I miss the days of Walter Kronkite who reported the news and just the news without pomp, circumstance and a lot of fanfare. Mr. Kronkite didn’t insert himself into the news like so many of today’s reporters that sensationalize every word. This was back in the day when hurricanes only had women’s names, but other storms were just that, nameless storms—unless they were a Nor’easter, but even then, they didn’t give them names every time the wind picked up past 20 MPH with the snow blowing sideways.
Now with so much dis-information being bantered about depending on whether the news source is center, far left or far right, it is hard to know what or who to believe.
I always revert back to the words of my late dad, Clement C. Sawyer. He told me, when at the young age of eight… “Don’t believe everything you hear on the radio, see on the television, or read in the papers.” I never forgot that. In other words, what he was telling me was to be discerning in everything and to trust and rely on my own innate wisdom.
As for chocolate… I’ve tried cutting down to a couple pieces a day, it doesn’t work for me. Just one piece is too many, and a whole chocolate bar or two or three—is never enough. I’m such an addict! Looks like I’m gonna have to 12-step myself off Lindt chocolate now too. However, I did purchase one Cadbury egg the other day. My son was sitting with me when I opened it. I cut it down the center (on a plate) the long way and was surprised to see a white goo surrounding a yellow center, like a real egg, but with a chocolate eggshell. We both marveled at it for a bit, and daring the other to try it first. We both did get brave enough to taste the runny stuff at the tip of the knife, and found it way too sweet! The chocolate exterior however was, well, chocolate, and ya can’t go wrong with just chocolate. I think that will be my first and last time partaking of a Cadbury egg. Thank you very much. LOL!
I missed Terry’s April Fools joke, I’ll have to go back and read it. I’m just coming off almost 3 days without internet, so I’ve got a lot of catching up to do. I had to resort to reading a book of all things! LOL! Actually I found it quite pleasant and got halfway through the 500+ pages. Now I’m dying to finish it! I may have just found my new addiction!
I agree with all this, Gail, despite my disappointment at learning that you missed my carefully contrived and crafted April Fool's joke. The rot started here (UK) when newsreaders started making faces while reading the news, so that we (the audience) would know when an item was funny, sad, annoying or something else. Before that they used to read the news dispassionately. Now they've moved on to giving their (largely unwanted) opinions on social media.
My household of two people comprises one who questions absolutely everything and one who believes absolutely everything - they say that opposites attract, don't they? I think we'd both benefit from being somewhere in between, frankly....
Congratulations on your first experience of a Cadbury's Creme Egg - they're fun, aren't they? Like a real egg on the inside - but gosh, you're right - that fondant filling is soooooo sweet.
I'm still cringing at having been taken in by Terry's April Fool. I'm blaming the fact that he's such a well-practised wind-up merchant that I din't stand a chance.....
Do tell me which book you're reading - that's pretty good going, to get through at least 250 pages during an almost 3-day internet outage. I'd love to know which book it was.
I’m picturing the President standing in the middle of a scale model of the office, and am left wondering what does that make his cats in this scenario…VP and Secretary of State?
I scan the news at a set time of day, and that's about it. My theory is that if it's world-shattering, my husband will tell me and if he's absent, then so will someone else. In the meantime, I get to be calmer and more aware of my surroundings rather than in my head trying to make sense of a world gone mad. My battle-plan came because I WAS getting so uptight!
Neither of us watch TV news and we tend to watch streaming TV and 'calm' shows - it's changed how we feel quite markedly. We barely if ever listen to the radio. Music from old CD's and Spotify. So there's this lovely wall of Other Stuff that has taken the place of news. It's like living in a medieval castle with high ramparts and a moat and a goodly supply of men-at-arms to protect us and so that I can get on with spinning, weaving, making pottage, roasting a pig and shaking out the floor rushes without worry.
I love your idea of scanning the news at a set time of day, Prue, and that you've recognised that you feel calmer and more aware of your surroundings. Absolutely brilliant!
