It’s been bizarre to see Twitter become so popular so quickly. I love its versatility and how it’s helped me do a lot of different things in my professional and personal life. For no particular reason I decided to take a month off to see what I missed, what I didn’t, and anything else I might have noticed.

Things I missed.

• Tweeting my frustrations with “the way things are”
• Questions my followers could help me with
• Talking about what I was listening to
• Complimenting @blairblends on his fab new avatar
• Announcements of big achievements (I had two!)
• Marking tweets as favorites.
• Reading tweets from friends
• Reading tweets from people who can teach me something I want to learn.

Things I did not miss

• The noise
• Being among the first to know about scandals or deaths
• Green avatars
• Reading tweets from people I am trying to keep tabs on

What Now?

I think it’s time to focus a little bit more on the people who I like the most on Twitter. This is going to mean unfollowing a lot of people I have been following for a long time. It’s going to mean unfollowing some people who follow me. I’m OK with that.

I also felt like I had more creative energy for bigger projects. I was surprised how much not tweeting meant for my “blog ideas” lists or ideas for my book. I think I’ll be moving toward just the occasional tweet during the day and doing most of my tweeting at night.

But overall, I found it an interesting experiment. If Twitter is a big deal for you (and I imagine some of you reading this might fit that description), I recommend taking some time off and seeing what you learn.