Mind Your Inputs

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what I put into my mind; my inputs.

What am I consuming? Why am I consuming it? How much of it am I consuming?

And how does it actually affect me?!

Like most people, I’m much more aware of what food I consume than what content I consume.

Usually, I know how much food I’ll eat in a day and I make sure it’s good for me.

I don’t aimlessly sit in front of my pantry for an hour munching on whatever I see…
I don’t have cake everyday just because it’s enjoyable to eat…
And I don’t keep eating when I’ve already eaten enough…

Yet, I find myself doing all these things with mental consumption.

I aimlessly sit in front of YouTube or Netflix for over an hour watching whatever…
I watch the stuff that’s the most entertaining, even if there’s no benefit…
And I often keep watching/consuming stuff longer than I should…

We all know an unhealthy diet will inevitably make someone fatter and weaker than a healthy diet.

We know this because it’s easy to see with our own eyes.

But what about the mind?

It’s not so easy to see how an unhealthy mental diet manifests its ruin.

But that doesn’t mean it isn’t causing similar or worse ruin than a poor food diet…

Aimless consumption leads to a less intentional life: simply put, if you aren’t intentional about what you allow in your mind, you won’t be intentional in other areas.

Passive behavior is contagious and spreads quickly. If your entertainment becomes passive, other areas will follow soon after.

Not setting a standard for what you watch/read/listen to lets your standard be set by the lowest bidder…

So when you open up Instagram with intent to scroll and just “see what’s out there”, you’ve already lowered or even removed your standards.

Passive behavior with no standards is not a goal anyone wants to aim for…

Ultimately, inputs equal outputs.

If you fill your car with low-quality, recycled gas, you can’t expect it to perform well.

Similarly, if you fill your mind with standard-less muck, you can’t expect it to perform right either.

There’s a lot of competition for our attention.

More than 720,000 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every day…

And around 34 million videos are uploaded to TikTok each day…

If you aren’t setting a standard for yourself, you’ll settle for the lowest bidder…

Mind your inputs.

Thanks for reading.