Ahhhh, the 'Other Stuff'! Speaking for my own 'OS', I've discovered a feeling of being more present in my life, and since deleting those apps I've enjoyed more time pottering in the garden, corresponding with friends, turning even more pages of 'Emma' (I've nearly finished the book - I'm loving it!) and am even looking forward to getting stuck into a couple of projects I'd long decided I didn't have enough time to tackle. Well guess what, I DO have the time!
What have I missed in the news? Not much, I don't think! I'm loving not apping - and like you I don't watch the TV news - but I did collect our Saturday paper from the Village Stores this morning. To be perfectly honest I concentrate mainly on just two sections: the puzzles pull-out and the 'Review', which I love in particular for its reading recommendations. 😁
I had to laugh while reading this! Sorry! Mostly it’s because this is SO me! I actually have pushed back on my social media time and I don’t watch or read the news everyday the way I used to. My go to news programs, BBC America and PBS. Don’t get me wrong; I like to be well informed but it was messing with my emotional well being to watch everyday and sometimes multiple times each day. If you want to be depressed, watch the news. Seems like everything is doom and gloom. It makes us forget that really wonderful people are out there doing wonderful things because they are overshadowed by the bad things going on. Doom and gloom sells better I guess! Pushing back on social media actually gives me more time to do the things I love, my art and reading books! I find that it really isn’t imperative to see what B had for dinner last night at his favorite restaurant, aka the plate of food pic! So, that being said I can now enjoy reading, in this case my favorite Substack writings, and enjoying a nice cup of tea while watching the birds at my feeder!
Oh, I'm so pleased to read that, Rebecca - it's seems it's not only our name which we have in common! 🤣
And you're so right - there's a huge difference between being informed and being run ragged by self-imposed overexposure to the news. There's soooo much doom and gloom, absolutely. I remember a class project at school when I was around fourteen in which we had to analyse a newspaper. We measured the relative space given over to certain categories - politics, business, advertising, sport, social affairs and tragedies (as a result of accidents, violence, natural disasters) - and we were all horrified at how highly tragedies 'scored' in terms of column inches. 😧
I'll take enjoying a cuppa while watching the birds over scrolling the news apps any time. I only wish I'd thought of tuning out the news rather sooner than I actually did! 😀
Okay, we are indeed kindred spirits!! I have those moments of gullibility and I'm so grateful I'm not alone in this. Oh thank you for the laughs this morning...and the beautiful shout out! You're so kind Rebecca and so generous of you. xox
Enjoy your weekend and hope to see you again soon for the write togethers. :)
That's brilliant, Julie - I love that I'm not the only one!!! 🤭
I was so pleased to have been able to share your good news in this post about the news, and you're sooooo welcome! 😘 Hope you had a brilliant time at the book launch today, and that my happy thoughts made their way to you across the pond! 🙌📙❤️
The book launch was FABULOUS! The happy thoughts worked wonders! Thank you so much. What a wonderful turn out. It was great to see so many friends I haven't seen in awhile.
You have made a fine decision for yourself here, Rebecca, realizing you had exceeded your limit of input. I was most moved, however, by your statement, "Reader, I wish I had the intelligence to filter out the outlandish so that I could properly identify the real news…" Real news -- what a concept! I remember real news. I remember listening to Dan Rather, Walter Cronkite, Chris Wallace, Brian Williams and never once questioning the veracity of their reports. News was news, and we could count on it. But when the world went awry in 2016, I threw out my TV. I simply could not stand any more. And I have no cell phone. It is simply self-preservation. This does not mean I am like your friend N. My brother keeps me informed on absolute essentials. You know, miracles like DT either going to prison with no appeal OR being re-elected. ( Both are likely) Meanwhile, as Jo Linney said, "I will do what I can and where I can to affect change where I believe it is needed and I can have some impact." It is the best we can do. Thanks for opening an important discussion here, Rebecca. I hope you will follow up and let us know the impact of your decision on your life.
Thank you, Sharron! And gosh, yes, what is 'real news' these days anyway?! Those are some excellent moves you've made for the sake of self-preservation - kudos to you!
I'm absolutely loving the very wise words that are being shared right here in the comments - it's so interesting to read about so many other people's relationships with the news.
