It's late. You pick up your phone to check one thing and look up forty minutes later. You've watched a stranger's kitchen get renovated, read three arguments about something that doesn't affect you, and seen the news twice. You put the phone down feeling a bit flat and you can't say why.
Have you ever noticed that content and content are spelt the same? One means stuff. Information, videos, posts, things. The other means being at peace with where you are. I don't think that's a coincidence.
You're the one on the door
The content of your life is everything that goes in. What you watch, what you read, who you spend time with, what you eat. All of it has a say in how happy and healthy you feel.
And you're the one on the door deciding what gets in. You can turn the telly off. You can stop scrolling. You can cancel the subscription. You can walk round the supermarket and choose what goes in the trolley. Nobody else is doing that for you.
I'm not perfect at this. Nowhere near. But I'm a lot better than I used to be, and that's what counts. Progress, not perfection.
It works the other way too
The content you put out matters just as much. Every time you touch someone else's day, with a post, a comment or how you treat them in a queue, it lands somewhere. Sometimes you hear about it. Mostly you don't. I wrote more about that in What ripples do you create?.
If you're trying to build a business or help people, that's worth thinking about. A powerful message nobody ever hears isn't very powerful. So get it out there, and make it something that leaves people better off.
The last hour of the day
When I first wrote this in 2017, the feeds were already loud. They're louder now, and much better at keeping you scrolling. The idea hasn't changed, it's just got more important. What you let in still decides a lot about how you feel.
These days I notice it fastest in the evenings. If I fill the last hour of the day with rubbish, I sleep worse and wake up grumpier. If I fill it with a book, a walk or some music, it's a different morning. (Usually. I'm still human.)
First published June 2017.
