It’s weird to say, but I think the most distinctive aspect of our home isn’t the number of overflowing bookshelves (literally—we have stacks of books that don’t fit in our bookcases), or frames and frames of religious art, or the surprising number of lamps in every room (overhead lighting is for the birds).

The most distinctive element of our home is that we don’t have a TV.

I lived with my parents before Stephen and I got married, so I had never owned a television of my own. And Stephen had an old monitor that went largely unused. It’s not something we’ve ever really wanted. While we were dating we did watch a movie here and there, but typically we cooked together, went on walks or runs, went to breweries/bars/restaurants, played board games, worked on puzzles, spent time with friends, and often just sat together and read something out loud.

Now that we’re married and spend more time together, we definitely watch more movies or shows than we used to. However, getting a tv just doesn’t seem like a good fit for us.

Something I’ve noticed as a culture (and I’m not the first one to note this), is that we’ve forgotten something about the art of leisure.

Entertainment has flooded our homes in the form of scrolling through the endless stream of social media, and the almost infinite number of tv shows, movies, and podcasts at our finger tips. Of course, none of these things are bad. There are great movies, edifying podcasts, and inspirational people on social media. But I do think that this vast array of pixelated media makes it really hard to look away. It’s so easy. And fun. And distracting.

At the end of a long day it is so much easier to turn on the television or scroll through Instagram than it is to read a book. In those two minutes stuck at a light it is much more fun to open up a social media app than to sit and ponder. When we’re faced with difficult emotions it is much more tempting to bury them in our phones with distraction than to sift through what we’re feeling.

As a result, books collect dust, games go unplayed, and true, real, connection is placed on the back burner.

As I already said, my goal is not to demonize technology and all that it offers us. However, it is to consider what a balance looks like.

After a year and a half off of social media (mainly Instagram), I felt pulled to start posting again a few months ago. Stephen and I discussed this decision and agreed on a 30 minute daily limit so as to put some boundaries on this tool that has a tendency to suck our time away from us.

At first this was mostly successful, however as time went on I found myself ignoring the reminder over and over again. This began to concern me, especially as I found it distracting me from giving my daughter my undivided attention. I wrestled with this pang in my conscience before seriously praying about it and finally coming to the resolution to dial back my time on social media to only two days a week.

This serves the purpose of ridding myself of the distraction throughout most of the week, making me more intentional about what I post (because I can only post so much over the course of two days), and spending less brain space on likes and follows and more on the tasks and people in front of me.

It may not work. Maybe I need to get off entirely, time will tell. I am immensely grateful to my husband who keeps me accountable and checks in with my resolutions regularly. Although the choleric in me wants to be all or nothing, someone pointed out that there’s an opportunity for virtue here.

Virtue lies in the mean. With something like social media there is certainty a lot of ambiguity as to where the mean lies. But I suspect that many of us are leaning heavily toward the area of excess when it comes to time invested in our screens.

At the end of the day, what really matters is the relationships we are in and the vocations we’ve been given. Maybe social media can be a part of that, but it certainly should not be the focus.

Off of our screens lie endless opportunities for growth, fulfillment, joy, peace, and ultimately, love. But we won’t find those things scrolling on Instagram, because it’s just not real.

Here’s to the golden mean.

— miranda