I'll certainly keep you posted about how my reduced exposure to what until very recently had been a wall-to-wall carpet of news furnishing my life. The fact that I have had the ability to access it from a gadget in the palm of my hand doesn't mean I HAVE to access it, and I can't believe that it has taken me so long to realise that!
It’s hard to find that balance, especially with the easy dopamine hits of doomscrolling. I have to watch it with my anxiety, too…whereas Ben seeks out the inflammatory rubbish news, so as to expose the vitriol to bright sun. I like what you’re proposing. 🩷
The doomscroll has a lot to answer for, doesn't it? It sucked me in for years over on those three traditional social media platforms I used to use until I started to really suffer from the impact of what I was choosing to expose myself to. Not any more, thank goodness! I love what you've said about Ben seeking out the inflammatory stuff in order to expose it to the light - that's another great way of looking at it!
Less scrolling and swiping is certainly a great remedy for too much of what most can't trust to be true. We never watch local, national, or international news, as most of it uses adjectives to describe situations and weather conditions as world-ending and posing immediate danger to anyone who doesn't love and hunt for the truth. I love staying in the know, and limit the sources I trust to 2 or 3 online. Substack U proves daily to be the best source for all things all around the world, by showing what real people do, think, feel, surmise, question, triumph, understand, support, reason, and solve in their day to day. Fantastic post, RH.
It's great to only seek information from a small number of trusted sources, Mary - I love this approach! For now I'm happy with the Saturday Telegraph (which takes me at least a week to read - the newspaper rack is bursting at the seams because I haven't read every section yet from the last few weeks' editions!) as my one edition of printed news media a week, but I'm enjoying not getting sucked in by either online or TV news.
I've had to stop myself a number of times just today, actually, from looking at the BBC News web page on my computer in between tasks today. It's long been my habit to finish, say, a session working with spreadsheets with a 'reward' of checking the news, and gosh, I've nearly caught myself out several times! I won, though!
Keeping it real by reading what those real people you mention put out there for us to read is an excellent way forward, Mary! Thank you so much for sharing your relationship with the news here - I've learned a lot! 😊
I wish we had a good print newspaper - I love the sound of turning pages. I'm jelly! What fun to have a stack waiting for you to read! Way to go for winning, too. Slow by slow, as my Jim says. 😀 You go, RH!
Great piece, Rebecca--and as usual not only funny, but generous to others as well.. Alain de Botton, favorite book of his: _How Proust Can Change Your Life_ -- also wrote a book I read _The School of Life_ where in, though I didn't search the book for exact quote, suggests that we are better off not watching local news because most of it is bad news that can make one think where we live too dangerous to venture places and that that view is hardly accurate. His observation made me realize that most local news focuses on crime. Just a thought. When I have time to search the book for the exact quote I'll send it to you. BTW, gullibility is one of my basic qualities that I'm not particularly proud of but that does cause me to pay close attention to every post I comment on. Here's an example from my childhood that probably shows how dumb how I was when little: I was watching "Peter Pan" --the musical with Mary Martin on TV with my dear father and it was past my bedtime. A commercial came on mid-show and he said. "Wasn't that great--bedtime." Off I went until he came and got me, laughing. I saw the whole wondrous show.
Oh Mary, thank you so much for this terrific comment! That remark by Alain de Botton is fascinating- thank you for sharing it - and it's really made me wonder about the extent to which our exposure to the news is responsible for our life choices, which fascinates and horrifies me in equal measure.
Your Peter Pan story is delightful - what a great joke by your dad! I'm so glad he came to fetch you back again - what a tease!!!! 🤣
You've reminded me of when a friend and I went to see the film 'The Sixth Sense'. My brain missed entirely the epic plot twist, and I needed the film's conclusion explaining to me on the way home from the cinema....
That's brilliant, Mary! I occasionally wonder if I ought to watch it again - but I still cringe about missing the twist the first time, so, well, y'know...! 🤭
Yo! Tez the Prez here. I spent a year between 1977 and 78 only listening to news that had a bearing on what I was teaching (Economics). It was much less stressful than the constant bombardment of doom and gloom.
