Good-bye Twitter! I’m reclaiming my life.

I love to read.

I love to write.

For this reason, I’m saying Good-bye to Twitter.

I’m not a fan of social media. I got a Facebook account when I was in Marianist leadership. It was an effective way to network with our members and communities around the world, but I tired quickly of the endless stream of everyday nothings. (I love you, but I really don’t need to know what you had for breakfast.) When my leadership term ended, I quit Facebook.

Article after article told me that writers must have an internet presence to garner a ready-made audience. Many publishers now demand it. I logged back on to Facebook, but logged off again soon after.

Then Twitter entered my life. It became my source for world and church news. I enjoyed the brevity and wit of some commentators, and still do, but checking my feed quickly became an obsession. I was spending (wasting) more and more time. Click this article. Respond to that comment. Refresh. Refresh. Ok….I’ll refresh one more time and then log off. Sigh.

Twitter is an amazing platform for social change, rallying and uniting voices and people to march and speak out against injustice. Sadly, it’s also a hang-out for hate-filled trolls. I hope that the folks at Twitter do more to control the hackers and bots that sully the democratic goals of the platform.

Another plus to Twitter is that it gives you up to the minute news. Seriously… Up. To. The. Minute. This becomes a problem for someone with an addictive personality. (She silently slinks in her chair, hoping no one notices her…) It’s also a problem when news is posted in a rush, without the necessary fact checking. What’s that called again? Fake news.

For me, Twitter has become a serious distraction from reading and writing. I don’t need to know what President Dunderhead tweeted or said five minutes ago. I REALLY don’t need to read all the follow-up commentary and retweets.

I REALLY need to reclaim those lost minutes and hours. What will I do with the new-found time?

I’ll read the news once, maybe twice a day.

I’ll read more books.

I’ll write more on this blog.

I’ll maybe, finally, perhaps, possibly…write a book of my own.

And, no. Lent has nothing to do with this. You know my track record with Lent. I’d be back on Twitter by noon!