It's amazing not only in its enormity, but the way that it demonstrates the tremendous efficiency with which our technologies today capture, surface, and mass distribute content.
I watched Gangnam Style. It was hilarious. It came recommended, but I chose to watch it. Do I think it was a mistake to do so? Not really. Did I have a better use of 253 seconds at that time? No I didn't. But the thing is that it's not an isolated event. There are multiple hits a day, ranging from an Onion article to the latest Marvel-based movie. All these hits add up, day after day. If we're honest with ourselves, it's a lot of time. And if we're even more honest with ourselves, we might have better uses of that time if we gave it more thought. But with all these diversions, who has time to think deeply about how to use our time? How ironic.
It reminds me of zombies and vampires. Every infected bite tastes oh-so-delicious.
In Life Reboot, I spoke about Streamlining material possessions. In my 8% body fat pursuit, I Streamlined my body. In this post, the subject is Streamlining the content we consume, or basically, what we're feeding our minds. Ultimately, all of this will add up to 360-degree Streamlining, which leads to a sleeker, more agile, and potentially awesome-r way to navigate our lives.
A number of my thoughts around content are based on observations after having lived in Silicon Valley over these past 5 years. Here, we are perpetually connected. People probably spend more time looking at screens than they do sleeping, eating, and talking to other people combined. That might be overstated, but not by much. There is no end to the screens around us: computers, phones, TVs, movie screens, even in the backs of taxis or at gas pumps. Not to mention auditory content, including the ever increasing treasure trove of music that's at our fingertips (thanks to Spotify, Rdio, Pandora and the like), podcasts, audible books, etc. Although it may not feel the least bit unpleasant, we are being assaulted with content on a daily basis. And the very thing that we lose, time, is the most important thing we have.
Don't get me wrong. Content can be amazing, and I truly respect those organizations that can put out beautiful work consistently (Pixar comes to mind, until recent past). It's not only content that's for entertainment purposes, but for educational purposes as well. A decade ago whilst working at the World Bank, I had two subscriptions that I would carry with me every day: the Economist and the Financial Times. And I would read them whenever I had a spare moment. That was a wonderful time, and I felt like I was in the know, with a pulse for the happenings in the world.
Besides knowledge and pleasure, there are other uses for content as well. They connect us. Sharing playlists, talking about the latest TV series, recommending books to read and movies to watch. These all form a kind of bond between people, although the bonds are probably based more on shared tastes than anything else. Even so, there's a true satisfaction in discovering and experiencing excellent content, recommending it to friends, and having them feel the same about its quality.
In the end, we are faced with the choice. When all's said and done, we are responsible for how we live our lives. We are responsible for making our lives awesome. The way I see it, if I can't come up with a better way to use my time, then I'm not being responsible. The solution is simple. It's a choice as well. You simply choose the level that you allow yourself for content that isn't directly related to your life, or what you're trying to accomplish. My choice is 3 hours a week, starting today. I've already cut out ESPN. Same with Facebook and news. Now there's a stopwatch that gets turned on every time I am looking for / consuming diversion. Ready, set, ...
P.S. The irony that this blog is content, and is railing about diversionary content consumption, is not entirely lost on me.
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