Yesterday, I received a text from a friend that said, " Friends and Family: As of today, we are kicking off new boundaries. After 3pm, I will not be reachable unless you call the house. I won't check my {cell/mobile} phone until after the kids are in bed. Please call me if it's urgent...I don't want to be unavailable to you. I hope you understand our attempt at being less distracted parents. XOXO"
How inspirational is that? I am so on board with unplugging from 3-7pm every night. For me, I'd also like to commit to staying away from the computer, since "quickly checking the dinner recipe" often turns into 35 minutes worth of detours through my email and all over the Internet. Between homework followed by "the witching hour" followed by preparing, eating and cleaning up dinner, then baths and bedtime, who needs additional distractions?
I'm starting to realize that the phone is no longer my friend. In the past year, I've gotten to the point where I roll my eyes and even groan when the phone rings. After the 2nd call of the day, I'm sick of hearing it ring.
Don't get me wrong, I love talking to my friends and family on the phone, but that's part of the problem. I get lost in the phone calls and before I know it, 30 minutes have passed, the kids have been ignored or have gotten into trouble for interrupting, and I'm behind on the 10 tasks I was doing before answering the phone.
How often does your phone ring? How often do you hear the text indicator on your cell phone? Do you feel obligated to answer the ring and check the text? Or chat with the caller and respond to the text? Or worse, do you have the ability to get email, Facebook or Twitter on your phone??? I can't imagine how often my phone would beep if I had Internet access on my cell!
Before cell phones, I tend to assume we weren't as busy. For those of you in your 30s and beyond, think back to the 80s for a minute...are you picturing feathered hair, heavy make up and double socks of different colors? Good. You're there.
No one had cell phones; if we were out and needed to talk so someone, we waited until we got home or if it was really important, we found a payphone.
Call waiting was new; sometimes we'd dial a number only to hear a busy signal and we had to try again later.
If the phone rang during dinner, our parents wouldn't let us answer it and we didn't even have Caller ID to see who had called. (*gasp!*)
As a teenager, we had to wait our turn to call our friends because there was one line in the house for everyone to share.
If our parent's boss called the house after 5pm, it was urgent, like informing them that the office had burned down. Now employers can text after hours to ask one more quick question about a project. No one seems to have any patience anymore. Nothing can wait until later.
I completely agree that cell phones are convenient and save tons of time. Almost every week, I receive texts from neighbors asking if I need anything from Costco, Super Walmart or Sprouts...today it was Home Depot. And I send the same texts to them. I'll often respond with something like, "Yes, toilet paper and 1% milk - thanks!" and I'm able to hold off going to the store for a few days. Seriously convenient.
But at what point is enough enough? When we feel the need to chat with friends or text throughout the day and it interferes with the attention we give our kids, what message are we sending???
One friend of mine (who works full time outside the home) turns off her phone as soon as she pulls into the garage and it stays off until morning. She has a baby girl that she doesn't get to see all day and she refuses to allow others to intrude upon those precious few hours with her husband and daughter.
Along these same lines, I know another family who has a house rule that at 8pm, all cell phones are turned off and plugged into their chargers. The teens aren't allowed to talk and text throughout the night and the parents are more engaged in helping with homework and kissing everyone good-night. I love that rule.
Your boundaries are going to be different than my boundaries, but my hope is that you will read this post and realize that you have to set some limits. Don't allow the convenience of technology to compromise your priorities. Learn to say, "no," more often in order to put your family first. For a short time each day, vow to ignore the ringing phone and turn off the cell so you're not tempted to peek at the texts.
Are you will to challenge yourself? What limits are you going to set?
How inspirational is that? I am so on board with unplugging from 3-7pm every night. For me, I'd also like to commit to staying away from the computer, since "quickly checking the dinner recipe" often turns into 35 minutes worth of detours through my email and all over the Internet. Between homework followed by "the witching hour" followed by preparing, eating and cleaning up dinner, then baths and bedtime, who needs additional distractions?
I'm starting to realize that the phone is no longer my friend. In the past year, I've gotten to the point where I roll my eyes and even groan when the phone rings. After the 2nd call of the day, I'm sick of hearing it ring.
Don't get me wrong, I love talking to my friends and family on the phone, but that's part of the problem. I get lost in the phone calls and before I know it, 30 minutes have passed, the kids have been ignored or have gotten into trouble for interrupting, and I'm behind on the 10 tasks I was doing before answering the phone.
How often does your phone ring? How often do you hear the text indicator on your cell phone? Do you feel obligated to answer the ring and check the text? Or chat with the caller and respond to the text? Or worse, do you have the ability to get email, Facebook or Twitter on your phone??? I can't imagine how often my phone would beep if I had Internet access on my cell!
Before cell phones, I tend to assume we weren't as busy. For those of you in your 30s and beyond, think back to the 80s for a minute...are you picturing feathered hair, heavy make up and double socks of different colors? Good. You're there.
No one had cell phones; if we were out and needed to talk so someone, we waited until we got home or if it was really important, we found a payphone.
Call waiting was new; sometimes we'd dial a number only to hear a busy signal and we had to try again later.
