Knowing Too Much Information

Info Overload in a Digital Age

We were never meant to have 24/7 access to global news in a world of over 8 billion people.

Our brains were not wired to handle and process that much information at that speed. I also understand the irony of me typing all of this into a blog that is going to the internet to add to the swath of information. That is not lost on me.

That said, when we continually share and disseminate information in the form of socials, wide variety of media outlets, computers, tablets, and phones 24/7, our brains and bodies have a hard time slowing down.

I work with clients – often moms – who are burning out, overwhelmed, overstimulated, and struggling with this onslaught of information. When we’re early in our motherhood journeys this includes the “right” way to mother.

As the world shifts and changes, we fill up with news about issues that matter to us.

It’s following thousands on social media platforms of all kinds but making few true connections.

This makes us know so much about who is causing harm, who is doing “better” than we are, and all the ways we go into comparison mode.

What information sharing used to look like

There was a time the world didn’t have internet or AI or social media. I was alive for that time. My teenage years are when these things began to spread, along with wide-spread cell phone ownership.

Given all this, it’s also important to remember that there was a time without telephones, radio, and a widespread semi-global postal system.

Information used to be shared by oral tradition and word of mouth. By individual paintings and musical pieces. By letters and written word.

Then, things progressed from there. Think about what life after the 1450s when the printing press became more widely utilized. First used to print the Bible, then to go on to give us books and newspapers and other printed materials. This is how information became widespread in its time, and it must have blown their minds.

Why? Because now information could be widely shared. Not at the speed we can share it today, but it connected the world in a way nothing ever had before.

I’ve recently picked up watching the show When Calls the Heart for the first time. The show started its timeline in 1910. Something that struck me is how quickly inventions began to connect this isolated little town with other places, but also how insulated they were.

They had books and telegrams and newspapers, but they were relatively disconnected. Transportation was limited, communication and connection inventions hadn’t come yet, and they were dealing with their own local tragedy.

This is how the world used to work.

Earlier this week, I was on a video call with people from across the US, up North in Canada, and around the world in Australia. That hasn’t always been possible. There was a time when all of us would have been almost completely disconnected, even those of us from the same country. (In case you don’t know, the United States is HUGE…so is Canada…and, I feel like Australia is, too…)

The world used to only know what was happening locally until someone traveled with news from afar. Then books were wider spread. Then newspapers and periodicals. Then the telegraph system. Then came widespread radio use and telephones and televisions.

With each invention, connectivity and communication spread. News and information became more widely available and accessible.

So, there was a time people had time to process information, assimilate it, and use it to move forward instead of becoming paralyzed by it. There were fewer parenting resources, womanhood resources, creator resources, wealth resources.

What does this mean for us today?

In our lifetime, we’ve witnessed the rise of the 2-hour news cycle. The first time I remember that cycle becoming a reality was in 1995 when a bomb went off mere miles from my home in Oklahoma City. The videos and images of that building crumbled and in rubble are burned in my mind forever. The week that happened is the first time I remember the same thing being on one channel no matter the time of day. Then, 2001 it happened again, except this time I watched in REAL TIME as the second tower fell. I watched from my 8th grade English class.

We were NEVER meant to experience that. I was never meant to witness murders – multiples of them – from the palm of my hand on my phone screen.

Yet here we are.

For us today, this means it’s our responsibility to develop media literacy.
It’s our responsibility to limit our own social media interaction.
It’s our responsibility to choose intentional connection and communication.
We have to be aware of how much information we are taking in and how often.

We also have to have a means of output. What does that mean? It means CREATING, not just consuming. It means an outlet that allows you to write, draw, think, process. It means creating margin and taking space from what you’re consuming.

Want an example of how to do that? Once you’re done reading this post (the end is so close), pull out a notebook and write your reactions.
Write your biggest take-away.
Explore ways you’d like to be more intentional.
Draw something as an interpretation of this material. (Yes, I’m serious.)

Another example of how to do this is to read more books. More long-form content. Sure, long-form like this blog post, but I’m really talking about LONG form content. Books, long videos, documentaries, newspapers, magazines, etc.

When we engage with this kind of materials, we have to utilize focus. We have to engage in broader and more complex ideas and ideologies.

Then, we can turn around and create based off those ideas.
Keep a commonplace journal.
Annotate your books or keep a reading log with important notes.
Rewrite things in your own words, expanding ideas (this is for personal use, not for publication, obviously).
Write questions you’d like to investigate further.

All of these are ways for us to create more and consume less.

And if you’re here, you likely are a mom who runs her own business as a creator of some kind. Intentional creation can often help us avoid burnout. Intentional consumption can help, too.