Hello Earthlings,
For the next couple of weeks I have decided to focus a bit on optimising productivity, this ties in a bit with my post last week about not really getting anywhere, you can catch up here. I like to view this as kind of taking last week's post and turning it into something positive. This post is a bit late, yet we could also look at it as being early for this week, being optimistic and all that(!) but the truth is, is I've had this typed up for a couple of weeks and I keep trying to tweak it so it reads nicely and whatnot but it doesn't go that well. So, here is a topsy-turvy post about procrastination and social media.
Whilst talking to my Mum a couple of weeks ago, the conversation drifted onto the topic of procrastination and social media and it inspired me to write this. As I procrastinate quite a lot, I don't mean to do it and I get very deflated when I have spent "all day" working on something but still haven't finished it. When in reality, I've had quite a few breaks doing nothing productive and simply engaging in the activity of having "a quick scroll". Indeed, I'm my own worst enemy as I know that if I really set my mind to something then I can do it. This may be a good point in the year to write about this as people are starting to get to the point in school where they actually do work, and people are doing uni assignments and people working need the extra little push before Christmas (terribly sorry for mentioning "that" work but I'm ever so excited), people's moods are going South as the clocks have gone back and motivation has well and truly left the building.
I don't really understand why whenever we are trying to distract ourselves from the task set we automatically default to picking up a tool in which we can access social media. And we scroll, and we scroll, and then we scroll through the posts that we have already once scrolled through. For this reason, social media annoys me. Ironically, I saw a tweet earlier from Jean Twenge, you can view her account here, which reads "Just as with most things (TV, alcohol, candy etc.) the key is small to moderate use. Use phones as a tool, but don't let them use you." It was the last sentence that really spoke to me, really social media does use us. We let all the social media accounts take over our life and as many people use as a reference, you can't even go for a pee without posting it somewhere. I don't have a solution to this for everyone, but I am consciously going to try and minimise my social media use and general phone usage, and in doing this I somewhat hope it is going to optimise productivity. If we want to, we can really use social media to our advantage and as Jean said, as a tool for us and not let them take over out lives.
There isn't just the negative effects of social media, a reason I use Facebook is so I can keep in touch with family members who I don't get to see often. I also have a blog, so I'm not hating the internet, I truly think we can use it for good. Using the example of a blog or a small business then social media can be a great way to promote your little internet space. You can be creative and make it look however you want it to look. You can gain motivation and inspiration for projects. You can learn so much and really make it worthwhile. Yet, we often just get distracted with the scrolling through Instagram and looking at the pictures that we have already seen. So, let's continue updating our social media sites with what we want but let's not get so caught up in spending hours looking at pointless stuff. A way I have attempted to combat the scrolling effect is by turning off all notifications on my phone, that way I don't get the notification telling me it is someone's birthday leading to me opening the app and wasting time. I find that this has actually helped me quite a lot.
Needless to say whilst on the subject of procrastination, if you have spent all morning being distracted then don't just write off the entire day. The morning, afternoon or evening can all be productive, just because one went wrong it doesn't mean the day is done! You have to forgive yourself in order to allow yourself to grow and develop, this also applies to many aspects of life and not just procrastination.
Until next time,
Lia x
P.S. The photograph I'm going to attach today is a post that I saw on poets Instagram.
For the next couple of weeks I have decided to focus a bit on optimising productivity, this ties in a bit with my post last week about not really getting anywhere, you can catch up here. I like to view this as kind of taking last week's post and turning it into something positive. This post is a bit late, yet we could also look at it as being early for this week, being optimistic and all that(!) but the truth is, is I've had this typed up for a couple of weeks and I keep trying to tweak it so it reads nicely and whatnot but it doesn't go that well. So, here is a topsy-turvy post about procrastination and social media.
Whilst talking to my Mum a couple of weeks ago, the conversation drifted onto the topic of procrastination and social media and it inspired me to write this. As I procrastinate quite a lot, I don't mean to do it and I get very deflated when I have spent "all day" working on something but still haven't finished it. When in reality, I've had quite a few breaks doing nothing productive and simply engaging in the activity of having "a quick scroll". Indeed, I'm my own worst enemy as I know that if I really set my mind to something then I can do it. This may be a good point in the year to write about this as people are starting to get to the point in school where they actually do work, and people are doing uni assignments and people working need the extra little push before Christmas (terribly sorry for mentioning "that" work but I'm ever so excited), people's moods are going South as the clocks have gone back and motivation has well and truly left the building.
I don't really understand why whenever we are trying to distract ourselves from the task set we automatically default to picking up a tool in which we can access social media. And we scroll, and we scroll, and then we scroll through the posts that we have already once scrolled through. For this reason, social media annoys me. Ironically, I saw a tweet earlier from Jean Twenge, you can view her account here, which reads "Just as with most things (TV, alcohol, candy etc.) the key is small to moderate use. Use phones as a tool, but don't let them use you." It was the last sentence that really spoke to me, really social media does use us. We let all the social media accounts take over our life and as many people use as a reference, you can't even go for a pee without posting it somewhere. I don't have a solution to this for everyone, but I am consciously going to try and minimise my social media use and general phone usage, and in doing this I somewhat hope it is going to optimise productivity. If we want to, we can really use social media to our advantage and as Jean said, as a tool for us and not let them take over out lives.
There isn't just the negative effects of social media, a reason I use Facebook is so I can keep in touch with family members who I don't get to see often. I also have a blog, so I'm not hating the internet, I truly think we can use it for good. Using the example of a blog or a small business then social media can be a great way to promote your little internet space. You can be creative and make it look however you want it to look. You can gain motivation and inspiration for projects. You can learn so much and really make it worthwhile. Yet, we often just get distracted with the scrolling through Instagram and looking at the pictures that we have already seen. So, let's continue updating our social media sites with what we want but let's not get so caught up in spending hours looking at pointless stuff. A way I have attempted to combat the scrolling effect is by turning off all notifications on my phone, that way I don't get the notification telling me it is someone's birthday leading to me opening the app and wasting time. I find that this has actually helped me quite a lot.
Needless to say whilst on the subject of procrastination, if you have spent all morning being distracted then don't just write off the entire day. The morning, afternoon or evening can all be productive, just because one went wrong it doesn't mean the day is done! You have to forgive yourself in order to allow yourself to grow and develop, this also applies to many aspects of life and not just procrastination.
Until next time,
Lia x
P.S. The photograph I'm going to attach today is a post that I saw on poets Instagram.
Comments
Post a Comment