I'd been worried that my cold turkey approach to the news apps might adversely affect our weekly 'Letters to Terry/Letters to Rebecca' correspondence, because I love to write about any amusing stories or headlines I've come across on Apple News. However, instead I'm rather excited to have adopted this constraint to my choice of subjects to cover in my letters, and am looking forward to seeing how they might evolve as a result. 🙂
I am definitely a news junkie, but I've found a routine that works for me. I read my substacks in the morning and watch certain trusted news sources in the evening. In between, unless someone sends me something amazing that just happened, I let the day unfold without monitoring it. And i feel that substack works for me because I only use my inbox, not the algorithmic feed-- that way, there's no endless scroll, no algorithmic creep. Like the writer you cited, I've let the rest of my social media recede, maybe checking FB once a week to keep up with friends, and that's it.
It seems to me that the key is to find a level and source of news which feels empowering rather than overwhelming, and stick with that. The substackers I like take a positive, "here's what we can do to help" approach which I find motivational rather than crushing.
I love the sound of your routine, Kerry - thank you so much for sharing - and I especially like your 'empowering rather than overwhelming' comment. 'Letting the day unfold without monitoring it' is such good advice!
Regarding the endless scroll, I've put a bookmark named 'Substack' on my top nav which takes me straight to my inbox rather than to Notes - I really struggle with Notes because it reminds me rather too much of Twitter (which wasn't a happy place for me at all in the end), and I don't like that typing substack.com into the address bar would always take me straight to the home page - aka the Notes feed!
Brilliant! I found out something else today, actually, which I acted upon immediately - that you can tell the Substack app to not default to Notes every time you open it. If you hit the Settings menu in the app and then go to Appearance you can change the default page to Inbox.
The news has become enormously entertaining. Probably healthy, for the most part. My neighbor asked me if I thought the Speaker of the House would be replaced. He works in a warehouse. A few years ago if you asked him who the Speaker of the House was, he'd of said his wife : )
I have been searching for the optimal balance of news consumption myself. I don't like reading/watching no news, but I tend to go down rabbit holes I don't need to go down.
I've found that consuming local news is best for me. I can get caught up on what's happening in my state, and if something is important enough to know about on a national/world level, I'll still find out about it.
I recognise what you've said about rabbit holes - I get lost for daaaaays in some of them....! That's an excellent point about the local news over the national/world side of things. I might feel that it still presses my 'I need news' button equally hard, though! 🤣
I think you address the greatest question of our age. To news or not to news. And nowadays we must parse out and search for facts. When news becomes opinion or activism then it’s not news. I turned off all news last year and just read headlines. Then Oct 7 happened and I knew the lies about Israel would be endless. So I’m parsing out yet again trying to educate those who are open to learning about history and facts. It’s daunting and sometimes depressing. But silence is unacceptable.
It makes me sad that the facts are so often in such short supply - or twisted and spun out of all proportion to fit a particular narrative so that they still look and sound like the truth but in fact are a very poor representation of it. Ugh.
Written by a friend of mine—Johnny Medicine Bear, it’s on Amazon.
He used to fly fighter bombers during the Vietnam war. Then flew for American Airlines after he got sober and retired from the Air Force.
He helped me get over my fear of flying about 2011, when I was visiting him in Florida. He took me up in a teeny tiny piper Cherokee plane. It took me a good 45 minutes to even get into the little two seater. But I did it with his patience aided by my doing some EFT-tapping on myself.
I have not been afraid to fly since and even flew over the big pond to Scotland last year!
I miss the days of Walter Kronkite who reported the news and just the news without pomp, circumstance and a lot of fanfare. Mr. Kronkite didn’t insert himself into the news like so many of today’s reporters that sensationalize every word. This was back in the day when hurricanes only had women’s names, but other storms were just that, nameless storms—unless they were a Nor’easter, but even then, they didn’t give them names every time the wind picked up past 20 MPH with the snow blowing sideways.
Now with so much dis-information being bantered about depending on whether the news source is center, far left or far right, it is hard to know what or who to believe.
I always revert back to the words of my late dad, Clement C. Sawyer. He told me, when at the young age of eight… “Don’t believe everything you hear on the radio, see on the television, or read in the papers.” I never forgot that. In other words, what he was telling me was to be discerning in everything and to trust and rely on my own innate wisdom.
