SAMEtember

I have been reading several books recently, each having themes saying something like this… “Our minds are always being filled with something, they are never empty. We become what we fill ourselves with, so what are you filling your mind with?”

Now, if I ever get free time, I have found myself in the habit of going straight to watching TV shows. I’ll usually put on Netflix and more often than not watch several shows, one after another. Time somehow slips past and before I know it my night is over and rarely am I rested more than before the evening started.

Now hear me when I say, there is nothing wrong or even bad about watching a show (in general). In fact, there have been several with themes or characters that have reminded me of truths about God. But just because I can watch shows doesn’t mean I need to spend as much time as I have in the past.

At the same time as these thoughts were bouncing around in the corners of my mind, I was chatting with a friend of mine who is a nutritionist. She said she encourages people not to go on “diets” that completely eliminate one food group. She explained that Chocolate, ice cream and even chips are ok (in small doses) if you are also having plenty of healthy foods and exercising regularly. The point she was making is, it is healthier to have a balanced intake than to take on extreme diets (which usually don’t last).

In light of these things, I decided to see what I was actually filling my mind with, a sort of science experiment. I didn’t want to fully cut TV out of my life because at times it is really relaxing to sit with my wife and watch a movie. I simply wanted to take note of what I was filling my mind with. So I set myself a small task during the month of September.

The challenge to myself was this... what if I spent the same amount of time taking in God’s word as I do zoning out on TV. 
Simple right? The basic principle was to be balanced - if I watch 30 Minutes of TV, I should try and read scriptures (or christ-centred literature) for 30 minutes too. And “SAMEtember” was birthed.

Now a week into it, this is what I have found…

Because I was literally timing how long I was reading or watching TV, I noticed two things at the end of this first week.

1. I have become a lot more aware of what I was spending time doing. This has helped me to snap out of mindless TV watching and somehow caused me to actually look forward to reading, as though I was competing with someone.
   
   
2. I read slowly and I’m dyslexic so I was constantly thinking of all the time it would take to balance the reading with the TV. So at the end of the week my TV time was drastically less than I was expecting. I obviously decided that some shows or movies were not worth wasting that time on.

WEEK ONE results of SAMEtember:  Mon 1st - Mon 7th.
TV Time - 6 hours 33 minutes
Reading Time - 5 hours 25 minutes.

Next update will be in a week. I wonder if you could try it for a week? 

“Let us strip off every weight that slows us down 
...And run with endurance the race God has set before us.” 
- Hebrews 12:1