Uluru-Kata Tjuta National park
Posted on by Debbie

What did I learn from my self-imposed social media ban?

I have just returned from a week long self-imposed social media ban.  We have been off on a little adventure and before I left I decided that I would use the time away as a break from everything. I warned my family  that I would be offline and that I wouldn’t blog, I wouldn’t engage in my usual social media forums such as Facebook or Twitter and I wouldn’t Instagram any of my photos.

My daughters had their doubts that I would last the distance, not that I’m a big user of these things but I do like to stay in touch. I had the mistaken idea that by going to the Australian outback I wouldn’t get any reception and so it would be easy! Big mistake!!

Sails in the Desert resort had free wifi in the rooms and in fact most of the resort area had wifi access. Very generous of them! I was getting notifications pinging in all the time, as I had scheduled my posts in the days before our trip. In the end I had to turn to airplane mode to stop all the distracting pings of emails, blog comments and tweets.

I managed to reconcile myself with not telling everyone how much fun I was having in the red centre of Australia but I must admit that I had to send my daughters, my sister and our parents some private messages throughout our time away just to tell them how we were and to share some of the amazing photos I was taking.  We live in a beautiful country!! It didn’t help that I only use my phone as my camera so it was always in my hand ( there’s a lot to photograph out there believe me!)

So what did I learn?

1. It helps to be prepared especially when the unexpected happens and you have unlimited reception.

2. Turn off from things in any way possible.

3. Warn people in advance that you will be out of contact as they might worry when you aren’t responding in the normal timeframes they expect from you.

4. Other people use their phones a lot! When you aren’t the one looking at your screen all the time you see just how many people are. I felt quite smug!

5. I love being in touch with people and sharing things. I really missed that side of things and yes I know that probably makes me sound a bit sad, but I like to think of it as being generous – sharing and caring…..

6. I missed the constant contact with family, my friends, my blogging friends and random unknowns who somehow stumble upon my blogs/tweets/instagrams and like or leave me comments.

7. Now that I’m back online there’s a lot to catch up on – blogs to read, comments to respond to, posts to write….!

8. Facebook was the least of my worries and I really didn’t miss it much at all and I don’t think I was missed much either.

9. Don’t take a book all about blogging to read on the plane – it gave me lots of ideas that just had to wait until the self-imposed ban was over.

10.  Yes – I’d definitely do it all again!

So that’s my take on switching off.  I probably wasn’t all that successful at it, but I showed myself (and my husband) that I can turn off when I put my mind to it.  I loved our time away and the scenery was breathtaking so it wasn’t an effort to look up rather than down at a screen.

Have you ever tried something similar? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

I’ll leave you with a gorgeous pic from the Red Centre. I’ll be featuring some more of my photos in coming posts as part of my ‘Every day is an adventure’ project so stay tuned!

One of the many beautiful sunrises over Uluru
One of the many beautiful sunrises over Uluru

Deb 🙂

19 Replies to “What did I learn from my self-imposed social media ban?”

  1. Pingback: Half heaven, half earth | Deb's world

  2. Hi Deb, isn’t Uluru unreal? It’s a hard call to make when you travel – to stay in touch or not? My blog is the only social media I subscribe to and then, I only do two posts a week, so I guess I’m pretty tame with it 🙂 I do like to keep in touch by phone with family and friends when reception permits. I guess I sit in the middle of the road 🙂 Welcome back though – I look forward to seeing more phone photos!

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    1. Hi! It certainly is unreal, so glad we finally got out there as it’s quite embarrassing when we travel overseas and tell people we haven’t been there!! I think it’s good to stay connected in at least one way. I’m happy with using my blog to do that if I can keep up with it from now on. Lovely to hear from you 😊

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  3. Good on your Debbie, sounds like you had a wonderful time. I’ve done it for 10 days a few years ago – didn’t interact with anyone via my mobile phone at all. I gave those nearest and dearest the resort’s contact number and that was it. Phone stayed off (except for one day when I was sipping a cocktail at a beach bar and couldn’t resist posting one photo!).

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    1. That sounds great, well done for lasting for so long! We are all so connected these days it can be a case of missing out on something important! I was actually glad to be missing out on updates as I was having such a good time. 🙂

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    1. Hi Dawn, thanks for the welcome back! I found this great little book the day before our trip and bought it as reading matter on the plane. I devoured it within a few hours, it was such an easy read. It’s called The Golden Rules of Blogging (& when to break them) by Robin Houghton. It was a good mix of 28 rules and when to break them, with real life blogger stories and expert comments after each rule. It’s probably aimed at new(er) bloggers and covers lots of things I new but gave me some good ideas too with realistic examples. Hope that helps! Have a nice day 🙂

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  6. Welcome back, Deb! So glad that you were able to switch off for some time to enjoy the company and surroundings. Whenever we go up to the lake in Wisconsin we have no internet and I don’t have a smart phone (just a dumb one, haha) so can’t check anything online. It is great to just unplug and take in the scene and enjoying the moment. Looking forward to more stunning photos 🙂

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    1. Thanks Barbara, nice to hear that you also manage to switch off at times too. I enjoyed the scenery and openness out there so much – but I’ afraid many of my photos just don’t do it justice. It’s freezing cold here today with snow forecast so we are missing the delightful temperatures as well as the views.

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  7. Go you, Debbie. I missed it terribly during our recent road trip. When we got back to the land of reception my husband and I spent more than an hour in a cafe, saying nothing, staring at our screens. I’m sure some would say that was terrible but, for myself, I don’t see that it’s any different from reading a book. Love the photo and looking forward to more.

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    1. I’m glad you understand what I mean Jill. It was a good exercise to do and I’m glad I know I can switch off, but I do enjoy being connected too. It’s a bit hard to get it it right sometimes isn’t it? I do happen to have a few more photos by the way!!

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  8. Stunning photo! I’m sure that you have many more beautiful shots of your trip to share (if you do), but I must agree, that enjoying the moment, and being in the moment, without having to blog about it, or share it with the world on social media constantly, is what makes a trip more relaxing, and enjoyable. I’m sure that others feel differently about this, but I don’t feel a need to constantly share every detail of my life online, or be online 24/7. Don’t get me wrong, I do love modern technology, but I can live without it for a while too…. but probably not for too long! haha!
    Welcome back – good that you had a break 🙂

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  9. Welcome back Deb! We missed you!
    Point 4 is an interesting one. I don’t like to check my phone when I’m having a meal with someone but not everyone feels the same way. I find it pretty irritating to sit across from someone who spends half their time on the phone! But maybe I do feel a little smug too ☺️

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