You've probably heard the saying “too much of a good thing can be bad”; but what about too much of a bad thing? Well, if you ask me, that would be even worse! What am I talking about? Well, I am referring to the news overload we are bombarded with in the 21st century real-time, up-to-the-minute streaming media era that would be appropriate to call infomania.
Is the human body and psyche equipped to deal with all the bad news of our planet on a day-to-day, minute-by-minute basis? I am of the opinion that we are not designed to efficiently cope with that amount of stressors.
Eustress vs distress
Hans Selye, Hungarian-Canadian endocrinologist, who first described and coined the term “stress” differentiated between “eustress”, or good stress and “distress”, negative stress. The difference is that while good stress can provide a healthy challenge and the body has the ability to adapt to it, distress can lead to anxiety and depression, due to the lack of ability to adapt well, leading to maladaptive behavior and negative coping mechanisms such as substance use, aggression or social withdrawal.
One of the main determinants whether a stressor will cause eustress or distress is how much control we feel we have over it. Consider the news: let’s take the example of the recent earthquake and tsunami in Japan. How much control do we have over what happened? None, although we may have some on the outcome. Yet, many of us tend to watch the news, ever-so available 24/7 and fret over what happened. Even worse than the reports of disasters that have occurred is the media’s favourite activity: fear mongering, like the constant “reports” of an imminent threat of nuclear meltdown at the Fukushima nuclear plant. The more time we spend in front of the television or computer watching horrific footage of the events, or yet another analysis and “worst-case-scenario” prediction of the nuclear plant, the less time and energy we are going to have to do something that could positively influence the outcome. What am I referring to?
These are some examples of what we can do to affect the outcome:
- look for ways of helping the victims and their loved ones
- learn from the events for your future benefit i.e. what can you do to prepare to deal with a disaster - every household should have a contingency plan for emergency situations
- stay positive and spread your positivity; example: a friend of mine who lives in Tokyo keeps posting informative, focused and positive writings in his blog ever-since the earthquake occurred
Even if you don’t feel that you can affect the outcome of the disaster, you can certainly alter the impact it will have on you and your family.
Some ways to diminish or eliminate distress caused by the news of disaster:
- limit watching the news to a manageable amount. Everybody has a different tolerance level; our tolerance for bad news is unique and individual. Mine is quite low, so I don’t even watch the news every day. I will skim Google news and read what I find necessary instead of allowing a network decide for me what I should be watching and hearing.
- keep your routine, don’t let news of a disaster stop you from having dinner with your family, or doing your workout, going for a walk etc.
- stay physically active or even add more activity as it has been shown to be beneficial in coping with stress
- don’t discuss the bad news constantly with your coworkers, friends and family, instead initiate conversations with positive, uplifting topics
Ever since I allowed the news of 9/11 affect my life way more then I should have by constantly watching the repetitious footage of the towers crumbling and the chaos following, I decided to be better prepared for news of disasters and wars: moderate my news-intake, be selective, keep positive and and be proactive. While being informed has its benefits, being bombarded with information can definitely be detrimental. I decided to equip myself with good coping skills and not to become a volunteer collateral damage to disasters that occur on faraway lands. Sure we can find thousands of websites with advice on how to cope with stress. I am suggesting that we can prevent the distress by not becoming around-the-clock news consumers.
So tune out, log off, disconnect, turn off...
Take a walk, talk to a friend... Face to face, not just on Facebook
Tune into Life... as it happens right around you...
Make someone smile, smile along...
Connect!
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