The 10 Things I Experienced When I Went a Month Without News:

This February I decided to conduct a little experiment, on myself. I wanted to know what I would experience, and how I would feel, if I stopped paying attention to the news altogether. Specifically, I wanted was a month off of paying attention to anything related to news, politics, and current events. What I experienced over the past 28 days partially matched my theory that ridding myself of some of the anxiety and other negative emotions associated with current events would make me happier. But, I also encountered some surprises along the way. The following list summarizes my experience in going 28 days without reading, listening to, or watching anything related to news.

1. I had to break a habit

Just in order to successfully go 28 days without news consumption was a struggle. We are all creatures of habit. And, like many other people in 2017, I have roughly 10 web pages I routinely visit. I have also got in the habit of scrolling through social media feeds from time to time. To avoid news, I had to stay diligent and break these habits. I had to completely avoid visiting any web page related to news. And, on my phone, I had to purposely turn away from all the Top Stories and Trending Topics that just find their way of appearing on the screen.

I would say this was the hardest around one week into the experiment. I had not quite broken the habit of reflexively visiting certain web pages, and was beginning to feel disconnected a bit. I also struggled in some social situations with people who turned the television on to news channels. I had to purposely look away, go to another room, or put on headphones.   It helped me to explain to people that I had given up news for the month. This did not stop them from watching the news when I was there, or talking about the news, but at least it stopped them from feeling like I was being purposely anti-social.

2. I freed up a lot of “mental energy”

I began to think of this exercise as kind of a cleanse diet for the mind.   For those not familiar, a cleanse diet is one where a person eats a radically different diet, often with extreme food restrictions, for a period of time, usually 3 day to 6 weeks. The goal of the cleanse diet is to wash away all of the toxins from one’s body.

It took about a week for my mind to feel “cleansed”. For the first few days of the month, the news that I had read throughout 2016 and the first month of 2017 was still on my mind. 2016 was kind of an exceptional year, and I think I ended up needing a week just to process everything that had happened.

Surely enough, when I stopped thinking about current events, how people are responding, arguing, etc., I started to notice an uptick in my mental energy. Every piece of information we consume and process requires mental energy. When something is both complicated and stress inducing, as politics and current events are, it can be potentially exhausting. When I stopped expending so much mental energy on news and politics, my mind became freed up to address other concerns.

3. I rediscovered old passions

When I was younger, and there were no smart phones constantly triggering me to look at news stories, I spent my idle time (time with no specific activity) quite differently. As a lifelong weather enthusiast, who studied meteorology in college, I would look at weather patterns, weather models, and weather occurrences around the country. I also spent a significant amount of time reading books and materials related to humanity, human nature, personality, social interaction and the like.

Both these interests never went away, and both of these interests were in a way renewed with all of the time and mental energy freed up this month by not watching news. I am currently looking forward to a season of storm chasing (I attended an event called Chaser Con the 18^th and 19^th). And I am looking forward to writing more articles like this one!

4. My mind went to a scary place

This is where I begin to wonder if political commentary in particular is just one gigantic distraction. About a week into my news free month, with my mental energy being returned to me, I actually had sort of a breakdown. I had a particularly rough day at work. I felt like multiple people were pulling me in a direction I did not want to go, regarding my career, and in some ways, my life.

Without news, political commentary, or anything similar to occupy my mind, I had no choice but to face my own disappointment with the current state of my career. This was something I had kind of been realizing all along, but prior to my news free month, my thoughts on this subject were on aspects of my job that were far more cosmetic. This breakdown brought me to a really dark realization regarding what I truly fear, that one day I will retire and die having never achieved my true potential. WOW!

5. It was not a complete escape

Let’s just face it; in order to truly escape the news, one would have to actually hide under a rock or something. Just because I took on this experiment and decided to stop paying attention to the news does not mean anyone else’s behavior changed one bit (nor should I expect it to).

As previously mentioned, people around me still wanted to turn on the news, read it, and talk about it. I can recall at least two dozen instances throughout the month where someone brought up something regarding Donald Trump or something, and I had to politely say “I am taking the month off of news, sorry”. Most people would respond with some level of interest in the experiment. But, that would often be followed by some sort of return to whatever the person had originally desired to complain about.

