Tag: internet

Lurking: The addiction to online subcultures

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Hello, you might remember over the past two years I blocked all politics from my social media only to add them back in moderation a year and a half later, I added them back in slowly and with a lot of cation. I only allowed certain people back into my space, and that’s because before hand, I became completely consumed in the Twitter subculture surrounding my political party.

And yikes, did it rewire my brain.

I don’t think we talk enough about what the sub-cultures can do, and not just the political ones but the intense niche interests ones as well. Fans become toxic online, which is why I’ve always warned against becoming a “stan”. These cultures are completely addictive. We like to say that we are just addicted to the site. “Oh, I’m addicted to Twitter” sounds a lot better than “I’ve addicted to a small community with extreme views on sexual kinks”. I’ve never fallen into one of those communities, but I know they’re there and have force online.

They’re all over the place, extreme little groups that have very strong opinions on everything from religious extremists to complete anarchists. They are all there, and they are all trying to take root in your brain.

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Keeping things in mind: Everything online is dramatized.

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The internet is a intense place, I don’t think anyone would argue that. You get the perfectly curated views of life and you get anger and intense viewpoints.

There hardly seems to be anything else.

Mid-way views, deep rational thinking, and realistic images are hard to find, but we’ve become numb to the fact that they’re missing. We’re feeding on that content and nothing else. It seems to go over our head that the internet is completely dramatized. The politics are more intense. The tragedies are expanded upon. Conspiracy theories are fed. And perfect lives are staged for praise.

We fall down rabbit holes and don’t realize that the internet is changing our views, but even more so, we don’t seem to realize that the rabbit holes we’re in don’t reflect real life. The internet will make you believe that the world is falling apart, but it’s not. If we go outside we can see that opposite sides come together in hard times and are polite to each other in the grocery store check out. We can also see that those who have perfectly frames lives are still chasing their screaming kids around and getting frizzy hair in the rain. We realize that the front we’ve been seeing, both the good and the bad, are completely overblown.

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  • The most inspiring story as of late has to be Selma Blair making her struggles with MS known. Chronic illness is a terrible burden to bare, it is greatly misunderstood, so spreading awareness is wonderful and brave. Here is her interview about it.
  • This video showcases a church doing ash Wednesday drive thru style. I normally don’t have ash’s on my forehead today, but I love the reminder that seeing them brings no matter your denomination. We’re all mortal and not meant for this world but the one after.
  • I’m a pen snob, just ask anyone, I’m really picky and I have a lot of opinions on what makes a good pen, so I was happy when I found a ranking of 100 pens. Though my favorite didn’t make it high on the list (which makes me wonder…)
  • This articles headline says it all: Religious practice is declining. Here’s why that’s bad news for disaster recovery.
  • I haven’t had a lot of luck with underwear and bras from Victoria Secret, which was my go to when I was younger. They’ve gotten uncomfortable and the quality has decreased, there has also been a lot of backlash against them for not being body positive, so I was really excited to hear that Target is launching three new intimates lines, because let’s be honest, I was in Target anyway!
  • This baby panda video is insanely cute and funny. It’s hard getting work done with the help of baby pandas!
  • This article on the cult of wellness touches on the same topics I did in my Lyme Disease post on fake medicine and real medicine. This article though speaks about the wellness move in general, from oils to Fitbits.

Retraining your brain: We’ve taught ourselves that mindless activities can take the place of hobbies

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20180716_202856.jpgIf you’re like me you might be making a big push to spend more time on your hobbies and less time wasting time. I know a lot of people who are doing this, because after all we are in a digital age that runs on wasting time. Instead of going for a hike you’re rewatching a show you’ve seen before on Netflix, or worse, you’re wasting your time scrolling through Netflix for something to watch. We mindlessly scroll and we know it’s a problem, so a lot of us are trying to fix it.

But adding our hobbies back into our lives often feels like a chore. I talked about how going from a mindless activity to a mindful activity often seems like hard work, and I think we can agree just by how hard it is to talk ourselves into doing the things we love.

