In a world where information circulates by limitless means, finding a reasonable balance to accommodate this information is a constant challenge, if not vital.
More and more people are becoming content-absorbing machines, especially in the current entrepreneurship and self-improvment ecosystem. The pathology of becoming an information addict is increasingly developing and I have been noticing it for some time now, especially with the emergence of such contents on several platforms. We are continuously immersed in an infinite flow of data.
The subject of the emergence of these “new tools” and their shortcomings will undoubtedly deserve other articles.
However, this pathology is dangerous.
On the one hand, mentally. It leads you to assimilate content without any real discernment or filter, and to extract the whole flow of information that goes around, whether it is good or bad for you. We can notice it with the number of hours we are able to spend on the various media or streaming platforms, as more and more people need their daily dose of content. This ongoing need for information results in a necessity to feed our brain with “data”, at any given moment of the day. The very act of feeding our brain with knowledge is needed by humankind, unless this information flow does not bring any personal utility or value.
On the other hand, this phenomena is harmful for those who, at the root, come on these content medias, such as Youtube, social networks or even online trainings platforms, to facilitate a step to take action or who come to look for tools to help them moving towards their goals. Consuming content in a desire for personal growth and progress towards a given goal is certainly necessary to accomplish it. However, a lot of information can end up creating a side effect: inaction.
My hope is to show you the potentially undesirable and harmful impact of having too much information or input in the achievement of your objectives, both in terms of the type of information you are exposed to and the different people providing it. The effect is particularly felt in the urge to continue consuming content over and over again.
This overdose or overload can be observed in the intensive activity of some people on these information tools made accessible on the Internet. They enroll in all the conferences, all the masterminds, buy all the training courses or books related to the skill or issue they want to develop or solve, absorbing their content without any action. I believe that this is one of the main reasons why people who want to start a business fail at the moment.
If we want to keep some honesty towards ourselves, we can only witness the consequences of this consumption of dozens of different contents. A real feeling of overdose facing the quantity of content, in transit in our mind, can be felt deep inside us if we make the effort to dive in and whatever the quantity of data your memory might be filled with.
I myself have witnessed these effects on my own actions, long delayed by a need to master every aspect of my projects, in a pursuit of perfectionism. You can’t be following the SEO (search engine optimization) conference at the same time as the marketing and product creation conference. You can not be on all the steps at the same time, you must prioritize.
There is a certain order for doing things, you must be able to discern the right time to go and get the information needed for the right action and the time when this action is required. If the amount of information you receive prevents you from taking action, it is likely that your information consumption is becoming harmful.
The content that forms our learning should not represent a hindrance to the completion of each step of our personal development, but rather it should represent the vehicle that will help us to act more effectively or successfully. I feel the consumer society we are experiencing is gradually being reflected with the emergence of an information society, which has taken place following the growth of the Internet.
It is better to start by testing your appetite for a subject, to delimit the field of skills you wish to acquire, to prioritize those that will allow you to progress in a linear way towards the achievement of the main goal you have set for yourself. The most important thing is to be able to validate each step with the right information and to eliminate unnecessary content.
Mastering the In & Out
In spite of my young age, in consideration of my personal experiences, and in consideration of the tools available to me, I can modestly recommend you to use a method that I refer to as “In & Out” (“L’entrée et la sortie” translated as intended in French). It refers to the ability, seemingly simple in its form, but quite complex in practice, to filter the information and content you receive and to extract only the purest value from it, so as to transform it into real useful knowledge. This tool allows you to block unwanted content at the gates of your knowledge. So that the content you receive truly serves the person you are and the goals you have set.
The “In” stands for the input : contents, information and data that you receive
The “Out” stands for the output : the useful knowledge that you will keep and preserve.
Hence the value of knowing the In & Out process, to be able to judge the information you are about to receive and to expose it to the judgments of your own convictions, beliefs or goals. If the information is legitimately valuable to your own fulfillment, then it can pass through the gateway of your mind.
This whole process of “In & Out” is an invitation to develop a shell, a shield, to protect ourselves from the constant flow of information that we may come across every day. This process has the sole objective of knowing how to recognize what is good for us and to promote a genuine quality of receipt regarding the information. These contents that you absorb will not be able to impede you from taking action as you will have previously filtered these contents.
This approach requires you to ask yourself the following question: does this information, this data, this content that I consult or that is offered to me, serve my intellect, my development or help me to move forward and take action?
In the end, this tool invites us to take a look at what we receive and to know to judge the quality of the resources we access.
Therefore, it is necessary to succeed in noticing the information that we get and to learn to recognize the feeling it brings us. If this feeling is harmful or useless, we must then judge its effect on our mind and decide whether or not to accept that it may impact us.
By using it on a daily basis, you will be able to do this filtering without even thinking about it.
This is also a real control over the flow of contents that goes through us, and a process of raising and judging the knowledge that we sought, or an immediate cure in case of breach of this equilibrium necessary to our mind.
Thank you for the time you took to read me.
