I have been writing lately about my struggle to preserve my sense of space, self and peace of mind in this era, when messages, notifications, alerts and alarms, many of them pushing fear and anger, are invading my space and putting me on edge and threatening the sense of spirituality, perspective creativity and quiet that I have worked so hard to bring to my life. I feel the sense of immediacy that the Internet, and especially social media like Facebook promote so heavily is obsessing and addicting people and causing them to smother one another – and me, sometimes – with messages, complaints, advice, warnings and most spurious information.

I feel for children and adolescents, caught up in the texting world, unable to think, wait or get to know their own minds, an essential element of creativity and spirituality. But I fear for their parents too, because they are getting into it just as deeply, not on Vine Or Instagram, but on Facebook and Twitter, Pinterest and elsewhere. I am confronting this directly. So far.

– I am reinforcing the idea that my life is not an argument, and I will not argue my choices and decisions on the Internet, or via e-mail.

– I reject drama and trawling for sympathy online.

– I reject the culture of warnings and alarms that have become the currency of many social media discussions.

– I do not do my grieving online, it seems inappropriate and unhealthy to me.

– Significantly to me, I am pausing. I am considering which messages are important, which really need to be answered. All messages do not have to be answered, all queries answered, all worries absorbed.

– I reject the idea that other people have the right to offer me unsolicited advice, a major element of a meaningful and independent life is reaching my own conclusions, making my own decisions, learning from my own mistakes. When I share my life, I am not turning it over to other people.

If I shared my life in a book, no one would even consider telling me what happened to their Uncle Harry or giving unwanted advice. The blog is my book, and the issue is about boundaries, and I don’t want other people telling me how to solve my problems.

Boundaries, as I have learned, are important, and these new kinds of communities – Facebook especially – promote the notion of eliminating boundaries rather than respecting them, which, as any therapist knows, is a critical element of mental health. Sharing my space is not taking it over.

And mostly, there is this question of immediacy. I take time in my writing and photography. I wait before publishing it, I slow the process down. That is the result of my first two days of considering how to preserve my space from the growing intrusions of the frenetic world. More to come.