Staying Positive By Dave LaRue

A couple of years ago I found and removed a source of growing negativity in my life. Before I made this decision, I’d felt less and less positive and more and more negative. Looking back, this probably started as far back as 2015 or 2016. It hit a certain peak midway through 2020, and I decided I’d had enough by November of that same year.  

Ever since then, I’ve invested more in reading and writing and creating more Comma Club workshops, spending more and better time with my family and friends having more meaningful conversations—and being less opinionated—living more congruent to my highest values staying true to who I say I am and who I want to be. It's way more fun and I'm discovering that I'm much happier and a lot more fun to hang out with! And I can enjoy others more, too. What was it?

The source of negativity I removed was cable news. I quit cable news in November of 2020. I have recently taken a hard look at my consumption of news and news commentary online and on social media and realized it was time to make a decision here, too. 

From everyone I’ve talked to, it seems a lot of us have felt worse than usual in this age of “doomscrolling” on phones and spending so much time with the news on at home. Are we weird? No. If anything, it turns out, this is universal. 

One memorable article sums up a lot of what's been studied on the topic. I think you’ll find it interesting. Any one of the takeaways would be enough to make you take notice, but taken together, they paint a clear picture. Here are some bullet points:

• A study from the time of the Boston Marathon bombing showed that people who consumed 6 hours of news daily were more upset than people who had witnessed the bombing in person or knew people involved.   
• That number shouldn’t sound unbelievable. In 2018, even before the peak “doomscrolling” of 2020, Americans spent an average of 11 hours a day looking at screens. Most of us work on screens, and use them for entertainment and to stay connected. Not all of this is easy for you to measure for yourself, but phones track screen time. How much time are you spending on yours? It's surprising how much time we spend in front of screens.
• A steady stream of disheartening news can alter your perception of the world, causing you to lack motivation and view the world with a sense of cynicism and hopelessness. Negative news has the potential to exacerbate your personal anxieties and the stressful situations occurring in your own life.
• It can lead to physical symptoms from fatigue, anxiety, depression, insomnia, and vivid or disturbing dreams, to gut problems and an increased risk of heart attack. To say nothing of causing people to socially isolate themselves, drink more, and otherwise spiral. 

Since I’ve stopped spending my time this way, I’ve created more thinking time, idea time, and daydreaming time… my desire to help inspire, coach, and make a difference is at a new high! More and more opportunities are presenting themselves! Crazy how it works! I'm able to see the good, the great, and the truth! I have a much clearer vision of my purpose and what matters to me! Remember that old saying "garbage in garbage out" well it's simple but true!

I'm not saying you shouldn't stay informed but you do need to create a process that feeds you the information you need and want, both professional and personal! For me, I decided to create more self-awareness around this and pay attention to how the news source made me feel. I made a rule to exit and then avoid sources where news was delivered in ways that excited or upset me or preoccupied me after I stepped away. Even sources I’d been fond of for years.  

Some easy questions for me to ask myself before spending time watching and listening to others—which is what the news and social media are—are:

• How will this help me accomplish what I want to accomplish?
• How is it helping me be the person I say I am? 
• Is there anything I can do about what I’m consuming, or will it only make me angry, upset, or demoralized?

It’s been the best news and the greatest relief to realize that the world wasn’t as bad as I was feeling. Take command of your attention and put it where it will help you be the person you want to be. I know you won’t regret it. 

Cheers!

Dave