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addiction
January 2007 
Re: Confessions of An Information Junkie
Posted on Nov 4th, 2006
by 
ebbandflow
ebbandflow
[Image Source: moriza]
deepsurface has a great blog post about being addicted to information:
"I check email constantly, but no less often that I check my blog reader for new posts and whatever contained links look interesting. If there's nothing new, my third choices are the New York Times, the Washington Post and Slate. Salon ranked right up there until I couldn't log in at work and had to suffer their intro ads.
I do this nearly all day long, occasionally breaking away from the computer to experience the real world. Even now, I struggle to finish this post without checking my blog reader to see of someone has posted something new."
This resonates with me as well. I have a similar information intake situation, which deepsurface says:
"this info-habit is shifting my balance farther into my head - and even farther from an “integral” lifestyle. Since Integral Theory is the closest thing to religion for me, that means I'm not living my values. What to do? Tell everyone about it in a blog post?"
Precisely.
This is what in part brought me here to Zaadz – to try and redirect some of this attention and energy. Here's what I wrote in my first blog post:
“I'd like to limit my technology/political information intake while increasing my spiritual and community connection”
My habit revolves around HuffingtonPost and DrudgeReport along with over 50 RSS feeds from technology & politics. Even more so that the election is coming up.
But I can't help to feel that it is a bit too soulless, and getting me further and further away from an Integral lifestyle as well.
What is that we're looking for?
What is the feeling or reward that keeps us searching for more?
Is it curiosity? Is it wonder? Is it surprise? Is it a searching for connection?
Somehow I think it is connection with resonate value systems and good news for the sake of humanity (i.e. the political reality of getting some accountabilty, and truth and reconciliation for everything that the Bush administration is doing to our country and the world).
But this type of connection seems too superficial and too surface-level to really be
the whole story.
I think it is the searching for the comments and e-mails that make us feel connected and human – rather than any new headline that is going to help decide the winners and losers in the upcoming horserace.
I also think that meditation and exercise can help increase the level of attention and focus that can prevent these types of wild goose chases down an endless rabbit hole of ambient news headlines. So let's just say I'm ready for something different, and that I need to walk the walk if I'm going to talk the talk.
Finally, here's a videoblog that my wife and I did that talks about the possibilities for empathy and compassion being the new crack cocaine of the attention economy and information addicts.
deepsurface has a great blog post about being addicted to information:
"I check email constantly, but no less often that I check my blog reader for new posts and whatever contained links look interesting. If there's nothing new, my third choices are the New York Times, the Washington Post and Slate. Salon ranked right up there until I couldn't log in at work and had to suffer their intro ads.
I do this nearly all day long, occasionally breaking away from the computer to experience the real world. Even now, I struggle to finish this post without checking my blog reader to see of someone has posted something new."
This resonates with me as well. I have a similar information intake situation, which deepsurface says:
"this info-habit is shifting my balance farther into my head - and even farther from an “integral” lifestyle. Since Integral Theory is the closest thing to religion for me, that means I'm not living my values. What to do? Tell everyone about it in a blog post?"
Precisely.
This is what in part brought me here to Zaadz – to try and redirect some of this attention and energy. Here's what I wrote in my first blog post:
“I'd like to limit my technology/political information intake while increasing my spiritual and community connection”
My habit revolves around HuffingtonPost and DrudgeReport along with over 50 RSS feeds from technology & politics. Even more so that the election is coming up.
But I can't help to feel that it is a bit too soulless, and getting me further and further away from an Integral lifestyle as well.
What is that we're looking for?
What is the feeling or reward that keeps us searching for more?
Is it curiosity? Is it wonder? Is it surprise? Is it a searching for connection?
Somehow I think it is connection with resonate value systems and good news for the sake of humanity (i.e. the political reality of getting some accountabilty, and truth and reconciliation for everything that the Bush administration is doing to our country and the world).
But this type of connection seems too superficial and too surface-level to really be
the whole story.
I think it is the searching for the comments and e-mails that make us feel connected and human – rather than any new headline that is going to help decide the winners and losers in the upcoming horserace.
I also think that meditation and exercise can help increase the level of attention and focus that can prevent these types of wild goose chases down an endless rabbit hole of ambient news headlines. So let's just say I'm ready for something different, and that I need to walk the walk if I'm going to talk the talk.
Finally, here's a videoblog that my wife and I did that talks about the possibilities for empathy and compassion being the new crack cocaine of the attention economy and information addicts.
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