Beyoncé Helps Me Through Facebook Ban

Most of you know who Beyoncé is. ( I didn’t before this week.) Many of you may know I was banned from posting on my IsraelB Facebook Groups and other Facebook Groups for a week, and the ban was lifted last night at 7.53.

Luckily though, I have several social media platforms in my IsraelB online community. So, instead of posting on Facebook, I used the IsraelB newsletter and IsraelB Twitter account – @IsraelBayit to tell people what was happening in our community, as well as of course the IsraelB website.

The question is though, how did Beyoncé help me through the week long ban from posting on Facebook ?

Well, this is the story – Every year I sing at a friend’s karaoke birthday party and the singer whose song I sing is chosen by friends. This year for some reason they chose Beyoncé. The problem for me was that I had never heard of her or her songs and so I had to chose one and learn it for the party.

So, where would I find the time to do this? The answer is, is that thanks to my ban from posting on Facebook groups, I had extra time and in that time I could choose and learn a song of Beyoncé. I chose her song, ‘Halo’ as it had kind of religious connotations.

But, what is the message of the past week of being banned from posting on Facebook groups? No, not just that I learnt who Beyoncé is, but rather, that when you need to you can manage and adapt to a new reality and life circumstances and often you can grow from it too.

More than that, when you change your life patterns and routine you actually find out new things about yourself and life. I found out about Beyoncé, but you can find out about plenty other things too!

Initially, when I first found out that I was banned for a week I didn’t think how I would manage. However, in fact as I used my IsraelB newsletter and Twitter more, the traffic to the IsraelB website was higher than usual. Growing up and surviving in life is all about improvising and changing your behaviour to the new reality you are faced with.

So, to answer some of your questions, of why I was banned from Facebook. There are 3 possible answers:

1. I wrote a TOI blog post reporting the religious fanatics disturbing the Shabbat Project Seudah Shlishit and it was the most popular read blog on the TOI website. It could be Facebook thought I was spamming Facebook due to the amount of times it was shared by other people.
2. They may have been complaints about that TOI blog I wrote.
3. It may have been that as the Shabbat Project was happening and I was posting listings on a number of Facebook groups of what was happening, Facebook thought I was posting too much.

So, what have I learnt from my week long ban from posting on Facebook Groups?

That, basically, you can use life experiences that may initially appear adversary and challenging to actually broaden your horizons and perspective.

In my case, instead of being sorry for myself for being banned from Facebook, I spent the extra time I had learning Beyoncé songs, especially her song, ‘halo’ which helped me get through the week.