The Craving for Constant Stimulation
Why is it that I crave constant stimulation? I find myself scrolling endlessly, more concerned with other people's lives than my own, more curious of other people's reactions to life than my own. And the more I consume, the more I convince myself that this is what I want. My brain seems to have been tricked into endless content addiction. I can't even say I'm different. As someone who creates content, not only do I consume more than most people, I'm a contributor.
But let's make something clear: the issue isn't content. Content existed long before we were born. Sophocles and Homer captivated thousands through epic storytelling. Shikibu's Tale of Genji, the world's first novel, one of the OG pieces of content, was written almost a thousand years ago. Content isn't the issue; it's our consumption.
Content Isn't the Enemy: Understanding Consumption
Because if you think about it, content used to be a luxury. It took months to write books. If you wanted to listen to music, you had to find someone who could play music and then make them play for you. Content was rare, and for that reason, it wasn't just consumed; it was contemplated and appreciated and reflected upon. When was the last time you thought about a great book or a piece of writing for a month?
A Look Back: Content as a Luxury
The question is, how did this happen? When did noise become the norm and silence become annoying? Information was supposed to be a gift, but instead, our appetite for overconsumption resulted in an epidemic of inattention, an illusion of knowledge, and the development of a tragic and crippling evolutionary blunder. There's a lot to unpack here, so let's rewind a bit and go back to where it all began: technology.
How Did We Get Here? The Role of Technology and Dopamine
Now, I'm not going to sit here and say that technology hasn't changed our lives in extraordinary ways. It's given us access to infinite knowledge, but not without a price: our patience.
The Price of Infinite Knowledge: Patience Lost
People used to handwrite letters and send them off by carrier pigeons. They'd wait weeks for replies, praying the messengers didn't end up as someone else's dinner. But as technology evolved, so did the way that we communicate. Pigeons became cars, letters became texts, phone calls became video calls. Everything became so immediate, stimulating, and engaging. Instant gratification became normal, and that's when problems began because our brains weren't ready for this. We're not designed to stare at screens 12 hours a day and binge-read endless feeds.
Decoding Dopamine: Beyond the Pleasure Myth
Endless consumption of content disrupts the neurobiology of our little friend, dopamine. Dopamine is popularly viewed as this seductive pleasure molecule, you know, a villain in a problem that needs to be detoxed. But that's not completely true. In fact, dopamine isn't about pleasure, not directly. It's about the pursuit of pleasure. At healthy levels, dopamine is actually a really powerful motivator. The anticipation and excitement we get from delaying gratification provides motivation to pursue our long-term goals. We had to put in work for a reward.
Technology removed those conditions because now it's so easy to consume and consume that our brain never stops releasing dopamine, and we never stop pursuing pleasure. This has led to an obsession with efficiency.
The Efficiency Obsession
Content is getting shorter and shorter. Books are condensed to summaries, long articles to bullet points. We watch short clips summarizing longer clips to increase efficiency. This is why we're experiencing an epidemic of inattention. Chronic consumption has raised our baseline level of stimulation. What used to be exciting is now dull. Right? Like working out and going to the gym is miserable without music. Taking a dump is terrifying without Instagram. For me, it got to a point where I couldn't even pay attention to a movie; I had to do it while scrolling Instagram and FaceTiming someone at the same time. It was wild, and I knew I couldn't be the only one who experienced this lack of focus.
The High Cost of Overconsumption: Alarming Consequences
In medical school, we learned about addiction, and based on the DSM-5, which is the gold standard of Western Psychiatry, I realized that I was exhibiting symptoms of severe addiction.
The Epidemic of Inattention: An Addiction Unveiled
Consuming larger amounts over a longer period of time than intended? Check. Unsuccessful attempts to control it? Check. Excessive time necessary to obtain it? Well, if I left my house without my phone, I would have to go back and get it because I can't live without that. So, check. Development of tolerance, defined as a need for markedly increased amounts of the substance to achieve pleasure and a markedly diminished effect with continued use of the same amount? Check. It started to make sense to me why I was always feeling so numb and why our attention spans are falling. We are incapable of immersing ourselves in the present moment anymore.
And if you thought things were difficult now, the epidemic of inattention was just the beginning.
The Illusion of Knowledge: Knowing Less by Knowing More
As attention spans dropped, our brains adapted by scratching the surface of everything that we consume. Paired with the fact that there's basically unlimited content and information available, we started to believe that since we could know about everything, that we should know about everything. That somehow it's our responsibility to be informed about where The Rock went to dinner last night or how an empty nest mama bear just won Fat Bear Week. What is Fat Bear Week? And also, who asked?
