Shabbat: I’m Working On It…
No, but really. The past few days I’ve been in Chicago for a work conference, which meant that I was actually at work on Shabbat. Despite that, I actually did a pretty good job adhering to the guidelines I laid out beforehand.
I turned off all notifications on my phone except calls, texts, and e-mails. I did have to be sensitive when my phone dinged, but I still tried to keep it put away and I only responded if something was critical to work right away. Otherwise, I kept it out of sight when possible, not even using it to check the time. Given the limitations, I think it went well actually; and I did better than last week for sure.
Trying to keep away from technology like my phone and the TV while still needing to be connected to work was definitely an interesting experience, especially since this is a new thing for me in general. It also taught me a few things about myself, for better or for worse…
(1) I am annoyingly sassy. I kind of knew this, and most of you probably did too. But, as it turns out, I have a lot of snippy comments scrolling through my head all the time. Usually, I text or gChat them to someone immediately, but for 24 hours I didn’t. For a while, I kept a running list in my head, but in the end I forgot them pretty quickly. My funny comments might be worth saving, but I should work on getting rid of the sassy, annoying complaints I have often.
(2) I need a watch. If I could check the time that way, I wouldn’t compulsively click my phone on and off and I wouldn’t “need” it in my sight constantly.
(3) Life is quiet without technology. I love having my own apartment, and my own hotel room for the weekend, but there’s a reason I turn the TV on at home all the time. I’m not actively watching usually, but I like having ambient noise when I’m getting dressed or making dinner. Life without TV or music or audiobooks is quiet.
(4) I get way too much spam e-mail. I’ve made a decent effort to remove myself from mailing lists and to block useless e-mails that come through, but there is still so much that makes its way to my inbox. By the end of Shabbat, even after responding to critical e-mails and even with it being the weekend, I still had more than 30 unread e-mails, many of which I immediately deleted. Instead of being distracted by them as they come in individually, I could either unsubscribe or maybe have my e-mail update less frequently. I’m going to look into this.
(5) Observing Shabbat is possible, even for me. It’s going to take some time to get used to, but especially with the way I’ve set it up, it’s definitely possible and could actually be really nice once I get used to it.
So, that was Shabbat take two! Thoughts?
