This time last year, I went on my first meditation retreat. It was a 10-day Vipassana silent retreat, which my boyfriend calls “meditation boot camp”, because I couldn’t bring anything: no books, no journal, no phone, no computer, no facebook, no twitter. I couldn’t even talk or make eye contact with my fellow retreat goers.

“You’re not gonna last a day,” he supportively predicted. I laughed because he knows me too well. I am a child of the internets/multitasking age. I’m a child that grew up with the radio on, the TV blaring, I’m on the phone, on IM, and doing my homework at the same time. I’m the generation where ADD, diagnosed or not, is a common disorder.

On top of that, the temperament, or constitution in the Indian Ayurvedic system, I was born with is characteristic of the wind: airy and fast-moving. Working with the ADD tendency is hard enough, it’s even harder in a culture such as ours, where everyone and everything seems to be all about distraction (for example: a cable news screen would have stock ticker at the bottom of the screen, weather, traffic on top, headline news running across, and four political commentators in separate locations on the main screen, and a tweet stream on the side).

In other words, I’m SOL when it comes to cultivating any ability to concentrate and focus for long periods of time. And yet, focus and concentration is the very thing I’m working on as a dedicated meditator.

Now what?

So, I’ve decided to give myself some bitter medicine. I’ve decided to go without Twitter and Facebook for a while. How long of a while? Well, I lasted seven days this first round. The first day was the hardest, when I would go and justthisclose to opening TweetDeck, when I’d stop myself. I do realize that there are many many useful uses for Twitter. I’d use it if I were stuck in storm in the middle of nowhere. I’d use it if I were at a conference and looking for fellow conference goers.

I had very many normal, ordinary uses for Twitter this past week, like asking for recommendations for places to eat and stay when I was in Portland, Oregon, or wondering if an event I was going to was cancelled or not. I made do without Twitter, however, in keeping with my vow.

So, I’ll be keeping track of my experience, and no doubt write about it here.