The Media & Your Mind: Who Owns It?

The Public Conversation Impacts You In Many Ways

Photo by Austin Distel on Unsplash

Ever wonder what happens when you feed your mind the wrong stuff?

It’s an interesting question, yet it’s one that not many people consider on a daily basis. More likely, it’s a topic reserved for a few fleeting zen moments that occur during a weekend retreat. Or the meditation portion of a yoga class.

Of course, maybe the reason we don’t think about it is that we are too busy thinking of other things — for example, the information that’s contained in the more than 7.5 hours of media we Americans consume each day. Our media habit (addiction?) has basically turned into a full-time job, and keeping up with it keeps us pretty busy, if not exhausted. New numbers from Statista show we’re now averaging 12 paid news and entertainment subscriptions, with Millennials tracking a bit higher, at 17 paid subs.

So, I’m thinking it’s a good time to ask: Ever wonder what happens when you feed your mind the wrong stuff? In today’s media landscape, the “wrong stuff” includes misinformation, disinformation, conspiracy theories, fake news, people who self-label themselves as experts and gurus and get away with it simply because they have an internet connection and built themselves a free website on Wix, and, well, you get the picture. Let’s take…