Ahem…(clears throat) Attention, readers! I hereby call to order the first meeting of what I like to refer as “Internet Junkies Anonymous.” Kindly place your cellular devices, iPads, tablets and other media devices down as we come together to talk about our favorite pastime, surfing the net.
Okay, okay…so this post isn’t really about gathering together to overcome our love of the Internet. Far from it! It’s about sharing the love! I freely admit I’m an Internet junkie– –more specifically, a social media junkie. And that’s okay. The first step to recovery is admitting you have an addiction, yes?
When Larissa asked me to write a guest post about how the Internet affects my daily life, especially with regard to social media outlets such as Twitter,
Facebook etc. I’ll admit I had a mini panic attack. What in God’s name would I write? Um…hi, my name is Lisa and I spend way too much time on Twitter and Facebook? Or maybe “Pssst…my screen name is Netjunkie. Drop me a line sometime.” The first seems a bit sad, the latter, desperate. And no, lol, my screen name isn’t Netjunkie!
Truth is, although social media outlets can be a huge time suck, they are also invaluable tools. They allow us to connect with one another in a way we were never able to before. Shoot, I remember getting my first pager when I was just out of high school and thinking it was the coolest thing in the world. People could beep me when I wasn’t home and I’d know to call them. Wow! What a novel idea. And my first cell phone? The thing was huge! I didn’t care, though. That big, damn phone let me connect with others when I otherwise wouldn’t have been able to, and I was beyond thankful for it.
Flash forward a great many years (ahem, I’m sooo not divulging my age). Cell phones now fit in the palm of our hands and we have outlets like Facebook and Twitter where we can chat with people, look at pictures and share instant message conversations in real time with people living on the other side of the planet. Wicked cool!
My two favorite mediums are Facebook and Twitter. I’d set up a FB account prior to becoming published, and find it’s great for connecting with people on a casual level. Yes, I do have an “author page” but for the most part, I use FB to connect with my closest peeps, and share cheer pics and video (I’ve got three daughters in All star cheerleading). Twitter, on the other hand, has been invaluable to me as far as meeting new people and networking 
my “author brand.” I didn’t know a soul when I came onto the Twitter scene and honestly felt a bit like a guppy in a shark tank. Would people talk to me? What if no one liked my Tweets? God, how do I fit what I want to say into 140 characters? It took a bit of patience on my part to get the swing of it, but once I did, whoa baby, I was a lean, mean, tweetin’ machine!
Going back to what I said earlier about social media being a time suck, as an author, and a busy mother of three, I find I need to limit my time spent on the net. Gasp! It’s too easy to get caught up in the massive amounts of free information thrown my way. While it’s important for me to connect with both my readers and my friends, If I’m not careful, I can waste an entire morning sitting in front of the computer. That’s never a good thing.
Books don’t write themselves! Balance is key, or as my mother always said “everything in moderation.”
My best advice to readers, authors, and really, anyone surfing the net, is to exercise restraint. Budget your time. Chat on FB, hop on Twitter and Google to your heart’s content, but limit the amount of time you spend doing so. Maybe set aside thirty minutes in the morning for reading blogs or sending out tweets. If that’s not enough time (I require more than that myself) then set aside another small chunk of time later in the day. Allotting time for surfing the net and social media will help you keep up with your goals and prevent you from suffering “Internet Remorse” later on. Good luck!
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