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On a weekend, recently, I was looking at the Instagram stories in my feed and one came up that bothered me. Someone snapped (I guess that’s a word now) their entire date night on both Instagram and Snapchat. I don’t have Snapchat, but I know this because the captions on Instagram were encouraging followers to also go over there to watch other parts from their date.

3 Reasons why this bothered me:

1. It says that documenting your date is more important than enjoying it.
2. Your spouse deserves more undivided time and attention on date night than this.
3. The time with them on your date is being taken for granted.

Let me explain

I’m an advocate of date night because I love the opportunities to grow closer that come with having one-on-one time doing an enjoyable activity with your spouse. So I was just kind of baffled that someone wanted to spend their date night posting pictures and video (mostly about their food btw), and captioning them on not just one, but two social media platforms. And we all know that thinking and writing a caption is not just a ten-second thing, it can take several minutes. So basically, the time all this took was adding up in my book.

I’ll admit that sometimes my husband and I are doing something on our phones for two minutes. And other times I’ll quickly post a pic because I like to share what we are doing, or what we did for date night in hopes that it inspires others. And maybe you posting about your date could do the same. There’s nothing wrong with using your phone occasionally. However, we don’t have to continually interrupt the nice flow of moments to take pictures and video and post it for everyone to be a part of. I believe that doing this takes away opportunities for authentic memories and conversation.

When you think about it, doing that defeats the whole intent of what a date night is in the first place! Like I said above, a date is supposed to be one-on-one time, not the two of you and your 1,000 followers!

wHAT IT ALL COMES DOWN TO

I don’t write this post to say “Don’t use your phones on a date!” or “Social media is so bad!” because social media is so fun and connecting, and phones can be extremely useful on dates! I write this because spending quality time together is so crucial to a marriage, and date night does that for us. If we allow ourselves to get distracted by whatever ’to-do’ we need to complete on our phones or making sure others know we live an interesting life, then I feel that the quality of the date decreases, sadly.

I think as newlyweds, dates can be taken for granted. We are used to spending time together on a consistent basis, and probably used to having a date night every weekend. But I bet you the couples with kids reading this right now are saying, “JUST WAIT ‘TIL YOU HAVE KIDS!” haha. So I am actually grateful this happened because I was able to evaluate how I’m choosing to spend the time I get with my spouse. It has made me ask myself, “Could we have been having a great conversation during that time we were on our phones waiting for the movie to start?” and “Does my spouse feel like I am not paying attention to him when I check my phone while on our dates?”

When it comes to enjoying a memorable date together and wanting to document it, I feel like the best balance is to just post about it when you get home. Focus on enjoying the moment, then capturing the moment with some pictures and videos, but continue enjoying it until the date is over with. Those are just my thoughts, though! Decide what quality your dates are currently and either keep going with it if it feels just fine, or make changes if necessary.

If you’re looking for some potentially great conversation ideas, check out this book I found that we take with us every once in awhile!

I’ve also written a three-part series on how social media affected date nights for me, and for our marriage in general. You can go here to read about that.

What are your thoughts? Please share below!

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