You Are What You Consume
Every piece of information you consume shapes your thoughts, emotions, and worldview. Yet most people have no deliberate strategy for information intake—they consume whatever algorithms serve them. This is like eating whatever appears on your plate without consideration for nutrition.
The Information Overload Problem
We consume more information daily than people in previous centuries encountered in a lifetime:
34 gigabytes of information daily for the average American
Constant news cycles designed for engagement, not truth
Social media optimized for outrage and controversy
Infinite content competing for finite attention
The brain wasn't designed for this volume. The result: anxiety, decision fatigue, shallow thinking, and chronic distraction.
The Attention Merchants
News and social media companies monetize attention. Their business model requires:
Maximizing time on platform
Triggering emotional responses (especially fear and anger)
Creating habits of compulsive checking
Fragmenting attention to increase page views
Understanding this model is the first step to resisting it.
Designing Your Information Diet
Step 1: Audit your current consumption
Track information sources for one week
Note time spent and emotional impact
Identify sources that inform vs. those that agitate
Recognize consumption patterns and triggers
Step 2: Establish consumption goals
What do you actually need to know?
What serves your work and life?
What enriches your thinking?
What can you eliminate without loss?
Step 3: Curate deliberately
Choose information sources intentionally
Set specific times for news consumption
Unfollow accounts that trigger anxiety
Replace reactive scrolling with chosen reading
The News Detox
Most news is irrelevant to your life and action. Consider:
99% of news doesn't require your attention
Constant news creates anxiety without benefit
Important news reaches you regardless
News cycles optimize for engagement, not importance
Try: A one-week news detox. Notice what you actually miss.
Quality Over Quantity
High-quality information sources:
Books (thoroughly researched, edited, enduring)
Long-form journalism (deeper investigation)
Academic papers (peer-reviewed)
Curated newsletters (someone else has filtered)
Primary sources (unmediated information)
Low-quality sources:
Social media feeds (algorithm-optimized for engagement)
Breaking news (unverified, incomplete)
Comment sections (unfiltered opinions)
Outrage content (designed to trigger)
The Input-Output Ratio
Excessive information consumption crowds out creation, thinking, and action. Notice your ratio:
How much time consuming vs. creating?
How much reading about things vs. doing things?
How much learning vs. applying?
A healthy ratio depends on your work, but most people skew heavily toward consumption.
Information Fasting
Periodic information fasts reset your baseline:
Daily: No information first and last hour of the day
Weekly: One full day without news or social media
Monthly: A weekend offline
Annually: An extended digital detox (week or more)
Notice how your thinking changes with reduced input.
Curating Social Feeds
If you use social media:
Unfollow aggressively (most content adds no value)
Mute keywords that trigger anxiety
Turn off algorithmic feeds where possible
Use lists for specific purposes only
Schedule specific times rather than checking continuously
The JOMO Principle
FOMO (fear of missing out) drives compulsive checking. Counter with JOMO (joy of missing out):
Most information you miss won't matter
Being uninformed about most things is natural and good
Deep knowledge in few areas beats shallow knowledge in many
Presence requires absence from elsewhere
Building New Habits
Replace information consumption habits:
Instead of morning phone scroll → morning reading or thinking
Instead of news with lunch → conversation or silence
Instead of social media breaks → walks or brief exercise
Instead of evening TV news → evening reading or reflection
Your information diet shapes your mental life. Curate it as carefully as you'd curate your physical nutrition.