For me it feels important to maintain faith that, deep inside, people are good, or at least are born innocent, and that it’s mainly our institutions, philosophies, and cultural norms that turn us against each other and harm our souls with toxic stuff. And that through seeking local community and connection we can reconnect with the natural tendency towards compassion that exists within us all even as so many of our leaders fail to show those qualities.

I read BBC’s website. Reading the news is less upsetting to me than hearing it or seeing it. BBC has a mix of serious and fluff that is just right to keep me from getting overwhelmed.

And if the news from BBC doesn’t bother me, I’ll read National Public Radio’s front page.

I find the balance by acknowledging that I am one of 8 billion people and that there are going to be 7.9 billion problems happening at any given moment. I think about my problems and how a majority of them are frivolous and minor. I acknowledge that there’s endless, immense amounts of problems for other people that are far greater than what I deal with.

And yet, I can do nothing for them. Not to sound brash, but why exert the energy worrying about something I can’t possibly have an affect on? Moreover, if I’m spending time worrying about things outside of my community, what time am I putting into helping my community? I wholeheartedly feel for refugees and absolutely loathe the man who called them dogs, his statements and our countries actions are abominable and they are just one of a litany of examples.

What exactly is the need to stay informed? Informed about what? Are these things that you are able to effectively assess and help? Do you have the money for every crisis charity or in need individual? I mean, what good does actively searching out these issues in the world bring you except for dishearten you and make the way you perceive life harder?

Don’t get me wrong from any of this - I am kind, ever giving and ever helpful at the drop of a hat before the question is even asked. I am a doer and I aspire to inspire by doing the right thing. But the right thing is relative. To do the right thing you have to take care of yourself first - you cannot set yourself on fire putting someone else out.

The balance is being positive and spreading that positivity at any given opportunity. It’s not helpful to engage in doomscrolling, even if the goal is to “stay informed” about the latest climate disaster two states away, or how Mexico is doing during Hurricane Hilary. Is the time you spent reading about all of that time spend taken away from your morning walk where you’d have come across the elderly person who needs assistance? Sounds silly but my old home was next to an assisted living facility so one of my semi-weekly happenings was to help these people in wheelchairs get across our terribly busted up roads.

The balance is finding ways to engage in your local community. Work or volunteer at the library or a non-profit performing arts center, get involved in the bills that are being proposed for your city and fight for them if they’re worth it and fight against them if they’re not. Change starts locally. We may be inspired to hear about the people of Hong Kong, but if we don’t actually do anything about our local problems then why are we cheering them on? Oh good, at least someone somewhere is doing something? Do your schools have funding for arts? Mine do not, so if kinds want to learn music or theater they have to do it as an extracurricular. These places are normally non-profit, heavily volunteer sponsored and are chronically understaffed. If you don’t like kids, senior facilities, hell the entire caregiving field if you don’t like old people either!

The balance is feeling where your time is well spent. Are you only reading articles and resharing them? Are you only commenting in spaces where other people are agreeing? Are you only engaging in spaces where you antagonize each other? My only political time spent on the old-place was sheerly spent speaking to the people on the fence. I’d usually be responding to a right-wing/libertarian type who maybe seemed to have a semblance of realization that they may be perpetuating evil, or I’d be categorically listing against their every point pushing on empathy and action. I’d never aim to insult, I’d try and work from their perspective while pushing for human morals. In retrospect, it was all a waste of time. At the time though it was 2016 and so any chance of what I had to say changing someones perspective if even a little felt important. Now I only bother if it’s someone who genuinely seems misguided in good faith and that’s way more rare now. Was that time composing a speech style essay better spent than resharing ~5 articles about various different issues that others may have already seen? Who knows, realistically bother were just scrolled past. Most of mine would barely get 5 votes at all, rarely ever being more than 20 votes. And I am almost 100% certain that my words, about this much text in response, is seen and not read forever ignored by the person I was actually responding to. I know because they are the type of people to not bother responding. In the same vein, what is resharing those articles doing if people are just seeing the same headline again, but from you this time? Realistically, neither making this speech nor sharing those articles are having any effective change, but the hope is that they make someone think? Or at least, I hope to make someone reevaluate something with another perspective and the article has whatever its agendas are, usually just trying to inform. (But again… inform what and why?)

