Almost everybody that you meet is right here.
They have too much of everything (Remember the song "Everything Now" by Arcade Fire https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zC30BYR3CUk), and so we find ourselves drinking from an ever-bigger, wider, faster, and stronger fire hose.
The incoming from the apps, the incoming from the news, the incoming from the emails (if you're of that age).
The incoming from the notifications, the incoming from the people around us, the incoming from work, the incoming from the social societies that we're involved in, the incoming from booking a holiday, the incoming from your wages are not correct, or I've run out of milk.
And we realise that we just have no space, and we are now a society that has no space.
One of the reactions to this is to do nothing and start nothing, to sit in your room and not pay any attention to anything. One of the things that's happening to the younger generations in response to the overwhelm.
The second is to adopt a strategy of doom scrolling, so that at the end of each day, you pick up your phone and scroll for 10, 15, 30, or 60 minutes, just to try to unwind your brain.
The other things though, the other things are possible to do, but they take much force and action, willpower they used to call it, I don't know if that's what it is but for me, it takes a degree of attention and strength to try to be better, because the overwhelming gets to me probably more than it gets to anyone else.
First thing is to be outside; if you're not outside, you're going in the wrong direction. The second thing is regular exercise. The third thing is what you eat; the fourth thing is how you sleep; the fifth thing is how you spend time with human beings —how you waste time with human beings, people that you care about, people that it doesn't matter whether you go over schedule.
The next thing is to break the schedule up as often as possible, because running on the treadmill like a laboratory rat, all of the time trying to just get tasks done, is a way leading to extraordinary unhappiness.
It all leads really well, doesn't it? Very easy to do, but I think the secret for me is this.
One small thing at a time. (atomic habits https://www.amazon.co.uk/Atomic-Habits-Proven-Build-Break/dp/1847941834 )
When it got hard for me, I always imagined I was at the bottom of a shaft.
It's rectangular in shape and lined by metal, probably 20 ft deep. I can just see the light at the top. There's nothing to get my hands on to climb out.
I'm stuck; it gets harder and harder.
Feeling around the shaft, I feel a little handle, tiny little thing, I start to pull myself up a little bit, then another, then another, then another.
I always fall back into the shaft at some point, but with that strategy, I feel at least I've got a chance of getting out.
The overwhelm is killing everyone, slowly or quickly. We need to develop strategies to help ourselves.
Blog Post Number - 4312
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