TV Eats Your <strikethru> Brain</strikethru> Time
I’ve turned into my mother, grabbing the remote when it’s dinner time and angrily turning the TV off in the middle of their show when my kids aren’t coming to the table. It irritates me so much. It’s useful for chill out time, or when you’re sick and can’t do anything but lay on the couch, or I just can’t listen to the bickering any longer - yes, I do use the TV to babysit. Some people like TV noise in the background and to help them fall asleep. I admit, I love some good trash reality TV while I’m cleaning or prepping food. The average Canadian spends over 20 hours per week watching TV. And don’t get me started on scrolling. Canadian adults are spending over 6 hours on the internet daily - and I bet its double screening with TV on too. Someone get me the stats on that.
That’s a lot of time! Calculate that with your hourly wage - hundreds, thousands of dollars being eaten away with mindlessness. Over weeks, months, a lifetime - there’s gotta be another way to spend the time. I know, I know, we’re not supposed to be constantly productive. But do you really feel good after hours of scrolling or four episodes into a binge?
I think we want the mindlessness sometimes though, don’t we. To zone out and rest. It’s not really rest though. Sometimes I give in to the dopamine hits and re-download candy crush and instagram and the reddit app. Then my phone starts yelling at me at some point with the update “your screen time is up 80% today”. I indulge a little bit longer and then I delete it.
This week I deleted all of it. All the apps, the games, the streaming services, the doom-scrolls, anything that will distract me. I get this nervous anxiousness when I just need something - a new headline - a win - an email to come through. That anticipation doesn’t feel good, it makes me annoyed with myself for needing it. Instagram makes me angsty, wanting other people’s lives that I don’t actually want, or creating this urge to shop that doesn’t exist otherwise. I’d rather just put it all away. My therapist tells me tolerance is the goal, not avoidance. But I’m an all or nothing person. I’m working on it.
What will I do instead? I’ll pull out my favourite cookbooks, wander the specialty grocery store, turn on some good music and make a great dinner for myself. I’ll read two whole books in a weekend. I’ll probably do silly things like re-organize my pantry or dust my baseboards. I’ll write, for sure. Take my kids for a walk. Hit the gym. Anything really, to get out of the screen and into my life.
