| This is the answer. It isn’t easy – it’s like quitting smoking in that way – but you have to take control of the input. For me that means cutting out hyperbolic news sources like twitter, Reddit, definitely any cable news network or daily news broadcast of any kind. Apple News is also terrible in this regard; no matter how hard I try to curate, they’re always shoving celebrity gossip and MSNBC or Fox News headlines at me. So it’s a daily struggle, but on my good days I check the New York Times and Hacker News once in the morning and in the evening. I have a couple of non-news blogs I subscribe to that I check via RSS feed, and then that’s it. I donate what I can to political and charitable organizations. It’s important to stay informed, but unless you’re a reporter or working in crisis management for a political campaign, I don’t think there’s a purpose served by becoming outraged by every public statement by every dingaling politician or pundit. I do 100% have a dog in this fight and care deeply about what’s happening in the world right now both in terms of the pandemic and in the shift toward far-right populism, but for me the strategy has to be: keep an eye on the general gist and direction of things and then act accordingly. Who needs help right now? Is there and action you can take? This is obviously a “your mileage may vary” situation. Some folks are no doubt able to keep one eye on their Twitter feed and stay perfectly sane and productive, and more power to them, but I’m not one of them. |