Four months ago, I did a Reassessment. I tracked where my time was going, by the hour, for a week. The purpose: to see if I really didn’t have time to work on my slacking projects or if I was just making an excuse. The results shocked me. When I saw on paper how much time in a week I dedicated to things like watching TV or playing on the web, I could no longer claim I didn’t have time to work out more or finish that book I meant to read. Confronted with where my time was really going, I realized that I didn’t need to force myself to do more stuff, I needed to do less. I had to cut off unnecessary wastes of time before I could add more to my load.
One of the biggest culprits stealing my time was the news. CNN, Yahoo, the local newspaper’s website, news links posted by my friends on Facebook – I found myself checking all of them, multiple times a day. Most of what I read added nothing to my day. The occasional compelling story was drowned out by hordes of over-sensationalized junk meant to fill up a 24-hour news cycle and maximize the number of ads I saw. How many of the dozen news stories I read each day did I remember even a day or two later? Not many. Reading news websites was choosing to spend hours per week on things I admitted had no benefit over things that get me closer to my goals. Unacceptable.
I also found that reading so much news harmed me by itself. Visit the front page of your favorite news site and you’re guaranteed to find the most horrible thing another human has done in the past week. Constantly refreshing ourselves with the latest tragedy of human behavior affects us. It gives us a sense that there is more crime than there is. It promotes fear-mongering. It degrades our faith in mankind. What good does it do you to get angry about each and every injustice that occurs among the seven billion people on this planet? You can always find something to offend you if you’re looking for it. I want to worry less about things I can’t control, not more.
Divorcing the news freed up time. I’ve probably redirected thirty to sixty minutes a day of reading, watching and listening to news to more important things.
Divorcing the news freed up emotion. I believe we have a limited capacity for worrying. If I’m worrying about every problem on earth, I’m not spending that time on things I can control. I’d rather make a difference in my little corner of the world than worry about everything and do nothing. When I took my time back from the news, the time I spent on more important things went up without me even trying.
When I have shared with others my decision to divorce the news, almost every person has voiced the same concern: “I like to stay informed.” I honestly don’t feel like I’m missing out. I’ve heard about every truly newsworthy event through friends, family and Facebook. I’ve kept up with Steve Jobs’ passing, Gadhafi’s death, American troops leaving Iraq. To be fair, I’ll admit that I’ve also been lost in a few conversations when people have brought up details of the Sandusky molestation accusations, the latest Herman Cain scandal, and Kim Kardashian’s wedding. I’m OK with that.
After seeing the benefits I got from not watching the news, I divorced the stock market. I was keeping track of my investments on Google Finance. I’d refresh the screen to see how my stocks were doing multiple times per day. I kept up on the day to day movement of a 401(k) I don’t plan to touch for decades. I’d read articles about what was going on with the companies in my portfolio. For what? I’m not competing with institutional investors and financial experts. Why was I worried about what happened to the Dow Jones between 2 and 4pm on a random Tuesday? Divorcing the stock market boosted my daytime productivity, and I don’t miss the stock checking at all.
Next on the chopping block was politics. It’s not that I’m not interested in the issues. I’m probably too interested. Similar to reading articles about assaults and murder, getting worked up about every political issue I can’t affect was frustrating. Also, I have my ideas and beliefs, and like most people, I’m not changing them based on what the politician du jour is saying. I wasn’t learning new information and rationally adjusting my positions. I was doing what most of us do: nod along with articles we agree with and ignore opposing views. This is called confirmation bias. We listen to the people already on our side. Pundits preach to their respective choirs, and we sing four-part harmony. I don’t need to convince myself of stuff I already believe. Tracking politicians’ speeches, positions and personal lives helps if I’m storing up arguments for a debate or answers for trivia night, but I have more important stuff in my own life to focus on. If I can’t devote the time to making a difference on an issue, it’s not worth adding my voice to the political noise.
Divorcing news, politics and the stock market isn’t for everyone, but I would challenge you to take a closer look at the gremlins that eat up your time and be honest about which ones you could stand to ditch. Worry about things you can change instead of things you can’t. Fight the urge to simply “stay informed.” Killing time on CNN and Yahoo could be killing your dreams. Be stingy with what you allow to fill your precious time – you don’t get that time back. You either guard your time with your life, or you waste both. You know what you could do without. It’s time to get divorced.
The Mastermind Project 
Bulls-eye, brother. You hit the nail on the head with this article. I’ve been practicing each one of these things you’ve divorced from for about a year now as part of my push towards minimalism. These being part of minimizing information overload. I even deleted my facebook for some similar reasons. Great article!
Thanks Amit! And yes, this is part of my push to minimalism as well. Clearing out the shrubbery.
This is great advice. I need to follow it myself.
Great blog post…..
Found this by way of a mutual friend on Facebook, and I just wanted to let you know I couldn’t agree more. I quit watching the TV several years ago, and haven’t missed it since. I still see the occasional episode of whatever when I’m visiting friends our out somewhere, just not at home. The funny thing is, when you’ve been away from it long enough, even the commercials are new and interesting (the first time). The only drawback I’ve noticed is that I occasionally need help understanding popular culture references like “phone a friend” or “vote him off the island.”
Ha! I sometimes need to “phone a friend” when someone starts naming off “Real Housewives.” Glad you enjoyed the post Travis. Having watched tons of TV for a few years after you, I guarantee you haven’t missed much.