And it's the strangest thing, but cognitive psychology has shown time and time again that tiny tastes of knowledge make us feel special. It's called the Dunning-Kruger effect. People who know very little about something often believe they know more than they actually do. Five minutes with ChatGPT can make anyone feel like an expert in aerospace engineering. But anyone who's devoted years studying, learning, and developing deep expertise in a particular field understands the paradox of knowledge: the more we learn, the more we realize we don't know anything. The diamonds of knowledge come from depth and deep exploration. Just because you read a new headline study about how serotonin and depression might not be related doesn't mean you suddenly have expert knowledge about the neuroscience of Zoloft.
And what's worse is that people feel compelled to share what little knowledge they've scraped together and confidently spread misinformation or content taken out of context. Imagine how scary this can be when you have billions of followers who are all impressionable and young. And to add insult to injury, there's an unspoken social pressure that we have to be up-to-date with everything. We're left out of conversations for not keeping up with the latest trends. We're ashamed and called Boomers when we don't know the latest TikTok trends and slang – definitely not speaking from experience or anything. We've been convinced that consumption is necessary for relevance and connection, yet research suggests that Gen Z might be the loneliest generation of all time. George Orwell once feared that lack of information would doom humanity, but it was Aldous Huxley in Brave New World who warned us we'd drown in its excessiveness. The mass distribution of information was meant to provide us with a wealth of knowledge. It was an illusion. After hours of content binging, it's pretty unlikely that you're going to walk away feeling good about yourselves, let alone any smarter. And for this, yes, I am speaking from personal experience.
The Erosion of Critical Thinking: Outsourcing Our Minds
And it was the illusion of knowledge paired with the inability to focus that set the stage for the development of a tragic and crippling evolutionary blunder. Overconsumption stripped us of the ability to think. Our brains adapted to consume information so efficiently that it forgot how to engage with it. We've outsourced all critical thinking to algorithms and influencers. Like, why would I exert mental energy and think when ChatGPT can do it for me? Why do I need to come up with my own opinion when I can adopt all the ones on my home feed? Why start a side hustle when I can start another episode of One Piece?
We've become such lazy thinkers that the first sign of cognitive effort is immediately offloaded to technology. We embrace narratives but rarely pause to question their intent. We're quick to share viral trends but slow to seek their origins. And we accept the convenience of prepackaged opinions at the expense of crafting our own. The gradual erosion and decay of critical thinking has led to a homogenization of thought. You know, blind leading the blind. Yet somehow, we've convinced ourselves that we're different. We rationalize our beliefs with statements like, "Everyone on social media is saying this," or "I'm seeing this all over TikTok, so it must be true." But in reality, it's the algorithms that have curated a 0.1% portion of the content that you actually vibe with. We endlessly consume the niche subsegment of the internet that was curated for us. We've become hostages to our own mind, accepting confirmation bias about our pre-existing beliefs without questioning things. And it's because of our lack of focus and inattention and the shallowness with which we consume everything that prevents us from thinking for ourselves.
Losing Ourselves in the Noise
Thinking was Evolution's greatest gift to us. It's what separated us from other species, you know, the fact that we can imagine and dream and create. Somewhere along the way, we were consumed by our own consumption. We became ensnared by the very tools that were meant to free our minds. And now we're too wrapped up in this nonsense to realize why we feel like our lives are so boring. And as I drift further into this maze of content consumption, I can't help but wonder, where are we headed? And what other essential parts of ourselves are we going to leave behind?
Finding a Path Forward: A Starting Point for Change
Now, if you've been reading this hoping for answers, I'm afraid I don't have one. Honestly, I don't know if a solution to this can exist. Consumption has become so interwoven into our lives that it's literally impossible to untangle. All I can offer is my perspective and a possible starting point in a chance for redemption.
My 5-Second Practice for Clarity
It's a simple 5-second practice that I've been implementing that's quite literally saved me hours of precious time that would have otherwise been lost. Before I engage in consumption of any kind, I close my eyes, take a deep breath, and find my focus. That's all it takes for a moment of clarity. And during this time, I ask myself, "Where is my focus directed right now? And where do I want it to be going?" Sometimes I do decide to consume; other times I decide to create. I realize it's less important which path I take, but more important the focus I find before I take it.
Content in Healthy Portions: Finding Purpose
You can take an extreme pledge to cut out consumption for the rest of your life, but as I said, content isn't the enemy. When consumed in healthy portions, it's given me purpose. Right? Like creating things and building projects has brought me more joy than any other endeavor I've ever pursued. And personally, I wouldn't want to live in a world without content.
Changing How You Play the Game
And with the rate that things are evolving, it's only a matter of time before the digital and physical world actually become one and the same. So think about this: you might not be able to change the game, but you do have the power to change the way that you play. Every click and every scroll is a choice. And so make it count by finding your focus before you do it.
So I hope that my perspective can help you navigate this unfamiliar road. If you're not done with your consumption for the day, perhaps take a deep breath first. Consider exploring resources on focus training; it might help you out in that department. Alright, bye for now.
