Getting rid of MD for good? Has anyone out there media fasted? Lets compare notes!

[laurellestarz]

When I started college I went through periods of time where I didn't daydream at all.

It was usually because I couldn't get my hands on the TV in the common room, and also because I didn't take any manga, anime, video games, or music with me.

(BTW, soundtracks are the WORST trigger for me because my imagination runs wild and there's no stopping it once it starts.)

At best, I had internet in my dorm and really I tried to limit that and the kinds of websites I visited.  The times I had relapses was when I would watch movies online or read fanfiction. I really hated myself when I did this stuff.

 

I realized that if I cut all (and I mean ALL) media, my fantasies were eventually after a while extinguished because there was nothing to feed the fire. I got to some critical point where it almost seemed unbearable. I felt that if I didn't fantasize I would just die. But the feeling passed and for a long while ( a couple of months) I was relatively normal and happy.

But then came a weekend where no one was using the TV (it was the holidays)... and so I used it, and that destroyed all of the progress I had made and my arse was kicked back to square one.

 

My question to you guys is have any of you media fasted successfully? And is anyone out there doing this permanently?And if so what are your results so far?

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I wonder if its even possible to do that? Because until late 19th century we didn't have any movies and people had to either go somewhere to get music or learn how to play an instrument. So as a species- we don't really need any of it, we've been doing fine without it for centuries.

One of my professor's doesn't even own a TV, all he has is classical music, books, and a phone in his home. He says that he'll never expose his kids to that trash. (It's not trash to me though!) I always wondered what the heck was his problem... and how his wife puts up with him! But now I think I'm beginning to understand. I think that some of us out there aren't equipped to deal with all this new, super-fun, flashy stimuli. Too bad I lost contact with him, this was before I found I found out about MD. I used to think he was a total loon, lol.

 

How he managed to permanently cut himself off from media for the past decade like is still a total mystery to me, because I eventually feel I need more than a newspaper to know what's going on out there, but maybe I'm just making excuses to indulge in DBZ and icarly. God knows, I'm excited that they're making the Hobbit movies, which is not a good thing for me.  : (

 

I don't know you guys, sometimes I feel like an alcoholic. I think there's a lot of hope for us out there... but some of us will always be one anime episode away from jumping off the wagon. I wish I could get back on the wagon but its SO incredibly hard. I might try again this summer. Does anyone wanna media fast with me this summer or keep a journal or something? IDK, as an experiment to see what happens? 

 

[Julie]

I want to congratulate you a strong and analytical personality. It takes a smart brain to find your own trigger, it takes courage to limit it and it takes strong will to start again after a failure.  (Although it doesn't look like a failure to me). There is a high chance you can make it because you keep on trying.

Talking about media, if this is your trigger, you indeed should cut them. You decide how much. I don't think all media can and should be cut. I also don't think you get excited with EVERYTHING available in media. Information in media can be divided into three groups: not interesting to you, interesting to you but not causing special thinking (or call it dreaming) and so interesting that it makes you think. The first one you and any other person limit by default, the second one is the the optimal for you, the last one is also very interesting but if it puts you in excessive dreaming state, you should limit it. The art is to define, which one is which. I did this exercise successfully, so it is possible.

I don't think we should limit the media consumption just because. Similarly to your professor I also don't own TV but this is the choice. Some people love TV and I probably can understand them. I don't like the stuff they serve there, so paying for TV would be simply the waste of money as I won't use it anyway. Good Discovery, CNN, BBC programs could be watched on Internet, news and music are also there, I prefer to watch movies in theatres or via Internet. Theatre, mp3, books, newspapers and magazines stay.

I don't think that it was better in 19th centure, where no music records and movies were available. It wasn't worse, also. It was different. I'm really happy with Internet, my life would be worse without Facebook, Internet stores, YouTube, this site and many others. But, yes, this is truth in my case that Internet is the strongest trigger as information there is almost unlimited and it can feed your brain all the time.

 

What I did in last month is that I'm still spending a lot of time consuming different media but I limit those, which could trigger my imagination too much in that particular time. When I was obsessed with Inception, I didn't read dreaming articles, didn't listen to its soundtrack and didn't watch similar movies. When it was gone, I did read dreaming articles, did listen to the soundtrack (which is wonderful) and did watch a lot of Inception-style moview. But the perception was different. There are many more examples like this.

What do you think about trying the above?

[laurellestarz]

Thanks for the encouragement, I actually haven’t thought about separating media into categories. The opportunity to cut off all media came when I started college, so I took it and it worked well for a while. I get excited with almost everything in the media, there really is no show or movie or song that I can’t listen to without going somewhere, even the news takes me places, lol. But documentaries and comedy radio don’t take me anywhere so I guess that’s a start. Also some videogames like Mario galaxy are okay, but then playing games like that feel like a chore.

I guess it’s nearly impossible to cut it all off completely, (unless you’re my professor).  Life would suck if we didn’t have e-mail or facebook, etc. I have to work on not going into other sites when I’m online but it gets hard since as you said the internet has unlimited info that can feed the imagination. Lately I often go in for one thing and end up somewhere else.

I really like what you did with inception, how you didn’t go into research mode. I often do that and end up paying a really high price. I’m gonna try that the next time I go to the movies, try to put it out of my head by the time I get home. I also think it’s awesome how you don’t have a TV, I covered the TV in my room with a towel and pulled the plug, my parents think I’m nuts.