So, I did hear about certain things through people around me. Some of it really sparked my interest, like the California Dam collapse. In retrospect, I probably could have kept up with that event and not had the results of this experiment turn out any differently.   But, I wanted to be sure that I stuck to my original intention, and not see other new stories.

6. I actually became less tolerant of angry political conversation

This one kind of surprised me. Before the experiment, I was already losing my patience with the typical political conversation. By this I mean conversations that people start without appreciating the true complexity of the issues at hand. They often begin with an insult or two, or some sort of expression of outrage at some politician, or political idea. They continue through the conversation expecting everyone to agree, and will sometimes ask a question. But, they are not looking for a well-reasoned consideration of what is at hand. They don’t even want you to say more than a sentence. They want an echo.

My tolerance for this experience pretty much hit zero by the middle of the month. Maybe this would have happened even without the experiment. It is an easy experience to get tired of. Still, I expected the break from reading news, and particularly political commentary, to make it easier for me to tolerate these simplistic and mean spirited exchanges.   Unexpectedly, the opposite happened.

7. I zeroed in on the true sources of waste

By late in the month, I realized that not all news is a waste of time. There is a benefit to knowing what is going on in the world, as well as in your community. But there are definitely things that I know, going forward, I do not need to expend mental energy on.

I am talking about shows where people just argue with one another. I am talking about articles such as Is Ohio Red for Good Now? (or Is Colorado Blue for Good Now?). I am talking about any show where someone purposely tries to take people’s statements out of context.

I also come out of this feeling like I do not need to keep up with every single development about certain things going on. There is a 24/7 news cycle now, with alerts, updates, and news feeds, designed to get information decimated to the public instantaneously. But, it doesn’t impact my life too much if I am a day or two behind. Unless it is an Amber Alert, a tornado warning, or some other kind of emergency, I can find out in a day or two, or a week, and not be the worst off for it.

8. There was still a second round of temptation

It was about 20 days into the experiment, the point in which many says habits are broken or formed.  And, I probably had broken these habits. Maybe the day was boring, but I suddenly found myself wondering, again, what was going on. I found myself tempted to go back and visit one of the web pages I had just broken out of the habit of going to. Maybe this was the time when I actually began to feel as if there had been some sort of significant occurrence that I needed to know about.

9. I have a new appreciation for being conscious of the mind’s intake

As a culture, we put a lot of thought into our body’s intake. What food are we eating? What diet should we try? When we adhere to a diet, or even just actively consider the contents of our food choices, we are being conscious of our body’s intake.

This experiment made me realize that it is probably just as important that we become conscious of our mind’s intake. When we look at click-bait, scroll through news feeds or our social media outlets, we are letting other people decide what information is going into our minds.

Some of it is okay. After all, most of us chose what to follow on these sites. However, some of it is purely mindless. In particular, I am thinking of the NewsStand app on my iPhone. Sure, they let me chose what to follow. But, the app also displays “Top Stories”, which is decided on by whatever controls that application.

On a more frequent basis, we should be consciously determining what we want to be thinking about. Luckily, there is this great site called Google. It lets you type in anything you want information about- whatever is on your mind, whatever sparks your curiosity, and get information, often great information, on the topic. People used to have to go to the Library for that. Now we can do that right after rolling out of bed. Let’s take advantage of it.

10. I am tempted but I am not

To return to viewing the news regularly now that February is over. It feels like the inverse situation to going to the gym. Many of us feel lukewarm about going to the gym. We kind of drag ourselves there, or fight some kind of internal mental battle to muster up the motivation to work out. But, it is we usually feel better after going.

Right now, I am curious to see what I had missed. But, in a way, I know that something I see will upset me. Something will suck me in and result in me wasting time on a mindless slideshow such as 25 Celebrities Who Voted for Trump. And once again I will be needlessly anxious, and distracted from making the life changes I have begun to make as a result of shifting my focus this past month, from news feeds to the components of my life that truly need attention.

