3 ways to manage your media consumption

Practicing mindfulness is a popular New Year’s resolution this year. Mindfulness as a search term scored a 98 last week on Google. The score represents the search interest relative to the highest point on the chart, so mindfulness is definitely a current trend. Likewise, meditation scored 100 last week. Both search terms scored near 50 just five years ago.

I began meditating last year, and have found it helpful in a number of ways. It hasn’t just helped reduce stress; I’ve also become more focused and productive at work. Meditation is tricky, especially for beginners. Most of the time, I use guided meditation apps or podcasts to help me focus.

Calm is an app I use, and each day it produces a themed guided meditation. So far this year, most of the themes have involved common New Year’s resolutions such as substance abuse, overeating and negative thoughts.

Today’s theme was mindful consumption of media. Each meditation ends with a quote, and today’s was from self-help author Mark Manson.

“Limitless access to knowledge brings limitless opportunity. But only to those who learn to manage the new currency: their attention,” he wrote.

Countless news sources and social media feeds, available 24/7 on smart phones, all compete for our attention. Many of these information sources are written to stir an emotional response to encourage clicks or comments, because engagement is media currency.

Most people know that, yet they nonetheless allow themselves to get swept away in the current of emotions produced by news rivers. If you read about tragic deaths, sexual assaults and insulting political barbs before you even get out of bed, you’ll likely carry those negative emotions with you all day long, and they will suck the joy out of your day. Do this day after day, and you’ll soon find you’re living a life void of happiness and fulfillment.

Limiting media consumption isn’t easy. As someone with a journalism degree who has made her living in media and content for most of her life, it’s definitely a struggle for me. If you struggle with mindful media consumption like I do, here are three tips I’ve found helpful.

Join Facebook groups

Over the past few months, I’ve joined Facebook groups for special needs parents in my area, female entreprenuers, online business providers and spiritual growth. Posts from these groups now dominate my news feed, reducing the number of posts that don’t produce any positive or helpful information, like friends or relatives arguing about politics. It’s also reduced the time I spend on Facebook, because these groups are filled with people who are living rich, fulfilled lives and they share ways I can do it, too. Instead of getting sucked into mindless videos or negative political debate, I’m inspired to put down my phone and live in the present moment.

Begin the day doing something creative

This tip came from my Facebook spiritual growth site. Research has shown that if you begin your day doing something productive and creative, such as exercising, journaling or meditating, you’ll carry that mindset with you throughout the day. Likewise, if you choose to begin your day doing something reactive, such as reading news or responding to social media posts, you’ll carry that mindset all day long. The former is far more positive and fulfilling than the latter.

Limit your news time

One of the nifty gadgets I’m using this year is a cube timer, which is exactly what it sounds like. It’s a plastic cube with times on each side and a timer mechanism inside. Turn the amount of time face up, and the timer will count down and beep when time is up. I use the timer to help me focus on work tasks, but it’s also helpful when consuming media. I only give myself 15-20 minutes of news time each day. When time is up, I move on. News sites like CU Insight can be really helpful when limiting news time, because you can quickly scan a variety of news sources.

Your attention is valuable currency. Once you master that concept, it will be easier to more mindfully consume media and select information that will help you live a happier and more productive life.