How Can I Control My Viewing?

Writer Linda Nielsen observes: “Self-control begins by learning to set goals.” To control your TV viewing you will therefore need to establish reasonable limits on your viewing time. The book Breaking the TV Habit suggests that you begin by analyzing your present habits.b Perhaps for a week you can keep track of what shows you watched and how much time you spent each day in front of the tube. Then take a hard look at what shows you’ve been watching. “Does not the ear itself test out words as the palate tastes food?” asks the Bible. (Job 12:11) So use discernment (along with the advice of your parents) and test out what shows are really worth seeing.

Some determine in advance what shows they will watch and turn on the TV only for those shows! Others take sterner measures, establishing no-television-during-the-school-week rules or one-hour-a-day limits. (Some educators recommend that ten hours a week be the limit on TV viewing for school-age youths.) The important thing is that you do set limits on your viewing. But what if a silent TV set proves just too much of a temptation? One family solved the problem this way: “We keep our set in the basement to have it out of the way . . . In the basement there’s less of a temptation to just flick it on when you enter the house. You have to make a special trip down there to watch something.” Keeping your set in the closet, or merely leaving it unplugged, may work just as effectively.