I think many of us wonder how much news we should be watching, and how many sources of information we need to be referencing in order to stay relevant. As much as we can develop our own set of house rules to enforce around information technology, one way or another we are destined to break any rule we try to live by. This is not because we are weak or lack good intention, but because the pull of these technology is stronger. If given half a chance, they will make you want them more than anything else in life.
In other words, rules won’t cut it here because they’re just not powerful enough to combat something that has been designed to steal and weaponize your attention. What we are up against here is far more compelling than your will, digital detoxes, or even your desire for health, well-being and meaningful personal relationships.
But only if you allow it to be so.
How much news and information is good for us to consume — or perhaps more to the point endure — in order to be part of the world? From the news sources to the podcasters to the influencers to the streaming services, all are incessantly intruding with a never-ending overwhelm of content “you’ve just got to see,” as the price for inclusion in staying up-to-date and being informed — in order to belong.
Discovering You Already Belong And Know
The underlying question is where you go to find your answers. How often do you look outside yourself to tell you not only what you should know, but also how you should feel about what is going on? This could not be further from what it is you truly need. To live well in the world we currently inhabit is to cultivate a sense of sovereignty over your own life when it comes to where, when and how much information is in your best interest to take in.
This requires a deep sense of self-awareness and self-trust that gives you the permission, the fortitude and the strength to opt out of what is not working for you. This can be as simple as deleting individual contacts from your feed or dramatic as eliminating all social media, but it can only be something you determine for yourself. This knowledge does not come from an expert, a set of rules or through some culturally accepted metric, but by staying close enough to yourself through all the moments of your day to recognize what is working for you and what is not. This is all as near to you as posing one simple question:
“Is this helping or hurting?”
Simply put, deciding what you take in and what you do not graduates you to the position of someone who has taken full responsibility for their lives. Once you recognize that to be on constant overwhelm taking in too much is to harm both yourself and those around you, you can decide exactly what you will put into your own mind and what you will not. This makes you a sovereign, sane and trustworthy source in the world.
While we might believe we need to watch the news to know what is going on in the world, in the process we often lose touch with what is going on within ourselves. When we are lost and disconnected from ourselves, we are in less of a position to make wise and discerning use of what is coming at us from across a screen. From this place of disconnection, we are more likely to spread the contagion of overwhelm and fear.
Activate Your Amoeba Intelligence
Watch and feel for yourself. Are you more or less empathic after the umpteenth image or news report? Does what you watch leave you feeling paralyzed in your own life?
As you feel this out for yourself, get truly single-celled-amoeba-intelligent about this: move towards what helps and move away from what hurts. Move towards what is helping you live the life that makes sense and feels healing to you, the one you most long to live. Move away from what hurts you, diminishes you and divides you against another. It is that simple.
Susan McNamara, M.A., CHHC, spends her time contemplating what it is that human beings actually need to thrive. Her most recent book, Remembering What Matters Most: A Call to Courage for Parents Ready to Take a Stand for Childhood in The Age of Technology is now available. She also writes on Substack.
Find holistic Counseling and Therapy in the Spirit of Change online Alternative Health Directory.
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