A Few Days Away From Facebook And Vocal

Introduction

This is my 1600th Vocal post, just thought I would mention that.

I had almost half a week away from Vocal and Facebook and told people about it below.

Although the title was clickbait, some people seemed happy at the news, c'est la vie, but most were happy that I was going to be back.

This is just a short piece about the benefits of taking breaks, although at least one person was mock-horrified that I had not published anything between Saturday morning and Tuesday evening, but that was just a bit of fun and gave me ideas for more creations, so on to my actual observations.

Doing Things Differently

One of the problems with anything that you enjoy doing is that it can almost turn into an addiction, and that can be true of all Social media. When I am away on short breaks I have my phone and a Kindle Fire The Kindle Fire is mainly for reading and watching programs on Amazon Prime. I would love it if it worked with Google Docs, but it doesn't and it doesn't work with the Vocal Editor in the Amazon Silk Browser, you can type but you can't save.

A few years ago I removed Facebook from my phone and have never restored it, so effectively I have minimum interaction with Facebook and Vocal when I am away on short breaks.

The thing is that just because I am not writing and publishing on Vocal does not mean I have shut myself down.

By cutting myself off from my Vocal and other publishing mechanisms it gave me a chance to focus on other things. Those other things provide me with germs of ideas that enable me to craft creations.

I also noticed while in Glasgow that although I walked a long way, I did not move very fast. I have a feeling this stop-start perambulation was a result of me taking a lot of photographs and exploring interesting places and locations.

Those photographs were shared on Instagram, so I am not completely divorced from Social Media, and I also use Twitter and Threads on my phone, but there is no major publishing going on.

I came away from Glasgow with ideas for half a dozen stories (that's a long way round of saying six isn't it?) one inspired by going through The Buchanan Galleries that you can explore here if you so wish.

The resultant story is here

I managed to experience the hellish banking area, massive featureless buildings, then some very rough bits, and then lots of cultural areas.

This is probably true everywhere, even where I live. Today, as it was a gorgeous day I took a walk out to the Temple of Antenociticus a two-thousand-year-old Roman Temple, roughly on the route of Hadrian's Wall but in the middle of a housing estate. There is still a feeling of mysticism and magic there, and this is just the sort of thing that helps me create my stories.

There are many threads that need to be woven to create a story or a piece of art or music, it is seldom a single strand, and just getting out and distancing yourself from the general norm can free your ideas, often seeing existing things from different perspectives and resulting in something completely unexpected but still worth taking to its natural conclusion.

A Thoughtful Conclusion

We do not have to be connected every minute of every hour of every day. That break can be part of the battery recharge that our minds and bodies both sometimes need.

Thank you for being with me on this and I hope you have been able to take something from this, however small.