As for chocolate… I’ve tried cutting down to a couple pieces a day, it doesn’t work for me. Just one piece is too many, and a whole chocolate bar or two or three—is never enough. I’m such an addict! Looks like I’m gonna have to 12-step myself off Lindt chocolate now too. However, I did purchase one Cadbury egg the other day. My son was sitting with me when I opened it. I cut it down the center (on a plate) the long way and was surprised to see a white goo surrounding a yellow center, like a real egg, but with a chocolate eggshell. We both marveled at it for a bit, and daring the other to try it first. We both did get brave enough to taste the runny stuff at the tip of the knife, and found it way too sweet! The chocolate exterior however was, well, chocolate, and ya can’t go wrong with just chocolate. I think that will be my first and last time partaking of a Cadbury egg. Thank you very much. LOL!
I missed Terry’s April Fools joke, I’ll have to go back and read it. I’m just coming off almost 3 days without internet, so I’ve got a lot of catching up to do. I had to resort to reading a book of all things! LOL! Actually I found it quite pleasant and got halfway through the 500+ pages. Now I’m dying to finish it! I may have just found my new addiction!
Love your Saturday morning posts! 🤗❤️
I agree with all this, Gail, despite my disappointment at learning that you missed my carefully contrived and crafted April Fool's joke. The rot started here (UK) when newsreaders started making faces while reading the news, so that we (the audience) would know when an item was funny, sad, annoying or something else. Before that they used to read the news dispassionately. Now they've moved on to giving their (largely unwanted) opinions on social media.
What wise words from your dad, Gail!
My household of two people comprises one who questions absolutely everything and one who believes absolutely everything - they say that opposites attract, don't they? I think we'd both benefit from being somewhere in between, frankly....
Congratulations on your first experience of a Cadbury's Creme Egg - they're fun, aren't they? Like a real egg on the inside - but gosh, you're right - that fondant filling is soooooo sweet.
I'm still cringing at having been taken in by Terry's April Fool. I'm blaming the fact that he's such a well-practised wind-up merchant that I din't stand a chance.....
Do tell me which book you're reading - that's pretty good going, to get through at least 250 pages during an almost 3-day internet outage. I'd love to know which book it was.
😊
You mean, Terry didn't remodel his study to look like the Oval Office? Great post, Rebecca. I think your new diet will work nicely.
I’m picturing the President standing in the middle of a scale model of the office, and am left wondering what does that make his cats in this scenario…VP and Secretary of State?
They'd be running the show, Bryn - all President Terry has to do is acquiesce to their demands! 🤣
correct.
They are special advisors (SPADS), but do9n't take kindly to people not following their 'advice'
Apparently he didn't, Mark, but I was absolutely ready to believe him! 🤣
And thank you so much for reading - I'll keep you posted as to how the new diet suits me. So far, so brilliant, actually!
🤣
🤣
I scan the news at a set time of day, and that's about it. My theory is that if it's world-shattering, my husband will tell me and if he's absent, then so will someone else. In the meantime, I get to be calmer and more aware of my surroundings rather than in my head trying to make sense of a world gone mad. My battle-plan came because I WAS getting so uptight!
Neither of us watch TV news and we tend to watch streaming TV and 'calm' shows - it's changed how we feel quite markedly. We barely if ever listen to the radio. Music from old CD's and Spotify. So there's this lovely wall of Other Stuff that has taken the place of news. It's like living in a medieval castle with high ramparts and a moat and a goodly supply of men-at-arms to protect us and so that I can get on with spinning, weaving, making pottage, roasting a pig and shaking out the floor rushes without worry.
I love your idea of scanning the news at a set time of day, Prue, and that you've recognised that you feel calmer and more aware of your surroundings. Absolutely brilliant!
Ahhhh, the 'Other Stuff'! Speaking for my own 'OS', I've discovered a feeling of being more present in my life, and since deleting those apps I've enjoyed more time pottering in the garden, corresponding with friends, turning even more pages of 'Emma' (I've nearly finished the book - I'm loving it!) and am even looking forward to getting stuck into a couple of projects I'd long decided I didn't have enough time to tackle. Well guess what, I DO have the time!
