Could You Live Without a TV?
By: Beth Bruno
Tags: Time, Writing, Life Lessons, Lifestyle, Relationships

Could You Live Without a TV?

Here are some things you would gain if you pulled the plug

Photo by Marc Schaefer on Unsplash

Why we pulled the plug

My husband and I are going on 6 years without a TV. It happened because I threw down the gauntlet and he picked it up. We revisit the decision occasionally, but we always come to the same conclusion — our lives are so much better for the lack of a television in our house.

At the beginning of our life together we were living in a little chalet on top of a mountain and the TV reception was spotty at best. There was no cable or satellite, and most days we couldn’t get any stations to come in. That was fine with us, we were newly in love and had plenty of books and music and gardens and hiking trails to fill our days.

Then, we got the opportunity to start life over in a neighboring state and as we were making all the arrangements, I secretly called and had cable connected so he could watch sports. He had always missed football and basketball when we lived on the mountain. It was my gift to him.

Fast forward five years and the TV had become a magnetic force that sucked us to it whenever we were in the house. Having cable meant dozens of channels. There was always something on. The TV was on in our house at least 5 hours a day.

One day I counted up how many hours a week, a month, a year we were spending in front of of the television. It ended up being 76 days a year. Are you stunned? I was!

This number was sobering. That is almost 3 months of our lives glued to the TV. When I showed this number to my husband he seemed skeptical. He didn’t want to admit that we were wasting this much of our lives in front of the “glass teat” as Stephen Kings calls it. But the math doesn’t lie.

We were in the process of buying a new house and when I suggested we not hook up the TV it was with little hope that my husband would agree. I told him that I thought he was addicted to it. That was all it took. He rose to the challenge to prove he could live without it and we have not had a TV since.

When people learn we don’t have a TV their eyes widen and they ask “What do you DO if you don’t watch TV?” It seems to me that people lack imagination to not be able to think what they would do if they didn’t have a TV, but just in case you can’t think of anything, here are some ideas.

Things we have gained by not having a TV:

More Time to Read

One of the things that had happened when the TV was the sun around which our lives revolved was that my husband began complaining that he never had enough time to read. While he knew that if he would turn off the TV he could find time to read, the lure was too strong to resist.

Without a TV in the house, we are both reading much more. Stephen King, in his book “On Writing” says, “Once weaned from the ephemeral craving for TV, most people will find they enjoy the time they spend reading.” He also says “Reading takes time and the glass teat takes too much of it.” We definitely found that to be true.

More Time for Intimacy

While I don’t necessarily mean sex, we have more time for that, too. What I mean by intimacy is the time that you spend together pursuing a shared interest, talking about anything and everything and laughing, laughing, laughing. Being together while creating and sharing meals. Walking hand in hand around the garden in the evening.

These things are the glue that hold a relationship together. If all of your time is spent in front of the TV, when are you finding time to nurture your relationship? How are you staying connected?

More Sunsets

We are lucky that we live on a mountain again, and we have a perfect view of the western sky from our perch on the side of the hill. We put chairs out there and in the evening, after dinner, we take a glass of wine out to the hill and watch the sunset, soaking in the quiet and enjoying more of that intimacy that I talked about above.

If we had a TV, we would be watching one of our “shows” instead of watching the amazing phenomenon of nature at her finest. It is a gentle way to end our day, and so much more rewarding than the next episode of our favorite show.

More Time to Write

No TV in the house means quiet and space for me to write without competing with the noise of the television. Stephen Kings says, “I’d like to suggest that turning off that endlessly quacking box is apt to improve the quality of your life as well as the quality of your writing.”

If you are a writer, think back to the number in the opening of this article. 76 days. How many words could you write in 76 days? That is 1820 hours in a year. You could write a novel or two in that time. Is it really that big of a sacrifice to give up one more episode of “The Bachelor” or whatever the latest hot show is? (Since I haven’t had a TV in 6 years, I have no clue what it is everyone is watching.)

Watching Sports has Turned Into A Date

Now, whenever we want to catch a football or basketball game, we head out to our favorite sports bar, have a beer and some wings and watch a game or two. We get to enjoy the fun of pulling for our favorite teams, and at the same time, we enjoy the atmosphere of ‘date night.” It’s a win-win.

We Get More Sleep

When we had a TV, it was not unusual for it to be on until 11:30 or 12:00 PM. This made it hard to get up in the morning and start our day feeling refreshed. It meant we did not have much time before we had to rush out the door.

Now, we are usually in bed by 9:30 or 10:00 which allows us to wake up extra early (4:30 for my husband, 5:30–6:00 for me)and enjoy the quietest part of the day. I always start my day with a cup of coffee outside on the porch. My husband reads. We both have plenty of time to slowly open to our day without rushing and becoming frantic as we look at the clock.

No Judgement Here

If you have a TV and you love it, don’t hear any judgement from me. I have been there. I know how strong the allure of the content is on that big, flat screen in your living room.

But, if you are willing to experiment with doing without it, even just a few hours a week, I guarantee you will find the time to do the things you say you have no time for. You may even decide, one day, that you really don’t need a television to have a fulfilling life.

Stephen King asks, “How many Frasier and ER reruns does it take to make an American life complete?” (Replace those shows with whatever you are watching today.) Are they really creating the quality of life you have envisioned for yourself? If not, you might just want to try pulling the plug. I promise you will not miss it. And you just may get that novel written!