This one is going to be a bit more of an unstructured mess. It could probably be split into a few different posts, all focusing on one of the subtopics. I’ll try to revisit a lot of what I wrote in the future and dive deeper into what I believe. Any statements of claim are my own personal opinion; I don’t have sources or studies to back this up.

I’ve been thinking a lot about “mental fitness” and how it might relate to physical fitness. We have a pretty decent understanding of the correlation between the food we eat and our body’s relative health. Sure, no two bodies require the exact same diet but the general contours of healthy eating exist. Eat a mix of fruits and vegetables, lean proteins, carbs (to varying levels), and fats. Try to avoid excess sugar and processed foods. A little dessert can be fine but it should not be the main course. Pretty standard advice; most sane diets fit that description. I think there’s a conversation to be had about our mental consumption –– the things we see and hear and watch and read.

Our minds work the same way as our bodies. What we see and hear and watch and read affects our mind and changes how we think. Not too much of a radical statement; if our brains are completely static what’s the point of learning at all? I think we do get away with not thinking about this too much and equivalating different types of mental junk as the same. Is there a difference between watching a two hour movie and scrolling TikTok for two hours? I think there is. I think a lot of people would say that they would prefer to watch a film than scroll on their phone for 2 hours, and I think a lot of those people would find it difficult to stop scrolling once they start.

It’s easy to sound like moral crusaders of yesteryear who said that video games ruin our kids brains, or pop music, or television, etc etc. Go back as far as Socrates and he was complaining writing is impairing brain function. Simply saying “TikTok bad” can lead to the trap of association with a general anti-new entertainment legacy. I think what this misses are the levels of damage. Is a 42 minute TV episode more damaging to your brain than a 2 hour movie? Maybe. I see one as a shorter form of the other, with slightly different ideas of how to structure the story. Is an episode of the average HBO show equivalent to an episode of Vanderpump Rules? I think there’s a pretty large gulf there. What about an endless stream of short form videos, most of which you will instinctively scroll past in the first few milliseconds, the rest edited with oversaturated video, cuts that don’t last longer than half a second, cartoon text writing what’s being said. That feels fundamentally different to me.

I don’t think entertainment is bad. It’s an important part of life and has been around as long as humans have (I’m sure animals do things for entertainment as well). Individual expressions of creativity are fundamental to humanity. I do think different types of entertainment provide different values (or drawbacks) to a person – that there’s such a thing as “worse”. I think if the only thing you watch are true crime shows you are going to develop a more paranoid style of thinking (or is it the other way around?). If the only thing you read are irony-poisoned tweets that have nihilistic messages, your brain will start thinking like that.

TikTok isn’t brain candy – it’s brain crack. It’s not a sweet treat at the end of a long day, it’s an addictive substance that changes the way your brain processes information. Marshall McLuhan once said “the medium is the message”. Well what’s the message of short form video content? All ideas must be visual, less than a few minutes (ideally seconds long). Beyond all other qualities it must be immediately entertaining. An idea is not worth seeing if it does not immediately hook you with an interesting sound or visual. TikTok doesn’t allow for space to think, to process. There’s no moment of silence for deep thought.

Maybe in small doses it’s fine. Thew way we use it now is nowhere near that. With a smart phone you never need to have another moment alone with yourself again. You have to wait a minute for the elevator? Time enough to pull out your phone and watch a few videos. In line at the grocery store? Plenty of time to check. Getting bored during a 30 minute drive? Why not? The ability to instantaneously pull up an infinite feed of short bite dopamine hits is something we have yet to reckon with. We’ve given up the ability to have a moment to ourselves, a chance to think about our day and the world around us, to actually experience life.

Popular culture seems to have caught up with these ideas. I have been seeing a lot more anti-social media sentiment recently. The term “brainrot” is a direct reflection of this: an understanding that spending too much time on twitter, reddit, etc. impairs cognitive ability. How many times do people lament their lack of attention span now? “When I was younger I could read for hours; now I can’t even finish a TV show without checking my phone”. It’s the phones! It’s the internet! It’s the hyper-connected mass of stimulation that’s designed to overwhelm that attention center in your brain and keep you locked in on whatever slop it’s serving you.

I’ve been coming up with some rules I’m going to try to follow in order to reclaim my attention and focus and strengthen my mind. Some are relatively easy, some are pretty tall orders. These might not be perfect for everyone, but I think it’s a good start to reclaiming my mind. The rules are not in order of importance; a rule at the end may be more important than one at the beginning. Some of these rules may seem unrelated to the content of this article; I hope to expand on these ideas in future posts.

• Minimize phone usage
  • At home, treat cellphone like home phone. Keep it in a designated area (“phone bin”), and only use it when at that designated spot.
  • No phone before bed or after waking up. The designated spot should be out of the bedroom. Use an actual alarm clock.
  • While possible, use separate devices for separate actions. A physical alarm clock to wake up, a notebook for notes, a dedicated camera for taking pictures.
  • While out in the world, only use phone at essential times (checking map, checking when friend will arrive, etc). Do not pull out to ‘scroll’ while in public – experience those fleeting moments for yourself. Do not check phone in line at grocery store, riding up an escalator, waiting for the bus. Experience life. Look around, look at all the other people. Take those few moments of silence to think for yourself. Erase that dependency on the phone. Look at all the other people on their phones.
• Avoid all short form content. No TikTok, YouTube Shorts, tweets (or x posts I guess). It’s not equivalent to eating candy for dinner. It’s crack.
• Avoid all algorithmically recommended content. If using Youtube, only watch what you’re subscribed too. Same goes for any social media site you plan to stay on. Only look at who you’re following. If the platform makes that impossible, ditch the platform
• Only one form of entertainment at a time. No phone while watching a show. Focus on one thing at a time.
• Make space in your day for creation / creativity. Write your thoughts down, sketch a scene, make a song; express yourself. Do not be content with only being a consumer. You don’t need an audience; create for the sake of creation.
• Read every single day. Ideally a physical book, e-readers are allowed too. Reading on phone / computer screen is not ideal – aim for physical.
• Spend as much in-person time with friends as you can. “Social” media sites are empty social calories. They give the illusion of connection while not actually providing it. In person time is the standard, video / audio chat is substantially worse, texting far below that, and it’s not worth mentioning anything else as a form of connection.
• Limit internet exposure in the morning. Take time to be with your own mind before willingly subjecting yourself to the horrors of the world.

I’m going to try to follow these as best I can. I might come back later and update this list, add new things based on new problems.

Here’s to a better mind. -C