We love them, it should be easy, but it never is. So we add it to our to do list, we force ourselves to do them. Maybe that’s the only way to break the cycle, to make yourself get up and act. Maybe it’s harder to channel motivation to do it in a more natural way. Maybe it takes some time to build up the excitement you used to have. But if it lasts for more than the first two weeks you have to really look at why these things still feel like chores to you.

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  • These beautiful pictures of microscopic plankton make you realize where we’ve been pulling our ideas from for science fiction films. They also make you realize how little you actually know about the ocean and it’s stunning creatures. It really is a whole new world down there.
  • I’ve been looking for the perfect black cardigan and I’ve found it at Loft. It’s the perfect length, cut, and it’s super soft.
  • This article is about the seven essential behaviors of creative people rings true. Learn how to help channel your creativity!
  • Bringing back this blog post from last year talking about five ways to beat the winter blues because lets face it, this time change started bring them out a few weeks ago.
  • This Christmas video is the kid version of drunk history. Kids tell the Christmas story, adults act it out. Super cute!
  • I’ve been loving this Instagram account (especially her stories). Lynzy is a mother of three in the medical field and her page is lifestyle based. She covers a lot but she does try ons at different stores each week and I’ve enjoyed them because they always gives me really good outfit ideas.
  • Samaritans Purse released their holiday giving catalog. It has a TON of amazing causes to give to, and they’ll send you a card for it if you’d like to give a donation as a gift to a loved one!

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Happy Thursday! I hope everyone is having a good day. It’s been a busy week for me, but I finally managed to finish this round up. I hope you find something good in it.

  • Millennial are killing… divorce? Finally something good. This article explains why divorce rates are falling, a lot of it has to do with who is choosing getting married. It also adds that cohabiting unmarried couples tend to be unstable, which is something that this book touched on in a chapter that really struck me, actually that whole book struck me, so I feel the need to link it whenever I can.
  • If you’re a Carolina girl (or boy!) like me, you might be interested in getting this cute Carolina Strong T-shirt. 100% of the proceeds go to Hurricane Florence recovery. Mine is in the mail as we speak!
  • This article by The New York Times on Goop, Gwyneth Paltrow’s “health” brand, is hysterical, in depth, and truly wonderful. It’s the best written article I’ve read in a long time.
  • I didn’t know our grey squirrels were boring or plain until I saw the the Malabar squirrel in India. Talk about having a beautiful animal to dig up your flower bulbs.
  • Speaking of animals and hurricanes, studies have shown that birds can predict them far before us, which isn’t surprising, what is is the fact that they’ll lay their eggs months early to avoid the storms.
  • “Social justice in the shadows” is the title of this article, which is insightful, moving, and also sheds warning. I’d suggest anyone read it.
  • This article could also be titled “even when you sit up straight you’re doing it wrong” and you should read it. Good posture now rids of of bad back pain later, and after Lyme, I’d like to never have back pain again.

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I’ve always loved internet round ups so I thought I’d start doing them at least once a month. I’ve made a few before, but this time I’m making a format and going to try to stick with it. So here are seven things from around the web!

  • Since I’ve started working again I suddenly need to wear less of my beloved denim and more dress pants. These slacks are going to be the only ones I buy from now on.
  • It’s a dream come true! Joanna Gaines is opening a line at Target. Excuse me as I go buy things for the apartment I have yet to move into.
  • If you’re a bookworm and/or a writer, this twitter feed has been making me laugh recently. It’s been a wonderful addition to my timeline, because I’ve recently done a lot of unfollowing to get rid of politics and bring in things I love.
  • I saw this seven year old being a fashion CEO on my Facebook timeline the other day and started laughing very loudly in my cubical. This is basically how I imagine the fashion world works.
  • This song off of Thomas Rhett’s new album is sublime. I’m obsessed with it.
  • My last blog post on mental health got featured. It’s the first time that’s ever happened, so I was beyond excited to see it. I’m really glad I added that category to my blog this year.
  • I love good satire news, I recently found the Christian version of the Onion.  I didn’t expect it to be so good.