Problems With an Overly Connected Society
My Personal Experiences of Information Overload
In the past month I’ve come to realize how important it is to prioritize my time and be able to ignore distractions. I must say that I’ve previously been pretty terrible at it — and still have much to learn — but that my recent insights finally have started to make me conscious, not only of how and why I slowly but surely have been heading towards a collapse, but also something that has given great awareness of how our modern society affects us and what it can demand of us.
By realizing what extreme exposure to information can do to one’s mind, I’ve learned important lessons that I would like to share. You might already have heard these things many times, but I really believe this is something that bears repeating.
If you think about how much information you will consume during the next few days, you might also understand that it’s highly possible information like the one you’re taking in right now will just slip right by.
For example, how clearly do you remember your day two days ago?
The reason why I ended up in my current situation might have several explanations. Firstly, I’m a perfectionist who by nature want to learn more or perform better and therefore can be hard to satisfy when only given mediocre or dull challenges.
Secondly, I’ve been in the serious business of procrastination — Something I’m gradually tackling with the powers of Kanban, Pomodoro and good ol’ routine.
Thirdly, I often care deeply about the things I do, which in turn allows me to spend hour after hour pushing myself even though I by experience know it’s during these hours I REALLY should sleep!
Seriously, don’t mess with your sleep
However, what I believe is the biggest problem is that I deliberately have been exposing myself to way too much information every day. Since I’m really interested in learning new skills (like programming), I can spend every awake minute looking for more and more information if nothing stops me.
And it‘s NOT easier to avoid just because you have every video, API-documentation, or code-snippet you ever needed (and a little more) only 5 seconds away at all times.
This is what brings me to the main reason why I wrote this post and just didn’t keep my insights to myself. Our information-age is a wonderful time to live in and the future is looking pretty bright in several ways. It’s just one little problem — If not treated with great respect, all this connectivity might actually be extremely detrimental.
To avoid falling for this pressure to always staying updated through social media, news or other channels, remember to spend a few moments every day just relaxing (And listening to masterpieces like this won’t hurt!)
Now you’ve at least been exposed to this post’s message one more time
I wish you the best of luck and hope you now can go through periods like the one I’ve had without as much trouble, even if this after all has been a great learning experience.
To finish up, here’s a few tips that my future self could use in order to stay in control of time (and with that, keep better control of his life):
- When you get to make decisions, remember to weigh both short- and long-term benefits against each other. Is this article, video or programming challenge really what requires your time at the moment?
- Do you really understand how to produce a Minimal Viable Product? (The quality of your work is fine! Just leave it and move on!)
- Remember where you belong — enjoy it! :)
