Recently our family made a very difficult decision that has affected our lives on a daily basis. It has affected our income. It has affected the way we spend our time. It has even affected the way we relate to each other. It was a very difficult decision, but one that had to be made.
This past week, while the kids and I were in Kentucky, my husband packed up the satellite receiver and shipped it back to Dish Network. What? Not the gut-wrenching topic you expected? It sounds silly but I can’t think of the number of times I’ve heard, “there’s no way I could live without cable!” About three months ago, we started kicking around the idea of getting rid of the service for many reasons, of which I’ll discuss in a minute. It really was a tough choice! For a month and a half we repeatedly said to each other, “we really need to call and cancel the dish.” Two months, almost two full months went by before we got around to it. (I can’t tell you that the wait had nothing to do with the fact that I enjoy watching Jeopardy every evening with my husband.)
Anyway, we finally did get around to calling and in a couple weeks we received the box for shipping the receiver in. I’m so glad they sent that box. Having to ship off all that equipment was kind of a ‘no going back’ moment. Once it was gone, it was gone. But you know what’s amazing to me? We haven’t really missed it. I mean every now and then the kids will dream of Sponge Bob and I used to enjoy a good episode of Phineas and Ferb, but for the most part we’re surviving just fine. Even thriving, I’d say.
I certainly do not think having cable or satellite made us horrible people. But I do think we’ve been happier without it. For anyone even remotely thinking about tossing out the remote (haha), I have to offer encouragement. I want to highlight just a few of the benefits we’ve experienced.
Saving Money
The most obvious benefit has been the money we’re saving by not having satellite service. We were spending $100.00 every month for just about every channel available – 75% of which we never watched. $100.00 a month is a big deal to just about any family these days! With the recent purchase of a vehicle and unexpected medical bills piling up, ‘extra’ is a welcomed blessing! Yes, we enjoyed all the history and learning channels. We’ll miss those the most, I know. But they really aren’t necessary. YouTube and other video sites make educational television readily accessible for free.
Saving time
Have you ever sat down to check the weather on the news and ended up sitting there for an hour? Two hours? More likely here it’s either checking the sports scores late at night or watching just one episode of Sponge Bob that ends up as 5 episodes. One of my biggest frustrations as a homeschool mom is waking up in the morning to a living room full of kids staring at a tv. grrrr It is so much harder to start the day off with joyful attitudes and early lessons when you have to drive a bunch of kids off the couch by flipping off the tv in the middle of Pokémon. They’re not happy campers. So much of our time is wasted by the television. As parents, sometimes we neglect spending time with the kids because we want to watch tv. Sometimes the kids neglect their work – chores and education – because they want to watch tv. Sometimes, my housework doesn’t get done because I want to watch tv! It’s extremely easy for 30 minutes to turn into an hour or two hours when it comes to television watching. What a waste!
Real family time
We enjoy sitting down to a family movie every now and then. And by every now and then I don’t mean a couple nights a week or even one night a week. Instead of all of us sitting in the same room and not talking to each other or looking at each other, we talk. We sing. We play games. We read the Bible or other books the kids choose. We read our Sonlight read alouds sometimes. We visit Grandma for dinner and games. (She loves playing skipbo and so do the kids.) We are interacting. We even take walks! Yay for exercise – we all need that!
Using our resources
It’s sad to admit but our kids probably have thousands of dollars worth of toys, games and movies in the house. One benefit to getting rid of satellite television has been that they are actually using some of these things again. We have two long dresser drawers overflowing with DVDs and video cassettes. And that’s just the kids’ collection! They are discovering some of their favorite movies again. Some they’d forgotten they had! I do still wake up some mornings to Dora or Transformers but I know that pretty soon the video will stop and begin rewinding. The fuss isn’t quite as great.
They play with board games and toys that just months ago were deemed boring. They even get to play the Wii more than before. And this they absolutely love. : ) My kids beg to play the Wii daily. This of course is NOT one of the joys of motherhood. With less tv watching, I am happy to let them play the Wii a little more often. But eliminating the satellite service has actually caused us to not play the video games as much either, really. We’re just too busy doing other things.
Freedom to serve
We’ve begun exploring another form of entertainment too. It’s called “work”. : ) Yes, I’m serious. We are discovering the joys of work. The satisfaction of completing a task. Of serving each other. This may sound trite, but work ethic is majorly lacking in the world today. All we are taught as Americans centers around getting through life with as much money and things as possible acquired by as little work, time and effort possible. We want luxury and laziness or relaxation and retirement. As a Christian, I know that this is completely opposite of what God commands of me! I can’t let my family fizzle out into a worldly pleasure-seeking, selfish and lazy brood. This is the path we’ve been on and, as a society, we’re conditioned to believe it’s a noble cause, partly by what we see lived out on television.
My daughter sewed a pillow for her little baby cousin last week. My youngest son is thrilled about learning to sew. My oldest son is discovering what it means to be the leader of his siblings. He’s understanding what it means to set an example. To be a help to me. To be a help to them, especially when their dad is not here to do it. All the kids have helped me cook much more than they did before. They do their chores a little more willingly. We are all learning that serving one another, demonstrating Christ’s love to one another is way more rewarding than an hour of television ever was.
As we’ve seen the benefits of not having satellite service, we’ve been encouraged to rid of other things in our life that are time wasters. Right now, we have three televisions in the house and I wouldn’t be surprised if we only have one by the end of the year. I think the biggest benefit to this hefty decision has been all of us learning to not find our contentment in circumstances and stuff. We don’t need any thing to make us happy. All we need is Christ. Things will never bring us happiness, not true happiness. We’re learning that we could be happy in a cave with nothing but Christ. This is a life-long lesson. I’m sure we’ll be learning it until the day we die. But we’re getting there.
