Social media detox

Before the detox

 After a long chat about what we want NUET to truly be all about we have decided to go a week without social media - no Instagram posts, no articles and no social media activity in general. We feel like we need to reconnect with what inspires us, and to relax a bit to regain that inspiration. 

It is only for a week, but since we constantly have to organize the website itself, answer emails, manage Nuet Wear, both Instagrams, our fb page etc, a lot of our time is dedicated to social media. Don't get us wrong, we absolutely love Nuet, and not to mention all of you- the people that make the hard work worth it, but we realized that we needed a few days to recharge. Social media provides the wonderful opportunity of connecting with people from all over the world and so much more, but it can sometimes also be draining. Therefore, in order for us to fully be present in our lives, and to put up the best content we can, we felt that a short detox is just what we need. 

“What is life, I wondered.

A voice whispered in my ear,

life is nothing but this moment.”

-R. Jacob

After the detox

Martine: 

I recently returned from a week spent in Israel and Palestine. During my stay, I visited different Palestinian refugee camps that my school collects money for every year, and I talked to both children and adults that have to face this harsh reality, of living in the middle of a conflicted area. Not to sound too much like a cliché but after my visit, I needed some time to process all the different impressions properly. The problem was, that when I got back home, it felt so weird trying to get into my old habits, at the same time as I was trying to process such a huge amount of new feelings and experiences. Most of the trip, I did not have any access to wifi, and to be honest it felt very liberating. Therefore, taking a break from social media for a while seemed like just the right thing for me at the time.

Before this trip I had started feeling a lack of inspiration and creativity, and combining work, school, friends, Nuet and every other social media platform, was just more stressful than ever. I am guilty of being a multi-tasker, and not feeling bound by Tumblr, Instagram, Snapchat and so on, felt very freeing. Clearing my mind and detaching myself like that was lovely, although it did feel slightly odd at times. The first few days, I would unlock my phone and then lock it again as I remembered that I was not going to check my emails nor be active on social media. As the week went on, I actually noticed how much of your time that is «eaten up» by your phone.

Social media is great in many ways, but I have truly learned how important it is to take some time to breathe and simply be every once in a while. We are not machines, and by distancing myself from the constant stream of news just for a few days, I found myself scribbling down ideas for posts and reading more than I have done in a while. My final thoughts are that I am defiantly grateful towards social media and all the interesting people and inspiration it can bring you, but that also implies that we need to remember to listen to our bodies and let our minds wander on their own sometimes.

Nora Marie:

To start off, I would like to inform you that this wasn't something I did in order to prove a point. It wasn't to prove that social media is ruining my life or having a massive negative effect on my life. This was a way for me to unplug for a little while. A way to not worry about what was going to be written one day, or uploaded the next. For such a long time I had to force myself to be in a creative spirit all the time. How else would I have the ability to publish interesting articles that mean a lot to me? Although this week has been very busy with school, meetings, extracurricular events, work and writing, I found that I indeed used my phone a lot less. You guessed it, of course, I would use my phone less considering I have a lot less to use on it. It felt liberating to only be using Facebook to talk to the people that mattered and work that makes me smile. Since deleting apps like Snapchat and Instagram I have had to find daily inspiration from elsewhere. In the middle of the week, I also lot my headphones, which really stressed me out as my headphones are such a big part of my life. When I was on the bus or walking outside I had to find other things to focus on.  

I am happy to have both apps again on my phone, and I am looking forward to keep posting what inspires me and share with you all. We both also love to interact and keep in touch with all of the people we have in our lives because of Nuet. 

This was a week that made me think, reconsider and reconnect with what inspires me.