What have I missed in the news? Not much, I don't think! I'm loving not apping - and like you I don't watch the TV news - but I did collect our Saturday paper from the Village Stores this morning. To be perfectly honest I concentrate mainly on just two sections: the puzzles pull-out and the 'Review', which I love in particular for its reading recommendations. 😁
Have to say I agree with the book review pull-out. They're hard to go past.
I had to laugh while reading this! Sorry! Mostly it’s because this is SO me! I actually have pushed back on my social media time and I don’t watch or read the news everyday the way I used to. My go to news programs, BBC America and PBS. Don’t get me wrong; I like to be well informed but it was messing with my emotional well being to watch everyday and sometimes multiple times each day. If you want to be depressed, watch the news. Seems like everything is doom and gloom. It makes us forget that really wonderful people are out there doing wonderful things because they are overshadowed by the bad things going on. Doom and gloom sells better I guess! Pushing back on social media actually gives me more time to do the things I love, my art and reading books! I find that it really isn’t imperative to see what B had for dinner last night at his favorite restaurant, aka the plate of food pic! So, that being said I can now enjoy reading, in this case my favorite Substack writings, and enjoying a nice cup of tea while watching the birds at my feeder!
Oh, I'm so pleased to read that, Rebecca - it's seems it's not only our name which we have in common! 🤣
And you're so right - there's a huge difference between being informed and being run ragged by self-imposed overexposure to the news. There's soooo much doom and gloom, absolutely. I remember a class project at school when I was around fourteen in which we had to analyse a newspaper. We measured the relative space given over to certain categories - politics, business, advertising, sport, social affairs and tragedies (as a result of accidents, violence, natural disasters) - and we were all horrified at how highly tragedies 'scored' in terms of column inches. 😧
I'll take enjoying a cuppa while watching the birds over scrolling the news apps any time. I only wish I'd thought of tuning out the news rather sooner than I actually did! 😀
Okay, we are indeed kindred spirits!! I have those moments of gullibility and I'm so grateful I'm not alone in this. Oh thank you for the laughs this morning...and the beautiful shout out! You're so kind Rebecca and so generous of you. xox
Enjoy your weekend and hope to see you again soon for the write togethers. :)
That's brilliant, Julie - I love that I'm not the only one!!! 🤭
I was so pleased to have been able to share your good news in this post about the news, and you're sooooo welcome! 😘 Hope you had a brilliant time at the book launch today, and that my happy thoughts made their way to you across the pond! 🙌📙❤️
The book launch was FABULOUS! The happy thoughts worked wonders! Thank you so much. What a wonderful turn out. It was great to see so many friends I haven't seen in awhile.
Oh, I'm so pleased, Julie - it sounds wonderful!
You have made a fine decision for yourself here, Rebecca, realizing you had exceeded your limit of input. I was most moved, however, by your statement, "Reader, I wish I had the intelligence to filter out the outlandish so that I could properly identify the real news…" Real news -- what a concept! I remember real news. I remember listening to Dan Rather, Walter Cronkite, Chris Wallace, Brian Williams and never once questioning the veracity of their reports. News was news, and we could count on it. But when the world went awry in 2016, I threw out my TV. I simply could not stand any more. And I have no cell phone. It is simply self-preservation. This does not mean I am like your friend N. My brother keeps me informed on absolute essentials. You know, miracles like DT either going to prison with no appeal OR being re-elected. ( Both are likely) Meanwhile, as Jo Linney said, "I will do what I can and where I can to affect change where I believe it is needed and I can have some impact." It is the best we can do. Thanks for opening an important discussion here, Rebecca. I hope you will follow up and let us know the impact of your decision on your life.
Thank you, Sharron! And gosh, yes, what is 'real news' these days anyway?! Those are some excellent moves you've made for the sake of self-preservation - kudos to you!
I'm absolutely loving the very wise words that are being shared right here in the comments - it's so interesting to read about so many other people's relationships with the news.
