The Lies of Social Media

I think social media is a great tool that can be used to connect with creative people and great companies all around the world, but I find it very hard to use it solely as a productive tool.  Often I find myself wasting precious time on it, time I will never get back.

A quick scroll through instagram turns into writing down book recommendations, adding places to my “explore Los Angeles” list, and much too often looking at friends of friends and friends of friends of friends of the opposite sex ( filters make them look good!).  Most of what I do on social media can, in some sense, be classified as productive.  But in the big picture of my life and my goals it is not helping me.  

I have also noticed that when I browse social media I am not so happy when I turn it off.  I’ve recently realized that social media is just a highlight reel of the greatest parts of people’s lives and it’s easy to forget that.  For instance, my Instagram is a gingerly perfectly curated feed of beautiful dogs, wonderful food, airlines flights, and travel photos.  But the honest truth is I spend a lot of time sitting at a computer editing footage, driving, and eating raw vegetables that are not even complete food dishes, they are just ingredients!  Social media doesn’t show the fact that not everyone's life is not a collection of perfect moment after perfect moment. It’s important for me to remember that everyone’s life contains highs and lows and often times the lows out number the highs.  

I need to fix this but I don’t think it is wise to cut out social media completely from my life, especially based on my career path in the film industry.  But I do think it is wise to figure out how to control it.  Here is my plan…

• First off I have removed all social media from the homescreen on my phone and put it on the last screen deep in a folder.  This way it is out of sight and hopefully out of mind.  

• Second I will only check it twice a day.  Once in the morning and once at night.  I have set aside 15 minutes in the morning and 15 minutes at night for social media.  After those 15 minutes are up, my social media is over for the day.

I look forward to seeing how I fill the parts of my life that are currently consumed by social media.  The times when I am waiting for the subway or waiting for a friend to show up at a coffee shop.  Instead of reaching into my pocket to stroke a piece of glass and metal to make me feel comfortable perhaps I will talk to the hipster sitting next to me with his $5,000 Apple Watch and EBT card? Just a thought.

This is the plan, it’s bound to change but I know myself and I know I need a plan in order to change or accomplish a goal.  I will keep you all updated in due time.  

I have an itch to write and I’m about to scratch it

35mm Film Photo taken in 2014

The summer before college started I found a book called The Artist’s Way.  It is a book to help with one’s creativity.  It’s a 10 week course that involves taking your “inner creative” out on dates and working with it to maximize it or to help unblock it.  Like most things I did it for a little while but then fell off.  Well, I guess I could say I didn’t fall off and more or less decided I was finished!  One thing I did pull successfully from The Artist’s Way is a practice called “Morning Pages”.  Basically the idea is that each morning you wake up and the first thing you do before going to the bathroom, eating, or brushing your teeth is to write three full pages of longhand writing.

I took this practice and ran with it for about two years.  It was wonderful and made writing one of the easiest things in my life.  Whenever I had a college essay I could now fly through it because thanks to morning pages writing three pages was like breathing to me.  Breath in and out and then I’m done!  

Over the past six months I have fallen off the Morning Pages boat, but I don’t want to fall off of writing. Over the past month I have been having an itch to write and I have started acting on it.  This time it is different in that I have begun to focus my writing more on topics that interest me instead of just random thoughts.   I plan to put my writing on Made By Spencer from now on. 

The writing will not be professional or grammatically perfect for that matter.  It will more or less be writing that falls somewhere between a personal journal and something you would say in a conversation to a friend. It’s going to be very informal and raw.  

Here we go!

Twenty Fifteen Resolution

“History repeats itself and that’s just how it goes”

— J. Cole

Day one of twenty fifteen and it already has me thinking about the year ahead. Will it be better than last year?  Will I grow or will I stagnant?  Will I continue to learn or will I close my mind?

I am not one for resolutions every time a new year comes around, but this year I have one.

I want to say “love” more.  It’s never been a word at the top of my vocabulary. I would like it to have a common place in conversations and in my life. Because the thing is I feel love everyday from friends and people around me but the word “love” is never spoken.   

This is my resolution this year, to say love.

Happy New Year and welcome to 2015-

Spencer