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This past week I closed my Facebook home page and promised my followers I would be taking up writing blog posts once again. For the moment I will be posting here every other week on Wednesdays. Maybe I’ll decide to write here every week, but for now I’m giving myself some extra space to grow into. Where any of this goes depends on my pulling my “now” together. I intend to begin changing and rearranging the pieces of my life that I have a tiny bit of control over.
I was encouraged by friends and told by publishing experts that if you write a book, you MUST have a page on Facebook in order to boost your sales. So I took the plunge. It was fun at first keeping up with my children and grandlings on a daily basis. There were friends, other artists and writers I followed that often sent inspiration my way. But for the last couple of years I’ve used any free time I had on Facebook swimming in the toxic pool of politics and losing my connection to our beautiful world.
The worst of it began in 2016 when the roof blew off my world. I quickly
became addicted to watching the constant chaos in Washington, while I got more and more angry, anxious, depressed, and devastated. Watching it all unfold kept my mind off moving and packing and then the obvious unpacking. Then during the Kavanaugh doings, just a few weeks ago, I finally realized that if I didn’t stop, I would spend the rest of my days following and sharing whatever the news of the day was on Facebook, MSNBC, or CNN.
My anger was at a high point, and I took it out on those around me. My anxiety was over the top. I didn’t want to go out much or talk to anyone. I told myself that if I didn’t stop it, my body would shrivel up into an unusable mass of dying cells and I would get crazier and uglier by the minute. Like a drunk whose tired of what alcohol does to her, I decided to close my homepage on Facebook. I will keep my author page, posting cheery, interesting posts about writing and creativity.
Will I miss you? Of ocurse I will. But there are other ways of staying in touch. You can subscribe to my blog on my home page at, www.joanzrough.com, or by liking my author page of on Facebook. You could also send me an email by by clicking the contact button, again on the home page of my website.
I do have a new writing project that I’m excited about. I’ll tell you more about it in a future blog post, but for right now, I’m working on getting my daily schedule cleaned up so that I can add at least an hour every day for sitting in front of my computer, filling page after page with words from my heart.
I believe that spreading positivity and love is the way I can best serve myself and those around me to get through whatever the future holds. We all knew that there were big changes ahead and that the process of recalibrating our lives would not be pretty. Reconstruction takes time, patience, stamina and strength to move through the complications of reshaping a world gone bad. I will turn 76 years old next month. I can’t afford to allow myself to OCD on the news that our country failing and is no longer a democracy.
I’ve learned that by ignoring my here and now, I will miss the season of colorful leaves that are falling all around me as the season changes. I’d miss noticing the confused Magnolia trees, who think it’s spring, and are in their second lovely bloom this year, and of course the last of the hummingbirds coming through as they journey south for the winter. I don’t want to miss out on the laughter of children as Halloween creeps closer, and all of the things that inspire me to keep moving forward with smiles and a delightfully warm heart.
I do have hope for our world,
however, and absolutely will vote in a few short weeks.
I pray you will, too.
Over the years we have known each other through writing online, there have been numerous times when I read your words and felt as if you were describing my own situation and thoughts. Today is definitely another one of those times.
Over the past two years I have tried (usually without success) to stop myself from indulging in the seemingly endless cycle of horrible news that continually bombards us. I know that doing so has stolen not only my time, but my sense of peace, my desire to create with words or play music, my enjoyment of the world around me. I am anxious and angry, always on a hair trigger of going off on a tangent about the state of our country and the madman at the helm of it.
So you give me incentive to try once again and try harder this time. To try writing on my blog more regularly. To look for new things to be enthusiastic about, rather than constantly rehashing all the old things that are making me despair.
Thank you for your honesty and for your inspiration. I look forward to following along with you on your journey to rediscover your creative life.
Becca, Thanks so much for your words. It does seem like we’re often on the same wave length. There have been so many times that your words have echoed exactly what I am thinking. I can’t say what you should do, but I can tell you right now, taking that step has already brought me lots of peace. Though I still watch a bit of news every day and read the papers, being away from that angry energy that Facebook is filled with makes a huge difference. It comes down to the fact that my angst and anger do nothing to change the horribleness of our situation. It only spreads negativity and the forgetting that we can help bring peace to all of us by simply being kind and being grateful for each other.
This post breathes the serenity prayer, a good thing! Though I have opinions, I don’t engage with others politically on social media. But I do VOTE.
Every other week sounds like a doable goal for blogging. One day I may embrace that schedule.
Thank you for this post. I do love forward to hearing more about that new writing project, Joan. 🙂
Hi Marion,
Thanks so much for your kindness. I would never expect to find you in the midst of political social media. You have been one of the examples I thought of during the months that I have been thinking about leaving Facebook. And the Serenity prayer helps me every day!
I’m looking forward to your book and will be filling you in soon on what I’m just beginning to work on.
Love to you and yours!
Joan — I’m with Marian. “I don’t engage with others politically on social media. But I do VOTE.” And like Marian, again, “I do look forward to hearing more about your new writing project.”
Thanks Laurie. Like Marian you have been a great example to me as I treaded water trying to decide what to do with myself. And I look forward to telling you all about what I’ve been thinking about and writing.
I’ve been blessed (with some manual surgical deletions here and there) to have a Facebook following of my own Tribe, more or less. And I do not watch TV news. So my intake of negativity has been limited. I applaud you, Joan, in taking steps to maintain your serenity. And I look forward to your renewed postings. Onward, into tomorrow.
Thanks, Janet. Peace and serenity are number one right now.
Amen, Joan! I couldn’t have said it better. I’ve missed your cool logic and words of wisdom. So happy to have you back. And I echo Marian. I don’t participate in political rhetoric but I do vote! I’m looking forward to hearing more about your next writing project.
Thanks for your kind words, Kathy. I’m glad to be back, though taking it a bit slower these days.
As usual, you write the words that I feel but have difficulty expressing. In an upside down world, it feels comforting to find ways of peace.
Your posts on Facebook usually were inspiring and beautiful. I will miss them and I understand the need to step away.
I’m excited about your new project.
Sending you so much love.
Dear Joan,
Thank you for sharing and modeling your truth.
I see the wisdom in what you are saying, and I also think about our sisters of color and those in poverty and minority status who are unable to turn away and tenderly focus on self care. I struggle with the privilege that I have to do that. In the meantime, injustice increases.
Your voice is needed. I hope you return to “the fray” following a much needed rest. I benefit from your presence.
Peace and love to you.
Pam, Thanks for your kind words. I too struggle with my privilege as I t;urn away, but feel I can be of better service this way than I can as an angry, anxious person who adds so much more negativity to a world that is already at war with itself. I need this time to pull my life together and become who I’m supposed to be in my later years … an inspiration and a peace keeper who has let go of the hate I was feeling so deeply. Living in Charlottesville with the constant reminder that we have become a well known site of hate and violence, I need to turn to a more spiritual direction.
I have been deeply inspired by Parker J. Palmer’s book, “Healing the Heart of Democracy,” and recently attended a day long discussion of his work. As I move along I’m feeling stronger and more able to address what is before us, in a manner that is more helpful that hurtful.
Again, Pam, thanks. I benefit from your presence as well and I hope you’ll return to my blog for more of what I have to say.
Thanks for your kind words, Sharon. Sending you lots of love, too.