Worlds Collide

I kid you not, if I took a screen shot of my open windows right now one of the tabs would be NPR's critique of The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brain and another tab is the article that spurred the book, Is Google Making us Stupid (written in 2008, clearly not "hot off the press").  So when I tuned into an interview with meditation expert, Tara Brach, yesterday on my commute and she referenced the book - it felt a bit serendipitous.  I have this yearning to dig into what the internet, text messaging, social media etc. or more generally, the insane pace at which information is available to us, is doing to our thoughts and psychological health.

Can we relate the rising cases of anxiety to the incessant flow of information?   Are attention deficit problems a result of plugging-in?    I want to explore...

Ironically, the tab to the Atlantic article on Is Google Making us Stupid is still open because quiet simply, I don't have the attention span to finish it!   Even being conscious of it, I find myself clicking out of the article to check email, to read something else, or just generally distract myself with nothing of importance 5-10 times in a single article (!!).  That is really frightening to me.    

I've been using the past two weeks to prepare for September.  More to come, but I'm using September and the "back to school" feeling to kick my productivity into a next gear,  Rather than dive right in, I've used these two weeks to start to flush off the cobwebs and get things in line.  Among other things I hope to achieve, is a less internet addicted self.  I plan to unplug with more time reading books and being outside.