If the phone rang during dinner, our parents wouldn't let us answer it and we didn't even have Caller ID to see who had called. (*gasp!*)
As a teenager, we had to wait our turn to call our friends because there was one line in the house for everyone to share.
If our parent's boss called the house after 5pm, it was urgent, like informing them that the office had burned down. Now employers can text after hours to ask one more quick question about a project. No one seems to have any patience anymore. Nothing can wait until later.
I completely agree that cell phones are convenient and save tons of time. Almost every week, I receive texts from neighbors asking if I need anything from Costco, Super Walmart or Sprouts...today it was Home Depot. And I send the same texts to them. I'll often respond with something like, "Yes, toilet paper and 1% milk - thanks!" and I'm able to hold off going to the store for a few days. Seriously convenient.
But at what point is enough enough? When we feel the need to chat with friends or text throughout the day and it interferes with the attention we give our kids, what message are we sending???
One friend of mine (who works full time outside the home) turns off her phone as soon as she pulls into the garage and it stays off until morning. She has a baby girl that she doesn't get to see all day and she refuses to allow others to intrude upon those precious few hours with her husband and daughter.
Along these same lines, I know another family who has a house rule that at 8pm, all cell phones are turned off and plugged into their chargers. The teens aren't allowed to talk and text throughout the night and the parents are more engaged in helping with homework and kissing everyone good-night. I love that rule.
Your boundaries are going to be different than my boundaries, but my hope is that you will read this post and realize that you have to set some limits. Don't allow the convenience of technology to compromise your priorities. Learn to say, "no," more often in order to put your family first. For a short time each day, vow to ignore the ringing phone and turn off the cell so you're not tempted to peek at the texts.
Are you will to challenge yourself? What limits are you going to set?
Posts
7 comments:
This is so well written and so true. Like right now I'm trying to figure out my computer so I can post my potd for project Tuesday and it's not working and I'm frustrated. I loved the way it was when we were growing up only one phone in the house and it was on the wall not cordless. Nobody answered during dinner or else. Things have changed. I know my kids friends have cells that are on them all the time till late in the night. Not at my house we settle in for the night and get our sleep. Thanks for posting this Katie. I will take the challenge and only cut back on my time on the computer like you I read on blog which leads me to another to another then an hour has passed.
Sometimes when I'm shopping, I'll see a mother talking on the phone while her small child is walking along side her, silently. It usually makes me sad to think that so many kids are missing quality time with their moms because so often their mom's are so engrossed in a conversation with someone who isn't even "there".
Because I love the memories of being out with my mom and there weren't such thing as cell phones and I didn't have to "shush" so she could talk to someone else, I wonder what the memories of todays little kids will be when they think of their moms gabbing away on the phone incessantly.
In my entire life, I don't believe anyone has texted me to see if I need something from the store. To think this is such a regular occurence for some people that it becomes time consuming...crikey!
I'm glad I read this post tonight. Tomorrow I'm starting to Homeschool Pre-School for my daughter and I need to send out a message letting people know I will be unreachable durning a certain time frame. I didn't even think about how the phone ringing (Playing Woody's Roundup for my husband or the NIS Theme song for my dad or Beat It for everyone else would interupt our "school time"
Phone is going off!
Great post! I say this so often to my husband, but if he's not on board with me (and he's not, yet) then how can I possibly enforce it in the house - not likely!
This summer I was visiting my Mom with my two kids, and both my sisters were also there for a visit (no husbands, just the four of us girls) - don't think we'd all been together like that in over a decade. And one night the three of us sisters were ALL on our laptops, in the same room, on Facebook, blogs, whatever; TV was on (no one was watching) and Mom was pottering around the house. I finally said "what did we all do in the same room together before we had wireless internet" and my Mom yelled from the next room " YOU TALKED TO EACH OTHER". So true. So we unplugged and played charades - too funny.
Love your blog!
Jen (the one who sent the scrapbook stuff). We're back in Australia, arrived "home" 2 weeks ago and its great to check out your blog every few days and feel like I'm actually home!
This is cool. We dont have a house phone, my cell is it, so I leave it on, but I don't respond to every little ring. I figure if its important, a. they'll leave a message or b. they'll call back. Most everything can wait. What I do have is my laptop in my kitchen/dining room area and I have the same problem you do! That quick checking of something turns into way too long. So, I think I'll unplug from the computer from when the girls get home from school til they go to bed. What a great idea! Thanks for sharing this!
Love the intentionality of framing in your time with your family, almost like wrapping your arms around them all to be sure you're all in synch. I've struggled with the cringe over voicemails since the early 1990's, those ones that drone on & on & on. Calgon, take me away!
I recall you gave me excellent advice a few years ago about answering non-stop and intrusive work emails, slating that for 2-3 specific times a day.
One word of caution, when you're so focused on circling the wagons, sometimes unintentionally you can exclude communications and touches to people God's placed in your life that can be important. Becky Tirabasi had a daily piece of advice for this. Every day, select 3 people you're going to connect with or communicate with or pray for. That kind of balance should keep you connected, with good, clean, prioritized boundaries.
Let us know how this goes for you, Katie. And when I can call! ;-)
Love you!
Post a Comment