Finding Clarity In The Clutter
There I was, scrolling down my Facebook feed, checking out the notifications. I would click the notifications of interest, then check to see who liked it or who responded. Then I hop over to Twitter and scroll for a bit. Before long, I was skimming through LinkedIn’s notifications with a little bit of a scowl. LinkedIn didn’t have as much drama and somehow seemed to be less “fun.”
I’m not big on drama, but if I was going to be wasting my time, it should be interesting, correct? Ahhh, interesting. Let’s hop over to Instagram. There are always great pictures and little video snapshots over there. Before I knew it, more than an hour had gone by and no work had been done. I wasn’t productive, but something HAD happened. I took in a lot of blocking information.
What is blocking information? Well, your mind takes in EVERYTHING it comes across and processes it in some way. We each subconsciously create our own filing system. Good, bad. Useful, not useful. Positive, negative. But, sometimes we take information which doesn’t fit our natural filing process and the only purpose served is to take up space. Blocking information. When you scroll down your feed, there are opinions and a lot of information. Some of the information gives you an emotion immediately. Some of it doesn’t. Some of it is just clutter. It is there to take up space. It’s always there. We take in the information and it stuffs our mind but we rarely take the time to digest it before stuffing it some more.
In an article for Ad Week, Shea Bennett noted the average person consumes almost 300 pieces of social media content daily or more than 50000 words. This equates to roughly the length of a 200 page novel daily. While studies show the average American reads approximately 5 books per year, the information we process from just social media daily adds up to more than 5 per week.
What would happen if we were to take control of that consumption? What would happen if we were to divert even half of that consumption time to focused learning?
The irony is many consume clutter because they lack clarity. We spend time taking everything in because we’re not sure of what we want to take in. So, we often let ANYTHING in. The ANYTHING becomes blocking information and clouds you from seeing the possible roads. There are myriad roads and possibilities. However, if there is clutter, if there is a cloud, it becomes hard to see anything behind it.
We seek clarity and we seek purpose. Yet, those are only found if you begin to intentionally move towards something. We think we’re moving because there is always something moving around us. Have you ever had the experience where you are stopped at a light and the car beside you starts slowly moving forward? To you, it looks and feels like you are rolling backward for just a moment. But in reality, you are standing still. The clutter is like slow-forming concrete and the longer you stay inside it, the harder it becomes to move. So how do you clear yourself from the clutter, digest and gain the clarity you seek?
Each month I schedule in my calendar a disconnect day. It’s freeing. It’s a bit like coming up to breathe.
There is still clutter in the world. There is still chaos. But, when you take intentional control of the process, you begin to see a bit more clearly through the looking glass.
Today is Day 30 of a 12 Week Writing Journey. Here are a couple of other posts:
I’m Robert and I speak about leadership & communication. If you enjoyed this article, hang out with me to get more over at robertkennedy3.com. Sign up here to hang out.
