drowning in entertainment: the age of distraction

21:25 wow what a hypocrite get off youtube

Being ok with boredom is truly a superpower nowadays

I just now realized how absolutely boring life is without meaningful social interactions. We seek distractions to avoid going mad

i’m on a mission to restore my attention span, deleting tiktok was my first step

The fact that I (born in the 2000's) would watch a 30 minute youtube video when I was younger and wouldn't get bored but now a 5 min tiktok feels like a eternity makes me realize how I am also getting stuck in this short videos addiction

I always feel self-conscious whenever I sit on a park bench without a phone or a book. It feels like passers-by must think I'm staring at them, because any "normal" person would be doing something instead of just sitting. This video helped me put that thought in focus. I think the idea that we all require constant entertainment has become a social norm - it feels uncomfortable to be seen going against it.

What's crazy is how quickly you can get your attention span back if you try and cultivate it. Not only can you weed your garden by removing short form content, dopamine rush social media from your life, but meditating, exercise, reading, and long walks without music or podcasts, when I'm consistent, put me into a zen level of focus. Conversations become excellent because people love how focused I am on what they're saying, because I really am listening to them intently. When I find someone who can do the same back, it's amazing.

The more "connected" we get, the more disconnected we become. Also, the people who are saying that your videos are boring are the type of people who you are talking about that put value into entertainment more than should be. Don't let the zombies and clones hinder you from saying what you want to say. Real people will listen.

all of gen z (including me) feels nostalgic of the late 2000s and early 2010s but it’s mostly just because we were kids. we had all these amazing toys, we mostly didn’t have to worry about other peoples opinions about us. we had minimal to no school work and when we did it was done in mere minutes. everything was simpler back then, but that’s just how childhood works.

The absolute guilt I felt, when I struggled to sit through this video due to the points she made brilliantly. How cursed we are.

I just realised i cant watch a youtube video without reading comments. As soon as i open a random video i run to the comment section.i dont even listen to the video. We are becoming more and more worried abt others opinion these days.

Honestly I have completly abandoned short length content and instead started to practice meditation whenever I have nothing left to do, I highly recommend!

"Americans remember the last 24 hours more than they remember the last 60 years." That's the thought that will pop into my head when I think of oliSUNvia from now on.

Lately it really does feel like life is just one big distraction

I’ve gotten rid of all social media except YouTube. I don’t regret it. It’s been 2 years. I still watch too much YouTube, it’s hard to get rid of it for me but I think I would be better off in life without it at this point

As a 23 year old, my screen time on my phone is about 1 hour, the time I spend mostly is cooking my own 3 meals of the day and even dessert. Playing with my dog and taking him for walks, I grew up poor so I didn't get a phone till I was 18 and honestly I hate having a phone

Your speaking skills, witty composition, and substantive ideas are inspiring. You're doing amazing, congratulations on a million subscribers!

I think this is related to the 'shower thoughts' phenomenon, "all my best thoughts come to me in the shower" -- this might be the only part your day when you are forced to just be alone with your thoughts. As evidence, I've met some people who always listen to music when showering, which seems like too much work to me for 5 minutes or so. I also tend to have some good ideas when trying to fall asleep, and I imagine others do too, since entertainment is counterproductive there :).

The worst part is that, over the years, I’ve worked hard to unfollow as many useless accounts as possible so that I naturally check social media less. Then came tik tok and every other social media wanted to copy them so now we are force fed stuff we don’t even want (yt shorts, ig reels, Twitter for you). I wish they just let us see what we want to see.

The Hunger Games reference was a chilling one, actually. I watched the films, and I was ENTERTAINED; I was entertained with the visual effects, how Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) dropped her headstrong-16-year-old-toppling-a-government lines, how romantic Katniss was with Peeta, how I was sad with her volunteering and sacrificing herself on behalf of her sister, Primrose. BUT, I say BUT, reading the book gave me a sense of DEEPLY knowing how effed-up the Hunger Games was. Yeah, I was creeped out by the gore visual effects of the movie, but I kept thinking (during reading the first book) if I and my sister (14 years old) would survive the games. You would think how TRULY BRAVE Rue and Katniss are for surviving half of the games while everyone was killing each other, the impending doom day by day, and the idea of the Quarter Quell where you get to be picked again to be locked in an arena with LITERALLY EXPERIENCED murderers and killers. Reading the book, reading the thoughts, the dialogues and the inner dialogues of the characters, and the act of just putting down the book for a second and think about what is truly happening inside the book made me realize that my I'm just consuming knowledge because it is fun to know or the idea of just knowing awes me.