Garbage In, Garbage Out: Fix Your Media Diet
It seems like everyone these days is pessimistic about the future. The future of their country and themselves. And no wonder if all you are reading and watching is the news on tv and online. Nothing but bad news, wars, crime, climate change, natural disasters. Hard not to feel despair.
Same thing has happened on the technology side. I remember when Science fiction used to be optimistic. The Jetsons, Isaac Asimov or Gene Roddenberry of Star Trek fame. Portraying ideal and golden future worlds where technology enabled societies and living that were better than what we have now. Now almost everything written in books or shown on tv is dystopian, dark and depressing.
The side effect of these ideas permeating society and influencing young people is that these same young people inevitably feel gloomy and unenthusiastic about science and technology. They see it as a force for bad not good now.
Our brains are programmed every day. You watch stupid sitcoms or Netflix shows, you become stupid. You watch brainless action movies, you become brainless. You read angry tweets, you get angry.
Your brain is your LLM aka Language Learning Model. But like AI, it’s highly reliant on all the data inputs you get.
At the micro-level, this is why you need to carefully curate everything you read and watch as it deeply influences your thinking. This is why I carefully filter my Twitter feeds & newsletters.
I still watch garbage brainless action movies for fun and short breaks. I admit I do enjoy various Star Wars series shows and good, intelligent & stirring series like the Peaky Blinders, Billions, Taylor Sheridan’s Mayor of Kingstown, Tulsa King, Yellowstone & 1923. I counter this with plenty of documentaries and optimistic Star Trek series like Next Generation, Enterprise & Strange New Worlds.
I read educational books in history, geopolitics, business and historical biographies of great men. Also worth reading the classics like Dickens, Tolstoy, Fitzgerald, Plutarch and the Stoics. I listen to many podcasts like Patrick O’Shaughnessy’s Invest Like the Best, David Senra’s Founders, Turpentine Media Empires, The Acquired, the Tim Ferriss Show, Chris Williamson, Creator Labs, 20 Minute VC & Not Investment Advice are highly motivational and educational.
What you don’t consume is just as important.
I rarely watch the news as it’s just junk for the brain. Netflix & Disney+ is an occasional indulgence but I purposely limit my time here.
The sooner you can adjust and fix your Media diet, the better off you will be. Your brain like your body, needs good quality nutrients. So work on avoiding the sugary crap and try having more of the veggie equivalents of media & content every day. For good health, you need to fill both your mind and body with good nourishment.