I'll certainly keep you posted about how my reduced exposure to what until very recently had been a wall-to-wall carpet of news furnishing my life. The fact that I have had the ability to access it from a gadget in the palm of my hand doesn't mean I HAVE to access it, and I can't believe that it has taken me so long to realise that!
It’s hard to find that balance, especially with the easy dopamine hits of doomscrolling. I have to watch it with my anxiety, too…whereas Ben seeks out the inflammatory rubbish news, so as to expose the vitriol to bright sun. I like what you’re proposing. 🩷
The doomscroll has a lot to answer for, doesn't it? It sucked me in for years over on those three traditional social media platforms I used to use until I started to really suffer from the impact of what I was choosing to expose myself to. Not any more, thank goodness! I love what you've said about Ben seeking out the inflammatory stuff in order to expose it to the light - that's another great way of looking at it!
Less scrolling and swiping is certainly a great remedy for too much of what most can't trust to be true. We never watch local, national, or international news, as most of it uses adjectives to describe situations and weather conditions as world-ending and posing immediate danger to anyone who doesn't love and hunt for the truth. I love staying in the know, and limit the sources I trust to 2 or 3 online. Substack U proves daily to be the best source for all things all around the world, by showing what real people do, think, feel, surmise, question, triumph, understand, support, reason, and solve in their day to day. Fantastic post, RH.
It's great to only seek information from a small number of trusted sources, Mary - I love this approach! For now I'm happy with the Saturday Telegraph (which takes me at least a week to read - the newspaper rack is bursting at the seams because I haven't read every section yet from the last few weeks' editions!) as my one edition of printed news media a week, but I'm enjoying not getting sucked in by either online or TV news.
I've had to stop myself a number of times just today, actually, from looking at the BBC News web page on my computer in between tasks today. It's long been my habit to finish, say, a session working with spreadsheets with a 'reward' of checking the news, and gosh, I've nearly caught myself out several times! I won, though!
Keeping it real by reading what those real people you mention put out there for us to read is an excellent way forward, Mary! Thank you so much for sharing your relationship with the news here - I've learned a lot! 😊
I wish we had a good print newspaper - I love the sound of turning pages. I'm jelly! What fun to have a stack waiting for you to read! Way to go for winning, too. Slow by slow, as my Jim says. 😀 You go, RH!
Great piece, Rebecca--and as usual not only funny, but generous to others as well.. Alain de Botton, favorite book of his: _How Proust Can Change Your Life_ -- also wrote a book I read _The School of Life_ where in, though I didn't search the book for exact quote, suggests that we are better off not watching local news because most of it is bad news that can make one think where we live too dangerous to venture places and that that view is hardly accurate. His observation made me realize that most local news focuses on crime. Just a thought. When I have time to search the book for the exact quote I'll send it to you. BTW, gullibility is one of my basic qualities that I'm not particularly proud of but that does cause me to pay close attention to every post I comment on. Here's an example from my childhood that probably shows how dumb how I was when little: I was watching "Peter Pan" --the musical with Mary Martin on TV with my dear father and it was past my bedtime. A commercial came on mid-show and he said. "Wasn't that great--bedtime." Off I went until he came and got me, laughing. I saw the whole wondrous show.
Oh Mary, thank you so much for this terrific comment! That remark by Alain de Botton is fascinating- thank you for sharing it - and it's really made me wonder about the extent to which our exposure to the news is responsible for our life choices, which fascinates and horrifies me in equal measure.
Your Peter Pan story is delightful - what a great joke by your dad! I'm so glad he came to fetch you back again - what a tease!!!! 🤣
You've reminded me of when a friend and I went to see the film 'The Sixth Sense'. My brain missed entirely the epic plot twist, and I needed the film's conclusion explaining to me on the way home from the cinema....
Maybe because I've been a writer for so long, I guessed the secret within the first 5 minutes.
That's brilliant, Mary! I occasionally wonder if I ought to watch it again - but I still cringe about missing the twist the first time, so, well, y'know...! 🤭
Yo! Tez the Prez here. I spent a year between 1977 and 78 only listening to news that had a bearing on what I was teaching (Economics). It was much less stressful than the constant bombardment of doom and gloom.
