I rarely have the radio on in my car but yesterday morning I couldn’t be bothered to have another argument with Siri when I ask it to play Sombr and it plays Samba. Nothing against Samba music, I like it but I am really into Sombr at the moment and they are who I want to listen to.
So I decided to opt for the radio.
“War”…scroll…”drones”…scroll…”rocket”…I went through a ridiculous amount of stations until I decided to just listen to a song I didn’t even like.
I looped in my head something I read on Pinterest recently and wrote down in my morning art journal.
“Listen to the birds, not the news”. (Wasn’t possible when driving in busy traffic but anyway).
I can have quite an active imagination when it comes to disasters. A doctor described it well when we discussed my level of anxiety by saying “Our brains have a filter, yours just doesn’t filter things the same way others do”.
I’d been discussing some quite disturbing anxious thoughts I’d been having, something I don’t openly share because of how graphic they are, so the “nicer” way of putting it is that ‘if the chances of being hit by a bus was 1 in 1 million, you would assume you were that 1 rather than being 1 in 1 million’.
So as a result, I really have to protect my peace and my health by avoiding the news as much as I can.
My social media feed isn’t too horrific, the algorithm must quite like me. My Instagram explore page is mainly women like me growing out their grey hair, Greg Davies clips, 90s pop groups motorbikes or something Wellbeing related.
So I decided to opt for the radio.
“War”…scroll…”drones”…scroll…”rocket”…I went through a ridiculous amount of stations until I decided to just listen to a song I didn’t even like.
I looped in my head something I read on Pinterest recently and wrote down in my morning art journal.
“Listen to the birds, not the news”. (Wasn’t possible when driving in busy traffic but anyway).
I can have quite an active imagination when it comes to disasters. A doctor described it well when we discussed my level of anxiety by saying “Our brains have a filter, yours just doesn’t filter things the same way others do”.
I’d been discussing some quite disturbing anxious thoughts I’d been having, something I don’t openly share because of how graphic they are, so the “nicer” way of putting it is that ‘if the chances of being hit by a bus was 1 in 1 million, you would assume you were that 1 rather than being 1 in 1 million’.
So as a result, I really have to protect my peace and my health by avoiding the news as much as I can.
My social media feed isn’t too horrific, the algorithm must quite like me. My Instagram explore page is mainly women like me growing out their grey hair, Greg Davies clips, 90s pop groups motorbikes or something Wellbeing related.
So I'm able to avoid all the disasters, hatred and trauma going on in the world right now, unless I choose to listen to it or read it.
And as much as maybe I should, I guess some people think we should all have knowledge of what is going on in the world, I just can't.
I can't control what is going on in the world.
But it's not just the noise of wars that I HAVE to avoid.
It's racism, people stating that "foreigners should go home", "foreigners shouldn't have the power to vote", and if a crime happens "I bet it was a foreigner"/"What colour was their skin?"/"What religion do they belong to?".
It makes me angry, it makes me sad, it makes me hate and I can't bring those feelings into my life. I can't change what those people say, challenging them and debating with them is pointless sometimes because these people are so set in their ways and almost thrive on being challenged.
I saw a Facebook post recently with a comment around foreign people living in the UK and that they shouldn't have the power to vote. However, this person is also happy with foreign people paying their taxes, they will also be happy for that person to cook their takeaway, build their houses, look after them in hospital, run a company they buy from....however...letting them VOTE?! ABSOLUTELY NOT!!
I just can't understand that and it fills my head with such negative thoughts, taking up far too much space that I have to choose to not read it.
I should say at this point that I am fully supportive of foreign people moving to the UK. I have no issue with it at all. My fiancé is Dutch, one of my best friends is Swedish, my next door neighbour is Turkish, they all work hard and are lovely people. We live as equals and should have equal rights in all ways. Just my opinion.
It's influencers. Showing off their weight loss without actually being honest that they are on injections. Getting their 4th gifted vacuum cleaner which they only promote on one story then try and get their followers to purchase using a discount code and using an affiliate link so not only did they get yet another free vacuum (which coincidentally is the BEST one they've ever had and has picked up all the dust and dirt that no other vacuum ever has...which they literally told us the last time they had a gifted vacuum cleaner...). Sharing a brand of vitamins that have changed their life, again the same they said about the other vitamins they shared only a week ago. Showing off the amazing, great quality clothes they've been gifted (again affiliate link and discount code) to then never wear those clothes again or sell on Vinted....
See, this is why I have to avoid listening to, watching or reading anything of this nature. It stays in my head, I find it hard to move on from.
Life is hard. Getting through the day sometimes feels really really hard. Sometimes exhausting.
Sometimes when I open my laptop in the morning and see emails or messages I think "I just don't want to do this today", going on social media "I just don't want to do this today", so I definitely don't want to turn on the news or current affairs programmes "I DON'T WANT TO DO THIS TODAY!!".
Not looking at these things doesn't mean we're burying our head in the sand, that we don't care, that we are naïve, etc etc.
It is completely ok to be "selfish" and protect your peace and to not add more to the mental workload of life.
I think we could all do with following this mantra when we need to, guilt free.
