Katherina Wilkins
Every morning I wake up sometime between the hours of 7 and 8, following the same mundane routine day after day. I look at the time; my eyes want nothing more but to shut again but I force them open to serve as a signal. I tell myself it’s time to start waking up, but I do not drag myself out of bed to go on an early morning run or take a refreshing shower to start my day. The first thing I reach for, without fail, is the phone plugged in beside my bed. Saturday morning is no exception, as I wake up by mindlessly scrolling through some form of social media. On snapchat, I tap through the posts made by friends, not truly paying attention to the details of their lives. On tiktok, I see the newest trend roaming the app, a video that puts a smile on my face, and a list of songs that “make you feel on top of the world.” I then move on to YouTube where I check the recommendations section: “Celebrities Read Mean Tweets #7,” “What I’m doing in 2021 Instead of Traveling,” “High schoolers decide who gets $1000.” But none of these things fill me with a sense of purpose. I never think to myself, “I am so happy I spent that hour scrolling through my phone. I really gained something from it.” Instead, I experience a deeply engrained feeling of discontent as I ask myself, “Why did I not get up sooner? Why did I not use that time to be productive? I need to change. I’m going to change. It’s just a matter of time.” But each morning I do the exact same thing, experience the exact same feeling, and give myself the spiel once again. I cannot kick the habit. At this point, my phone is like an addiction.
But this morning, the very last day of January, I look outside my window with the anticipation that a changed world will lay before me. The freshly fallen snow lays like a blanket over the yard, untouched, without a single blemish, completely undisturbed by mankind. I listen through the cracked window; I hear birds chirping, singing their morning song. Normally, I find the winter months to be nothing but a nuisance. The plants look like they’ve died and the cold weather chills me to the bone. But this year, I have begun to appreciate the beauty that winter has to offer, as the sun trickles through the bare branches casting shadows upon my walls. Nonetheless, I have always loved the snow. A few hours after waking up, I suit up with the rest of my family to take a walk through my neighborhoood in the icy world before us. I laugh as my dog frolics through the snow that is halfway up his legs. I pay attention to see if anyone has walked the same path as us, but we are the first to leave a trail of footprints behind. I look up at the pale white sky to see giant snowflakes falling towards me at a leisurely pace, slowly melting as they land on my gloves. I come to the realization that nature takes its time. It is not concerned with the fast, short-term entertainment that I have grown accustomed to. It is these memories, the walks I take with my parents as we admire the snow, telling stories and sharing in laughter, that I will cherish the most.
I began this assignment with the mindset that I already knew what the outcome would be. Afterall, I know that my love of nature will always surpass that of social media. What I did not expect, is how the process of writing about these vastly different experiences would change my outlook on the morning habits I have adopted. In a way, it required me to be honest with myself and has granted me an overwhelming motivation to make a change that I believe will have a large impact on the way I feel. I am under no illusion that I will kick my bad habits in one fell swoop, but I have already begun to make a change. I have limited the number of social media sites I visit and I am cutting down the time spent on my phone in small increments, with the end goal of spending no part of my morning on my phone all together. I would rather spend this time taking a short walk outside to prepare myself for the day or water my plants with music in the background that puts me at ease. I believe that starting my day surrounded by natural beauty will be a much more fulfilling experience, and I am interested to see the shifts in my mood when the changes are eventually made.