About being offline (and "yiques your cellphone is shitty!")
I have recently bought a new cell phone. Not so much because I needed one, but because I was getting pretty fed up with the amount of people asking me for my Whatsapp account.
"Hey, Melanie, send me your Whatsapp!"
Oh, sorry, I don't have a Whatsapp account.
"What do you mean? Everybody has a Whatsapp account!"
Uuuugh.
So I went there and got me a brand new phone that can access Whatsapp, Telegram, Google Hangouts and whatever other method of social network communication possible (which includes Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Tumblr).
Did this change my life?
Well, not really. I pretty much still only use my Whatsapp account to talk to my mom. I'm online for most of my time (though not always available - sometimes I'm online, but I'm busy doing something that requires my full attention). It is somewhat useful if someone wants to talk to me while I'm using a fullscreen application at home (like when I'm playing video games), but other than that, everything is pretty much the same. Of course, it did make my life a bit easier in a couple of aspects. For an instant, I really enjoy using the GPS system or the real-time bus schedule app. Even Instagram is something that I thoroughly enjoy.
I was actually rather happy with my previous cell phone. I only used it to make calls and send SMSs to my mom, but it was really small, compact and practical. The battery lasted for over two weeks and the alarm clock never let me down (and it was customizable!). Technically, it was all I needed in a phone (oh, it also took pictures). If someone ever asked me to go back to my previous phone, I think I'd be okay with it. It granted me one small perk that no one sees as something good: it allowed me to spend some time completely offline.
For those who may not know, I work as a computer programmer, so I'm online for pretty much my whole 8 hours of work. When I get home, the first thing I usually do is turning my PC on to check my e-mail, fiddle with Duolingo and scroll past a couple of Twitter posts. However, for some reason, last year I started not to turn the PC on when I got home simply because, for whatever reason, I felt fed up with the internet. I don't know, sometimes I'm just not in the mood to interact with anyone, but last year I was actually tired of being online. Most of what I did (specially checking on Twitter) was becoming a very automatic habit.
When I started to turn the computer off more often, my parents started to find it weird. Whenever they didn't see my monitor turned on, they'd ask "what's wrong? Internet's off again?", and I was like "Nah, just too lazy to turn the PC on". I usually spent my offline hours reading a book, studying something in the old-school way, drawing or writing. A couple of months before NaNoWriMo, I actually started to turn the PC off half an hour after I turned it on, which I only did because I wanted to remove a couple of songs I did not like from my mp3 playlist. For the rest of the time, I'd just work on my story. As a result, I got a manuscript with over 100 pages that I'm currently revising. Soon after I finished it, NaNoWriMo was up and I started to work yet on another manuscript (which is also over 100 pages and I plan on editing as soon as I finish my current one). Profit!
I guess what I meant to say with this enormous post is that being offline, even if for a short period of time turned out to be a healthy habit. I feel like I've been more productive this way. It feels refreshing not to care about what other people are talking about on social networks because... well, there isn't much that you can miss in a couple of hours offline. Having a cell phone that keeps me connected 24/7 did not change a thing.
"Hey, Melanie, send me your Whatsapp!"
Oh, sorry, I don't have a Whatsapp account.
"What do you mean? Everybody has a Whatsapp account!"
Uuuugh.
So I went there and got me a brand new phone that can access Whatsapp, Telegram, Google Hangouts and whatever other method of social network communication possible (which includes Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Tumblr).
Did this change my life?
Well, not really. I pretty much still only use my Whatsapp account to talk to my mom. I'm online for most of my time (though not always available - sometimes I'm online, but I'm busy doing something that requires my full attention). It is somewhat useful if someone wants to talk to me while I'm using a fullscreen application at home (like when I'm playing video games), but other than that, everything is pretty much the same. Of course, it did make my life a bit easier in a couple of aspects. For an instant, I really enjoy using the GPS system or the real-time bus schedule app. Even Instagram is something that I thoroughly enjoy.
I was actually rather happy with my previous cell phone. I only used it to make calls and send SMSs to my mom, but it was really small, compact and practical. The battery lasted for over two weeks and the alarm clock never let me down (and it was customizable!). Technically, it was all I needed in a phone (oh, it also took pictures). If someone ever asked me to go back to my previous phone, I think I'd be okay with it. It granted me one small perk that no one sees as something good: it allowed me to spend some time completely offline.
For those who may not know, I work as a computer programmer, so I'm online for pretty much my whole 8 hours of work. When I get home, the first thing I usually do is turning my PC on to check my e-mail, fiddle with Duolingo and scroll past a couple of Twitter posts. However, for some reason, last year I started not to turn the PC on when I got home simply because, for whatever reason, I felt fed up with the internet. I don't know, sometimes I'm just not in the mood to interact with anyone, but last year I was actually tired of being online. Most of what I did (specially checking on Twitter) was becoming a very automatic habit.
When I started to turn the computer off more often, my parents started to find it weird. Whenever they didn't see my monitor turned on, they'd ask "what's wrong? Internet's off again?", and I was like "Nah, just too lazy to turn the PC on". I usually spent my offline hours reading a book, studying something in the old-school way, drawing or writing. A couple of months before NaNoWriMo, I actually started to turn the PC off half an hour after I turned it on, which I only did because I wanted to remove a couple of songs I did not like from my mp3 playlist. For the rest of the time, I'd just work on my story. As a result, I got a manuscript with over 100 pages that I'm currently revising. Soon after I finished it, NaNoWriMo was up and I started to work yet on another manuscript (which is also over 100 pages and I plan on editing as soon as I finish my current one). Profit!
I guess what I meant to say with this enormous post is that being offline, even if for a short period of time turned out to be a healthy habit. I feel like I've been more productive this way. It feels refreshing not to care about what other people are talking about on social networks because... well, there isn't much that you can miss in a couple of hours offline. Having a cell phone that keeps me connected 24/7 did not change a thing.