at I watched the equivalent of one movie's worth of Star Trek episodes last night with my wife- we sat on the couch, ate grilled broccoli with oreos for dessert, and had a great time. Those kinds of moments are important.

But suppose we did that 4 nights a week, every week for a year. (That's way below how much time the average American spends in front of the tube each week, by the way- the average is about 28 hours a week, around 1,456 hours a year).

That's 52 weeks x 2 hours = 104 hours.

I'm all for the great American cinema, but I'm also for truly appreciating great works of art, too. You can't drink out of a fire hose, and you can't appreciate great movies when you're watching a non-stop stream of them every day.

Here's 4 ways to reduce how much time you spend in front of the tube:

1. Don't eat and watch. If you enjoy the experience of eating and watching and don't want to change that, try something small- pick a couple of nights a week to eat without television, and make it special.

2. Get rid of cable. It's costing you a massive amount a month- why not take that same money, downgrade to something like Netflix, and use the extra change to go do something fun?

*Get rid of the TV. *Simply not being able to turn on a television helps kick the habit of flicking it on every time you're in the room. With all the online options for streaming, you can still keep up on your favorite shows.

4. Turn to alternative entertainment options. Build a fire, check out a good audio book from the library, and turn all the lights out. You'll be amazed where your imagination can take you when you have no visual stimulus.

Note: while this blog applies to everyone, it especially applies to time-strapped musicians. Can you imagine how much better you'd be at your instrument with an extra 1,000 odd hours a year to practice? Or how much larger your fan base could be with the extra time for marketing? Simply turning off the tube could be the biggest favor you could ever do for your career.