While attempting to be more mindful of the foods, medicines, etc. I'm putting into my body on a day-to-day basis, I've realized that I've been paying more attention to the media I consume, and how the different themes of media can shape our thought process.
I will confess that my guilty pleasure is listening to true crime podcasts. I spend most days at a desk, behind a computer screen, so I enjoy listening to interesting cases, solved and unsolved. Is this hobby good for my psyche? Probably not. Probably in moderation, but probably not.
I spend at least one night a week alone, and within that one night I am either exceptionally paranoid or functioning normally depending on how much true crime I'm consuming.
What I'm trying to get to is thinking of the things we see, hear, and even smell the same as we think of what we put in our mouths and digest through our bodies. We are digesting unhealthy material on social media the same way our bodies metabolize a few glasses of wine. Our stress levels increase, our fight or flight kicks in, and our sight and sound consumption, I believe, is a direct correlation to our mindset for that day, and even the days following.
But why is it so much easier to turn on a true crime podcast, scroll Instagram for countless hours, and watch reality tv, as it's easier to pop that frozen burrito in the microwave instead of eating the wilting kale sitting at the back of the fridge? Rather, make a conscious decision to choose the thing you know will give you probably zero immediate gratification, but will elevate your future self.
This may sound silly, but I'm going to try to be as conscious about what my eyes and ears eat as I am about what my mouth eats. Switch out a time I scroll for a time I flip pages of a book. Or take my eyes off the TV and put my eyes on a board game I can share with my family. If I really want to be crazy, I'll trade my true crime podcasts for some self-help and wellness podcasts. Though maybe I won't make any radical life changes just yet...
I challenge you to do the same. Eat one healthy thing with your eyes and ears a day, and simply see if anything even minuscule changes in your mood. It might even change the way you confront the day as a whole. The only thing left to do is try.
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