Yesterday, Steve Pavlina wrote an article about Overcoming News Addiction. I thought the article was really well written, especially the 13 points he made about the news which are:

1. News is predominantly negative.
2. News is addictive.
3. News is myopic.
4. News is marketing.
5. News is shallow.
6. News is untrustworthy.
7. News is thought conditioning.
8. News is trivia.
9. News is redundant.
10. News is irrelevant.
11. News isn’t actionable.
12. News is problem-obsessed.
13. News is a waste of time.

There are a few points I wanted to add to his article. Firstly, I have been slowly staying away from the news on a more and more consistent basis over the last two years and I’ll tell you that I sure don’t miss the negativity. I realized that “news” is actually “bad news” so I stopped watching it. Any newsworthy items that come around that are important somehow make it to me anyways via a friend or relative so I’m not too worried about missing anything important.
Secondly, if you believe in a subjective reality you have to realize that there is no way for you to miss out on anything important anyways because you are creating the news that you are watching. Whenever you “see” or “watch” the news, you are re-creating that thread of conscious thought inside you and re-creating tomorrow to contain that negative thread unnecessarily. Effectively cutting out “bad news” from your life will make the world around you a better place if you believe in a subjective reality, and even if you don’t it will still make your life a better life because it will remove unnecessary negativity from your life.
One thing that has helped me to cut out the news while still being able to watch some TV shows has been my purchase of a PVR device for my digital cable. The PVR allows me to record the shows I want to watch and fast forward through the commercial breaks which are usually just as bad if not worst then the news. Often times the news will insert a quick snippet during the commercial breaks to suck you into watching the whole news at 11:00pm for example. By skipping the commercials, I can also skip the news without skipping the show I’m watching.
The worst part about the commercials on TV nowadays is the pharmaceutical companies selling pills. The commercials come on so often and are so well created that they make you feel like there is all kinds of stuff wrong with you. “Do you ever wake up tired? Then you need our sleeping pill.” Well who in the world doesn’t sometimes wake up tired? They don’t say “Is it because you ate a spicy burrito right before going to bed and had heartburn all night?” or “Is it because you’re really stressed because your relationship with your husband is falling apart?”. Instead they say “You may have a fairly common condition called _________ and you might need _________ to ensure you get a good nights sleep.”
I just don’t like being conditioned to think that anytime I wake up tired it’s because I didn’t pop some pill. Anyway, the important thing to realize is that regardless whether you believe these commercials or not, if you watch them enough they start going straight to your subconscious mind. Then one day you wake up tired the first thing you’ll be thinking is that you need to go see a doctor and get some sleeping pills.
Here are my suggestions:1) Stop watching or reading the news. Cutting out he negativity will significantly boost your positive mood. Try it for 30 days to start if you’re unsure you want to do this long term.

- Paul

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