12 Things I Learned in 2016

 

1. In blogs and articles, the text prior to the first item of a list often goes unread.

If the article is titled something along the lines of 14 reasons why…, or the top 20 …, people will often just skip right to item #1. So, from now on, when writing lists, I’m only going to include text before item #1 when it is absolutely necessary.

 

2. Being yourself means being yourself even when it makes you uncomfortable.

It’s easy to show off your true personality in situations where a positive reaction is expected. Anyone with even the slightest amount of self-confidence can point to situations where they went out there and decided to “be themselves”. But, there are also plenty of situations where being true to oneself can lead to vulnerability. This is why many people claim to be themselves, but often retreat behind their masks at the prospect of discomfort. One must be willing to face criticism, disapproval, and even loss of friendships, relationships, or jobs in order to honestly be staying true to themselves in all situations.

 

3. Caring about others means caring about others even when there is no benefit.

 

This is kind of obvious, but we often lose sight of this, especially in the adult world. A lot of relationships are formed out of some kind of mutual benefit. A good example of this is the show Arrested Development. In this show, every interaction between the characters, who are mostly family, involves some sort of tit-for-tat almost business like deal between the characters. There are even some less obvious situations, with people in our lives whose benefits (knowing the person that can invite you to the party, get you into the club, help you meet your next sexual encounter, etc.) are constantly in our subconscious. To truly care, we must distance ourselves from these considerations and consider any of these benefits as a gift rather than a prerequisite for our willingness to associate with another.

 

4. People reflect their own reality.

To the people we encounter on a day-to-day basis- we are just bystanders in their reality. And, everything they do is a reflection of that reality in some way. If someone says something critical to another person, that statement is more of a reflection of him or her than the person they are criticizing.

 

5. It is actually fun to be an island of calm.

When everyone around you is freaked the fuck out.

 

6. Your reality begins within.

Than it is reflected outwards. It is not the other way around as so many people falsely assume. Many people assume they must wait for something external; a new opportunity, a person just coming into their lives, or some sort of out of the blue event, in order to change something or progress to the next level. But, the first wave is always internal. The reality, what we think about, what we believe, and what we consider right is reflected outward once we truly believe it. When we alter our internal reality, over time, the reality around us will slowly begin to reflect what we already believe. Then, these events, opportunities and new people will emerge.

 

7. All things of value require some time and effort.

Sometimes it is your own effort; sometimes it is the effort of others. But, things don’t just fall into place. Doing nothing or sticking with stuff that is easy and comfortable will lead to little to no, or temporary, reward. Relying only on the effort of others will put you at the mercy of said people.

 

8. Three days without physical activity can feel like death.

We were not meant to be nearly as sedentary as we are.

 

9. Energy is one of the most important attributes in life.

The amount of energy, as well as the type of energy, that we both project and receive has major implications for our lives. It is no accident that in the book The Happiness Project, where author Gretchen Rubin decides to take on one initiative a month for twelve months to improve life satisfaction, her first initiative is to improve her energy levels. Without the energy, we can do the things we love and be the people we love being!

 

10. Our humanity is under siege and must be protected

What I am talking about is what separates us from the robots; our individuality, things like our senses of humor, emotions of all kinds, and that general spirit that makes us our human selves. This is being subtly attacked on multiple fronts at this point in time. Many of us have jobs that focus solely on performing tasks using certain procedures, or worse, focus on things like schedules and hierarchy. Our pursuits of materialism and status reduce our sense of value to what we have and what we kind of labels we can show off. And, our increasing dependence on machines and technology for more and more components of our lives farther blur the line between humanity and machines as spoken words are replaced by text, social media, and computerized algorithms.

 

11. You don’t have to be the center of attention to matter

Imagine you are at a club. You are dancing, getting a little crazy. Maybe you’re “crunk”, or even on speed or molly. Likely, you are being ridiculous and have drawn the attention of a majority of the club’s patrons. Who is the most important person at that club at that time? It’s the DJ. It’s the guy (or girl) standing off to the side with headphones over their heads. That person has the power to wreck the night in a jiffy. There are a lot of situations like that in life, where the individual who has drawn the attention of others is kind of interchangeable while someone in the background is actually making everything happen.

 

12. You better learn to enjoy the journey

Otherwise you have two choices; stagnation and frequent misery.