As with all things, I think there’s something to be said about moderation. If by trying to be aware of everything we are paralyzed into doing nothing then are we not worse off? That’s not at all to say stay ignorant, but rather to focus on learning what you can effectively bring change to. Realistically, we cannot help another country. Spending my time looking at the tragedies of war or natural disasters won’t make me a better person. Ignoring them by choosing to spending my time more effectively doesn’t make me a worse person. Realistically, we cannot help another state (to an extent) Spending my time scrambling to put together links for donating to worthwhile charities to help Maui? That one is actually great as long as no one else has done that work. But worrying about the train spill in Ohio, Flint, Michigan’s water situation, or the latest assault weapon attack? There is really not too much that you or I can do about that from where we are. And realistically, we cannot help even another city, easily at least.

But realistically, we can absolutely help our town or city, and fairly easily. We can absolutely get involved in our local community, and as we learn about what moves are being made here we can make the connections we need to network with other cities. Suddenly you’re a part of the town hall meetings and because of the area you live eventually you are the liaison with the local police and you are the direct shotcaller for how they might deal with the homeless population, which gives you the opportunity to meet with the mayor to discuss how budgeting for services would actually reduce the total cost and whatever other stuff to get less cops and alleviate the homeless. Again, not totally BS here as my dad is in progress, hopefully, accomplishing just this. Living here for almost 20 years and have been making calls to our P.D. monthly the whole time - break-ins, day thefts, assaults, my dead end road, my parents, and I have seen a lot. It sucks being an activist and needing to have a relationship with the police, but it’s them or actual bigger issues. But now after all that time, the last couple years my dad has been consistently going to town hall meetings and speaking up about the problems that we have (re: crime, unchecked drug abuse and lack of services). Just a year before that our city passed something that made it so police can’t make people leave private property, which is mostly good, but even in situations where they’d started fires, which is really bad. Normally I’d support CalTrain land being freely camped on, but using it as an open bonfire during fire season is not the way to do it. Anyway, if this proposal is well received and seems viable to our city then it could be a program that becomes more widely adopted.

So from my experience, the healthy balance between staying informed and doomscrolling is to not doomscroll if it’s stopping you from helping. You don’t even need to stay informed as you will most likely see and hear all the same things just through your daily routine if there’s a TV with news, a phone with a web browser, or a newspaper with a headline. I’m not saying don’t read them when you come across them, I’m saying why actively seek out problems from afar, especially when we can be the solution to problems right in front of us. The best way to have a healthy balance is to get involved in your local community. You have a public school that probably needs help, an extracurricular that gives a child something to look forward to and sets them on a good path, a local library that wants readers, a person who wants to work but just needs a little assistance. There’s hundreds of problems all around you, including your own. Why worry about whatever Egypt or Venezuela or our climate? Make the changes to the things you have an affect on directly and let yourself be healthy enough to accomplish them. If doomscrolling or staying on top of every little thing paralyzes you then you will accomplish more by avoiding them entirely.

I’m doing something where I can when I can. Personally I think that matters more than trying to know about every tragedy. It’s sad, but we live in the age where almost anything that happens can be answered with, “which one?” Rather than getting caught up in that cycle, I aim to try and break it by simply being present in the moment and doing what needs to be done to prevent other things from collapsing. Don’t be reactive but aim to be proactive, and don’t fall into the trap where being proactive is trying to show just how aware of everything wrong with the world you are. You’ve already talked about how that cycle hasn’t worked for you.

It doesn’t work for anyone.

Stay positive friend, and spread it.