Authentic Connection & Alternative Communication

What happened when I decided to take the Digital Detox Challenge? Part 2:

I felt more connected to my family. Instead of replying quickly to them via text, I actually dialed their numbers and spoke to them. I’m now Facetiming too because I can see their reactions and they can see mine. My sister noticed this change first. She’s away at college and I’m wrapping up my last year of boarding school. We actually now speak multiple times a day. Besides via text to complain about the Philadelphia Eagles performance, she Facetimes me all the time. I was pretty shocked this weekend because she called me when she had an emergency. It’s funny because I still told her to call our parents, but she called me first.

My sister also wants me to come home from school and meet her at home for the weekend. I normally would not even find out she was home until she would post a picture on Instagram with her friends. So, this weekend we are actually planning a big dinner on Saturday night that my parents are going to cook. I even got to weigh in on what we were eating and which friends we were inviting. It just feels different to plan and be a part of an event rather than see what is happening on social media where you haven’t been included. Everyone uses the term FOMO, and it’s real. Social media is like living in the past and trying to have a popularity contest with people who aren’t your friends. I believe that the anxiety I felt in the past comes from two factors. The first is realizing that you weren’t invited to the event in the first place. The second is trying to understand the purpose of the picture and caption that were posted.

Why do people gamble on whether some random person interacts with their post? Why do some people take their posts down when they don’t get enough likes?

I also started to organize watch parties of movies and documentaries with friends. I still don’t miss the endless scrolling on social media and getting lost in the echo chambers. I’m not sure I can even remember what I watched in the past. It seems like scrolling on the reels of social media leaves little imprint while wasting many hours of my day. The idea for my watch party came after I learned in environmental science about a series called Chimp Empire which was recently released on Netflix. I decided to book a room on campus and invite ten friends to watch it over a month after dinner on Sunday nights. The invitation text just said the name of the show with the time, date, and place.

I was pretty shocked when on the first Sunday night eight people showed up. Chimp Empire was a big hit amongst our group. The limited series is filmed in 18 months alongside the largest chimpanzee society living in Uganda's Kibale National Park. It almost feels unreal to watch the camera and see a society that is both complex and similar to our own. After each episode, we also stayed to talk about it.

After we finished the series, the first question was what we were going to watch next month together.

My plan is to keep digitally detoxing and reporting back on my journey.

John Maida, guest blogger and NoSo YLI. Student at The Loomis Chaffee School