I have been staring at the screen for the last twenty minutes, wondering how to begin a post about the week I am about to begin -- a week of vacation with people I love, and a complete break from work, and a nearly complete break with all things digital.
I read this post by Gwen Bell about a week ago, detailing a bit of her mindset about a digital sabbatical that she took while digging more deeply into the rest of her life. I read it, and then went away and thought, and then came back and read it again. (I rarely do this. My RSS-feed and work-related to-read list is so long that very few items get read more than once.) But after reading, I couldn't get the idea out of my head that I really needed time away from the web.
The internet and everything related to it used to be a great deal of fun. I've been an early adopter of more than half of the social networks that existed by mid-2009, and I loved the game of figuring out how they worked and making friends and developing new bits of my life digitally. I've kept blogs for almost ten years, and love the way that they have rebirthed the concept of serial writing while providing a community of fellow readers (thanks to comment forums). Wikipedia is one of my all-time favorite things ever. I could go on, except that I can't.
My love for the internet is being pushed aside by my desire to try new things. Which would be hard if it were just my digital life that was affected by that change, but it's also my job. I run an eRevenue program. Everything about the work I do (the people I pay attention to, the behaviors they exhibit, the tools I build, the stuff I read, the studies that matter, the new tools I need to master, the ways in which I need to educate an enormous team of others) revolves around the internet, and demands that I be an expert in everything I can get my hands on. It's vitally important that I learn everything possible, and teach it to others. But I'm coming to the realization that I don't know how to be a person who works entirely with the internet without also being consumed by my online life.
Lately, Facebook and Twitter and Flickr and YouTube and Etsy and Ravelry and Wikipedia and Crowdrise and LiveJournal and my Google Feeds and even this blog have become work. I've had to choose, in every minute, whether I was going to read a stream and flag articles of importance or prepare singing for an audition (I ultimately canceled it because I wasn't prepared); or knit a gift for a friend (it's not done yet); cook an elaborate meal (I opted for the 30-minute variety); take a walk with my girlfriend (the walk was gorgeous and lovely, but I could feel my blackberry vibrating in my bag and it made me feel guilty); or practice my Spanish (I answered a pregunta from a client who didn't speak English with a broken un momento; voy ayudar, rather than providing assistance myself). I don't know how to fix it yet, but this must end.
Tomorrow, I am boarding a bus with the most wonderful woman in the world. I'm packing a backpack with bathing suits and a pair of jeans, a book to read, and my knitting bag, and carrying my guitar in the hand that isn't clasping hers. We're heading out of town for a glorious week of rest and relaxation -- kayaking and hiking and picnicking and swimming and cycling and walking and climbing walls with tiny nephews and cooking dinner for appreciative parents and picking apples and baking pies and playing cards and watching sunsets and roasting s'mores and sleeping under the stars. There will be no internet. There will be no email. There will be no social networking, or reading of "news" online.
I hope that the time away lets me come back refreshed, with some answers about how to do the work that matters without being consumed by the things that don't. Because at the end of the day, that beautiful woman and those charming little boys and the rest of my glorious family are going to win -- and I want some other things to not have to lose.
If you love me and would like to spend time with me while I'm upstate on my vacation, call the parents' house; I'll be in the pool by 3 o'clock tomorrow.
First published at expetesso.com
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