Putting Facebook in the Corner

My normal routine is to get up at 5 and suck down coffee while reading email, Facebook, and my Bible study lesson, and then write or workout, depending on the day.  Then all the family wakes up and we all start rolling together.
On Tuesday this week, I was checking Facebook and before I knew it, I was feeling grouchy and realized I had just spent 40 precious minutes reading superficial accounts of my friends' lives.  I counted backward and tried to remember a time when Facebook had brightened my day, and it had been a long while.  It was time for a change.
I do see the value of Facebook.  I can keep all my friends and family near and far updated on our lives.  I can offer some love through electronic means to a friend who is depressed or overwhelmed.  I do use it for that, but when I allow anything to take up nearly half of my alone time and I don't feel better afterward?  It's time for a change.
I decided on a Facebook fast. So the rest of the day Tuesday and carrying on to Friday morning, I stayed off of Facebook. I had to have a few exceptions. Social media is my job at work, so without looking at the news feed, I updated our status.  I received an alert that my sister wrote me and I logged on to reply. A friend of mine invited me to her book club, and I needed to RSVP.  Other than that, I stayed away.
This morning I broke the fast and logged on. I decided that since I hadn't been on in several days, I would allot 15 minutes to reading the news feed.  After 7 minutes, I was done.  Of course there were updates that I missed, but I'm okay with that.
Adam and I choose not to have smart phones, so the allure of checking Facebook at a restaurant when real people surround you is lost to us.  However, we have WiFi in the house, and lately, I've found myself updating my news feed while I was cooking dinner.
I categorize and prioritize my activities into levels of life-giving and life-draining.  Making dinner in my beautiful kitchen with music playing and kids dancing is life-giving.  Stopping this to check Facebook is life-draining.
This week, I put social media back in the corner where it belongs.  It has some value in my life.  It has some life-giving aspects, but after stepping away, I realized that I had inflated the value.  Now it's back to a small corner of my life and I can spend more time on activities that fill me up rather than drain me.  I think I'll go read a book.