How many times today have you texted or emailed while talking to someone else? How often do you sit with someone and engage with your phone rather than the human being across from you? How frequently does a glance at your inbox inject you with a fresh dose of anxiety?

At our recent panel at SXSW Interactive on women's online "performance anxiety," we talked about the pressure women feel to present their ideal selves online, but the conversation ultimately turned to the enormous amount of time the Internet occupies. While author Susan Orlean said she feels like she can be herself on Twitter, she admitted that social media "occupies mental space. It's on your ongoing mental to-do-list." The other panelists echoed this sentiment.

Bianca Bosker, HuffPost's senior tech editor, said she addressed this issue in her own life by making a 2012 New Year's resolution to not "check in" digitally when she could be making eye contact with the person across from her and not to tweet when doing so would interrupt a conversation. (Read more of her tech resolutions here.) Then filmmaker Tiffany Shlain shared why and how she and her family actually take a technology Sabbath every week -- and yes, she really does it.

We were impressed. What would it be like to go a day without the Internet? Would we wither under the force of our own tech-induced ADD? Would we be oblivious to major events elsewhere in the world? How would we let everyone know what we were doing at every moment?

We think those are questions worth answering -- and we hope you'll join us (well, those of us not running this website). If you're not ready to spend a day every week away from the Internet, why not start with one day? Just one. Saturday, March 24 is the National Day of Unplugging. In what the site Sabbath Manifesto describes as a day of "tech detox," you spend a whole 24 hours without screens of any kind -- including TV. (You can take the pledge here.)

If that still feels a little extreme, here's a modified Unplugging Day plan we've devised just for you:

Step 1. On Friday night, put an auto-response on your email saying you'll be out of contact Saturday, March 24. READ MORE