Such a good idea, President Terry!
I'd been worried that my cold turkey approach to the news apps might adversely affect our weekly 'Letters to Terry/Letters to Rebecca' correspondence, because I love to write about any amusing stories or headlines I've come across on Apple News. However, instead I'm rather excited to have adopted this constraint to my choice of subjects to cover in my letters, and am looking forward to seeing how they might evolve as a result. 🙂
By the way, I think I too would have fallen for the ice cubes advert: it sounds stupid enough to be plausible!
Glad I'm not the only one! 🧊
I am definitely a news junkie, but I've found a routine that works for me. I read my substacks in the morning and watch certain trusted news sources in the evening. In between, unless someone sends me something amazing that just happened, I let the day unfold without monitoring it. And i feel that substack works for me because I only use my inbox, not the algorithmic feed-- that way, there's no endless scroll, no algorithmic creep. Like the writer you cited, I've let the rest of my social media recede, maybe checking FB once a week to keep up with friends, and that's it.
It seems to me that the key is to find a level and source of news which feels empowering rather than overwhelming, and stick with that. The substackers I like take a positive, "here's what we can do to help" approach which I find motivational rather than crushing.
I love the sound of your routine, Kerry - thank you so much for sharing - and I especially like your 'empowering rather than overwhelming' comment. 'Letting the day unfold without monitoring it' is such good advice!
Regarding the endless scroll, I've put a bookmark named 'Substack' on my top nav which takes me straight to my inbox rather than to Notes - I really struggle with Notes because it reminds me rather too much of Twitter (which wasn't a happy place for me at all in the end), and I don't like that typing substack.com into the address bar would always take me straight to the home page - aka the Notes feed!
Yes, I've done the same thing with a bookmark that avoids the feed. It works for me, too.
Brilliant! I found out something else today, actually, which I acted upon immediately - that you can tell the Substack app to not default to Notes every time you open it. If you hit the Settings menu in the app and then go to Appearance you can change the default page to Inbox.
The news has become enormously entertaining. Probably healthy, for the most part. My neighbor asked me if I thought the Speaker of the House would be replaced. He works in a warehouse. A few years ago if you asked him who the Speaker of the House was, he'd of said his wife : )
I think that consuming the news with a pinch of salt makes a world of difference, Richard! 🤣
I have been searching for the optimal balance of news consumption myself. I don't like reading/watching no news, but I tend to go down rabbit holes I don't need to go down.
I've found that consuming local news is best for me. I can get caught up on what's happening in my state, and if something is important enough to know about on a national/world level, I'll still find out about it.
(Does this work? Rarely....)
I recognise what you've said about rabbit holes - I get lost for daaaaays in some of them....! That's an excellent point about the local news over the national/world side of things. I might feel that it still presses my 'I need news' button equally hard, though! 🤣
I think you address the greatest question of our age. To news or not to news. And nowadays we must parse out and search for facts. When news becomes opinion or activism then it’s not news. I turned off all news last year and just read headlines. Then Oct 7 happened and I knew the lies about Israel would be endless. So I’m parsing out yet again trying to educate those who are open to learning about history and facts. It’s daunting and sometimes depressing. But silence is unacceptable.
It makes me sad that the facts are so often in such short supply - or twisted and spun out of all proportion to fit a particular narrative so that they still look and sound like the truth but in fact are a very poor representation of it. Ugh.
The book? “From Savage To Shaman”.
Written by a friend of mine—Johnny Medicine Bear, it’s on Amazon.
He used to fly fighter bombers during the Vietnam war. Then flew for American Airlines after he got sober and retired from the Air Force.
He helped me get over my fear of flying about 2011, when I was visiting him in Florida. He took me up in a teeny tiny piper Cherokee plane. It took me a good 45 minutes to even get into the little two seater. But I did it with his patience aided by my doing some EFT-tapping on myself.
I have not been afraid to fly since and even flew over the big pond to Scotland last year!
The book is a sort of a memoir/ autobiography.
I’m totally engulfed in it now!
Oh wow, it sounds fascinating, Gail! Thanks for the info! 😊