This year during church on Mother’s Day I felt the Holy Spirit whisper to me “take the month of June and fast from social media”. Of course this was something that I did not want to do and had often used the excuse of “but I use it for my small shop” as a reason not to do extended fasts. But it turns out that was exactly what I needed. I was feeling lost with where to go in the world of small shops and creators. In the mix of Instagram and following other small shops I had lost my sense of direction. I saw other shops putting up new items for each holiday and preparing for Halloween in July. I saw them do brand rep searches and wondered if that was what I needed. I saw them making reels on a daily basis and tried to keep up. I had gotten into a cycle where I was defining success by what other’s were doing and not by setting my own goals or looking to what God wanted me to do with the gifts He had given me. I had known for a bit that keeping up with stories, reels and posts were distracting me from my family and those around me. Don’t get me started on keeping keeping up with the algorithm always changing or what was being seen the most at that time. Once I heard that whisper from the Holy Spirit, I knew it was time to listen. I made a post explain that I was stepping way and why, and I let everyone know that they could email me for custom orders. I then deleted both Instagram and Facebook and held strong to that fast for all of June and a few days into July. Let me tell you, it was wonderful. We all know that our phones can be something that takes our attention away from family or those around us and I knew that to be true for myself, but it was very eye opening to realize how much it was taking away. I was more present in car rides with my husband, playing with my kids, and around family in general. I couldn’t believe how many times I would have a desire to grab my phone at a red light (which I don’t even like to admit but, would happen). It actually was scary to look around more at those red lights and see how many people are looking down at their phones knowing that I used to be one of them. Even in times when I was watching a family movie with my kids I felt more present and attentive when they had questions or pointed out what they enjoyed. My work did not suffer either, I had 2-3 custom orders lined up that kept me plenty busy and were very fun to work on. I still photographed them to share eventually but even those felt easier to accomplish because I wasn’t stopping to share stories along the way. Don’t get me wrong, sharing on social media is not a bad thing, but it certainly was life-giving to step away from. I took time to ask God what He wanted me to do with BabyCloth and I felt led to start this blog. I felt that it could be a space where I can share sewing and crafting projects, where I can share areas in motherhood that I struggle and how He has refined me. I also felt it would be a space where I could share what He has done in my life. I now recognize that my areas of focus are the beautiful custom baby gifts that I am asked to make and praying that anything I write or share along the way will help others. The last thing I want to share about what I learned from my social media fast is how quickly I was drawn back in. I did not rush to open up Instagram immediately on July 1; it was actually just sometime in that first week of July that I decided to open it up. I then went about 2 more weeks before downloading the app again. I found that even just opening the web version using Safari on my phone led to temptations of opening it to mindlessly scroll. I realized that it was going to take some very real intentionality so that I do not allow my phone and social media to distract me from my husband and kids. I know that it can be a useful tool to connect with others and that I can use it to share the projects that I am working on. Actually the only reason that I downloaded the app was that I found a small group of Christian moms who I am doing a devotional with for the next 30 days. Social media certainly has space in my life and I am not done with it, however I’m so grateful to have seen the ways I was using it wrong. I am grateful to be more aware of slipping into the comparison game and will be planning to do more fasts in the future.
