My college's WiFi connection is notorious for being spotty and unreliable. This past weekend, however, it went out completely- at least for me. No matter what I did, my phone would not connect to the Curry WiFi. So I, unwillingly, went the weekend without Internet.
I was frustrated of course, because I couldn't talk to my friends via Snapchat and Facebook Messenger- my main forms of daily communication. I was also stranded without iMessage, Twitter, Instagram- the works. Without these distractions available to me, I was forced to do all my homework, and I spent a lot more time reading for class. Besides, I had nothing else to do.
While my girl friends used their cell phone data to send selfies via Snapchat, and edit Instagram posts over the weekend, I stood idly by. I found that I actually didn't mind NOT spending time "finding good lighting" for a selfie. Rather, I spent the time talking to my friends, which I found much more enjoyable than Snapchatting my faraway friends at different colleges in different states.
While my girl friends and I went out together, I spent no time worrying about posting to my Snapchat story to show everyone I know what I was doing. I also didn't spend the time watching other people's Snapchat stories to see how they spent their Saturday night. I found that ignorance truly is bliss. There's no need in following the daily life of people I haven't spoken to since high school, and there is definitely no need for dozens of "friends" to follow my daily life either. Who's business is it, anyway?
Without Internet access, I didn't really talk to my friends from home, or anyone outside my residence hall, really. I talked to people exclusively face-to-face rather than through an impersonal screen. I talked to the people who I was in the same room with, rather than across campus, or hundreds of miles away.
There's something special about living in the moment, rather than in another world provided by a cell phone and a Wi-Fi connection, that I had forgotten about- that we have all forgotten about, due to our obsession with the iPhone in front of us instead of the ever-present and under-appreciated here and now.
It was blissful that no one could really contact me. Yes, I received text messages from my roommate and my mother, but my phone wasn't blowing up with Facebook messages, a constant stream of Snapchats, nor Instagram notifications like it usually is when I am connected to the Internet. I wasn't wasting time scrolling through Twitter, or stalking Instagram models and hating my body because of it. I was more centered in my own life than I ever remember being.
After a weekend without Internet, my question is this: why do we feel the need to be connected to friends and family at all times? Why should your boyfriend be able to message you in real time at all hours of the day and night- and you feel the need to respond, for fear of "leaving him on read"? Where has our social freedom gone, partially and healthily detached from people, while maintaining our own independent lives?
Yes, connections with our loved ones is important, and communicating with them is the only way to maintain these relationships. But no relationship, whether it be with your significant other, best friend, or sibling, requires the constant communication we have accepted as normal through our obsessive use of social media (God forbid you break a Snap streak!) You don't have to talk to people at all times of the day. You have the ability to break free, and become un-reachable if you so choose to. If you want to get away from people, and take some time to live in the moment, you should be able to do just that.
So disconnect from the Internet, put down the phone, and live in the here and now, rather than the would-be. Make real life, in-person connections, rather than worrying about maintaining connections with others online. Don't forget about the people right in front of you, and don't forget about yourself, as your own individual person- separate from the "you" on social media. Be yourself in real life, rather than online.
Disconnect.
