues. And that is coming at me non-stop. It’s a constant adrenaline spike which, over the course of the day, creates anxiety. So somewhere around 2:30pm every day, I realize I’m not breathing. And I actually have to work very hard to get my breathing back to an acceptable pace with the type of depth that doesn’t encourage adrenalin and anxiety. Is this social media’s fault? I don’t know, but I’m trying to find out.

Anger. The news makes me crazy. Crazy angry. In the olden days of 2002, you would get your newspaper in the morning, and you might watch the news at 6 or 11 on tv or maybe listen to the radio a little bit, especially if a Major World Event (like the Toronto Zoo Pandas, for example) was happening. When I tell the older generation (and let’s face it, a lot of younger-than-me people think I’m included in that generation, but they’re wrong because I’m just as up with the Miley/Sinead/Sufjan debate as they are, and yes I'm hip enough to know that the debate is over and everybody is now all Team Miley) that I get all of my news from Twitter, they don’t believe me. Like, they literally refuse to believe that the only way I learn about world events is through Twitter. And they’re right, because I also learn about these events from Facebook, or every once in a while a parent will email me a compilation of Maxine cartoons or a meme that was popular in 2007. But a constant barrage, and 47 takes on the same theme (ie pictures of children being gassed in Syria, or how many times we mention that A LOT of native women are MISSING and nobody is doing anything about it, or how many girls are raped and alcohol/clothing/suggestive behavior/anything-but-the-rapist is blamed for the rape…) OK I have to stop. Because I’m getting angry, which you can probably tell from my use of ALL CAPS (which, for the record, is also a hip way of being ironic sometimes, so it gets confusing). However, this might be the first time I’ve been angry today, and it’s 2:49pm on the first day of my break. So there’s that…

Focus. I typically have 5 tabs open. One or two that relate to my office job, and then Gmail, Facebook, Twitter, Tiny Buddha (I made it my home page to remind me to chill out) and sometimes Instagram, though I usually check that on my phone. (I’m off Instagram this week, too. Sorry, guys. You can come over to my house if you want to see my child watching Dora, or taking a hilarious selfie, or eating cereal, or singing “AI BEE SHEE DEE” while strumming her ukulele.) Don’t get me wrong. I get all of my work done for the job that pays me (not that bastard boss Music who still owes me $79,407 in unpaid labour). But I also tend to flit constantly between these tabs. I find it hard to concentrate on anything for longer than 10 minutes. This has infected my songwriting, too. Because now I sit on the bed to work, and of course my iPhone is there constantly lighting up with new messages to check. And the message could be ANYTHING! Maybe a licensing company wants to use my song for a film or a commercial! Maybe somebody is writing to invite me to open a Canadian/US tour with Chad VanGaalen! Maybe somebody called “A&R” is writing me to let me know they heard my song “Harria” on ReverbNation and they are really interested in my music, please call them for more information. Maybe Groupon has a great deal! Even today, I’ve found myself flitting, only to be disappointed because I don’t have any tabs open (aside from Gmail, but I don’t think I’ve received one meaningful item all day. Oh wait, yes, a CBC producer emailed me back to say he would listen to the song of mine I asked him to listen to. So that’s nice.)

Time. I need more time to do things. Like make sure I stretch my limbs every day, so I feel good. Make sure I can focus on my child and the other love of my life. The bearded one. Maybe that’s what I’ll refer to him as in this thing: “The bearded one”. I’m pretty good at getting stuff done that needs to be done, but I can also lose time once my daughter is in bed and drift into a lazy, sleepy state of click click click and as I’m going to bed I’ll remember “Oh... I wanted to work on that song...” It does, in that regard, feel like a drug.

So that’s where I’m at. So far today, I’ve succeeded in taking a walk on my break, touching base with some people about music-related work, and a host of other productive things (along with the work I do at my job). And it’s 3:06.