Editor’s Note from April: This excerpt from Katrina Kenison’s Mitten Strings for God really struck a chord with me. The more I read about mothers’ experiences turning off the TV, the more excited I am to try it in my own home. We thought this would be a great featured post as we prepare for Screen-Free Week April 29th – May 5th.
Our lives are a series of choices. Some we deliberate over, others we make automatically. But as we begin to live our lives more consciously, with more attention to the details, we become increasingly aware of just how many decisions we do make in the course of every day–from what we toss into our grocery carts to the images we allow into our living rooms.
We begin to choose foods that promote healthy bodies and, in the same way, we begin to choose sensory experiences that nurture our souls. Knowing that the shape and mood we bring to a day has a deep effect on our children’s own sense of well-being, we begin to pay more attention to the atmosphere in our homes. We may become more thoughtful in our words and gestures, more deliberate as we attend to our surroundings. The challenge, of course, is to make our choices creatively, so that the details of our lives support and nourish what is best in us.
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As I think back to the battles my children and I used to have over shows and times and channels and hours in front of the set–and to the vague sense of unease I felt about plopping my young children down in front of the loud, insistent sounds and images of television–I realize that the cold turkey approach was the right way for our family. After a few weeks of adjustment, we were weaned. And after that, we never looked back.
In our house, eliminating television cleared a space for the things we really care about. In fact, I don’t think it is an exaggeration to say that turning off the TV was the greatest single thing my husband and I have done to foster creativity, imaginative play, and independent thinking in our children. What’s more, we realized that we suddenly felt more connected to each other and more in touch with ourselves. Somehow we got far more than we gave up. We’ve found that no TV means
- More time for music. When Henry doesn’t know what to do with himself, he goes to the piano or picks up his guitar to pass the time. He and his dad practice together every day, I’ve taken up the recorder, and Jack is the rhythm section. Many evenings we all sing and play together.
- More time for reading. We read aloud, we read alone, we read for pleasure and education. In fact, we jump down into books as if they were rabbit holes, passageways into other realms. Everyone in the family has a book going all the time.
- More time for art. There are hours for drawing and coloring and projects. Like music, art is simply part of daily life.
- More time for play.
- More compassion. Television turns us all into jaded voyeurs. When you are bombarded with violence, sex, and catastrophe, you can’t help but become desensitized to the images that wash over you. Once we eliminated that daily flood of sensory information from our lives, our own senses seemed heightened. Our children experience life fully and feel it deeply–both its beauty and its sadness.
- More time for each other. No TV has meant that we have all gotten very good at entertaining ourselves; we know how to make our own fun, how to make one another laugh.
- More time to live. We spend our days doing instead of watching; entering into real-life activity instead of disengaging from the world; creating our own images and stories instead of absorbing manufactured ones. When it’s time to relax, we do so without delivering ourselves over to the media. We open ourselves to the moment instead.
Once we see our homes as sanctuaries from a hectic world, then televison begins to feel more and more like an unsavory intruder, robbing our rooms of life and meaning, stealing our time, and preying on our souls. When it comes to TV, less is really more. Or, as my son Henry has advised me: “Just say that TV fills your head up with other people’s ideas, which means that you don’t have as much room for your own. Also, it’s a waste of time.” Words of wisdom from a product of the counterculture.
When the TV goes off, life begins.
CHALLENGE: If you haven’t done so yet, sign the pledge on our Facebook page for Screen-Free Week!
We are unplugged this week. Except for some photo editing and other job related activities we’re are unplugged at home. I love these weeks even though it takes my kids a day or two to detox. Today is Wednesday. I call it Happy Day because the detox is usually done by now. There is more music – piano, drums, tin whistle or even listening to the Christian radio station (ok so that is plugged in). There is more trampoline time. More walks. Life, in general, is better.
If anyone out there thinks it can’t be done…..it can.
Even eliminating the computer from my day helps me get so much more done!
Go Unplugged!!!
I completely agree, especially about compassion. We haven’t gone cold turkey at our house, but when I start to get too relaxed about screen time (computer, iphone games and the TV) I notice that behavior and attitudes start to slide. There is no getting around it. Thank you for this reminder!
We purposely do not watch TV or have cable. Doing so means we have time to talk, play games and read. Our weakness is video games. I think that will be our goal for this week – turning off the other technology in the house.
I am wondering how it is possible?? I have 2 boy tots one 4 and one 2 1/2 if I don’t put on a show for them to watch after breakfast I can’t take a shower! If I dont put anything on I’m most positive the house will be a wreck when I am done. Do you have any suggestions because I would love to do it, but can’t see it working.
I had three in diapers at one time. Sometimes I think you do what you have to to survive. Get your shower!!
We unplugged for Lent this year – 40 days and 40 nights, and I was ASTOUNDED at the changes it wrought in our home. I didn’t have time to entertain the kids with a newborn in the house, so they had to figure it out themselves, and figure it out they did. They devoured books, wallpapered the house with their drawings, my preschooler even figured out how to write words phonetically and started making his own cartoons. They became kinder and gentler, especially to each other. It was so refreshing not to have to argue and referee the blasted TV! I’d encourage anyone to give it a go!
For DOREE, is your 2 year old still in a crib? Could you put the kids in their beds with books or some special toys brought out only for that window of time? If you don’t think they’d stay put, maybe you could give them color wonder markers and paper and have them color on the bathroom floor while you shower with one eye watching them. And learn to shower REALLY fast!
We don’t have TV in the house, and are internet-free on Sundays when there is neither work nor homework (my husband telecommutes full time, so on weekdays we need that connection on). Ever since we instituted this, Sundays are a fantastic time. And yes, sometimes we think our children have _almost_ too much imagination. Almost.
I had 3 kids 3 and under… I would have gone insane if I didn’t put something on at times. I used short dvd’s which had a beginning and and an end and no advertising. A happy mum is worth half an hour i say….