During the early 1990’s I lived in Japan. I was in the US Navy and stationed on a ship operating out of Sasebo, on the southern island of Kyushu. My house was located on the edge of the naval base, about a 15 to 20-minute walk from the docks. On the rare occasions we were in port I would get up early and walk down to the ship.
Like all times of life, I had things I was struggling with. Family issues, career issues, financial issues…the usual things everybody on the planet goes through.
I have always found walks to be a great way to get my head together, collect my thoughts and reflect. Alone, early in the morning, trudging through the dark, I was able to sort things out in my head. Most of the time, whether I was walking to work or from it I felt more positive at the end.
I got in the habit of listening to audio tapes during my walks. I would alternate between education stuff and what might best be classified as “Motivational”. One of my favorite guys to listen to was Tony Robbins.
It cost a lot of money at the time, but I subscribed to his Powertalk series. Each month you would get a set of two cassette tapes – one with Tony, the other an interview with someone. Back in the days before the Internet, video streaming and podcasts getting my monthly tape set was a real treat.
That was almost 30 years ago now. I haven’t listened to those tapes for decades. But one of them, entitled “Stand Guard at the Door of Your Mind” I still remember. It influences me today just as much as it did back then. I’ve found it to be a principle that’s always important, but especially so in times like today.
We all live inside a narrative. Call it the Matrix if you will, although I feel that movie reference might be getting tired, but our perception of reality is based on our narrative. It defines how we interpret what we see, feel and perceive.
We are bombarded by information all the time. Television, the Internet, our friends – everyone is trying to get a chunk of your mind and influence how you see things. With social media, 24-hour news and targeted advertising the assault on your senses is relentless.
Most of it is crap.
It was crap back in 1990 and it’s crap today. Sturgeon’s Law holds true – 90% of everything is crap.
This is why you need to stand guard at the door of your mind. The best way is to limit the flow. Just like we’re being asked to self-quarantine to slow the spread of the CoVid19 virus, you need to quarantine yourself from the flow of crap to your brain.
You need news and information. You need trusted, credible sources for information you can use to make decisions. Most of the time you’re not going to get it from social media, from the major media companies or from crappy shows like “The View”. Everyone there has an agenda and, while there is credible information to be found, there is a very low signal-to-noise ratio in these sources.
Where you decide to get your news is up to you. Any list I could give you would be biased toward my world view which may or may not be correct. I don’t know. I’ve learned that you need to gauge the message with your experience. That’s something that can only be done over time.
What I will suggest however is to start taking a critical view of the news and information. Evaluate the source and compare the information to your experience. Don’t take things at face value just because you want to believe it to be true,
Here are five things I’ve found to be helpful:
- Most media sources are less interested in giving you the truth as they are in advancing their agenda. This could be revenue, likes or a worldview. There may be a kernel of truth in there but wrapped in narrative and opinion.
- Any subject that is “settled” and where dissenting opinions aren’t tolerated is probably wrong and won’t stand up to scrutiny.
- It’s better to feed your mind with positive information than negative.
- Both extremes are probably wrong. The truth lies somewhere in the middle.
- Epstein didn’t kill himself. Oswald was a patsy and the moon landings were probably faked. (Okay, only two of these are true.)
I had to throw that last line in to see if you were paying attention. 😊
Conclusion
You always need to stand guard at the door of your mind, to curate the information you are feeding your brain. This defines your narrative, your mindset and your reality. Ideally you want your perceived reality to track as closely as possible to the truth. Right now, during a pandemic, there is even more false information and rumors than normal. People are disoriented, uncertain and afraid. It’s times like these we need to be especially cautious.
Stay safe everyone.
