JOYFUL PIECE #2

Dealing with information overload...

Psychologists and mental health counselors focus on helping us to deal with anxiety. Could anxiety come from our intellectual ability to imagine and anticipate events?

The eating of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil was forbidden. Was it forbidden because of the probable effect of knowledge overload on the fragile human character? 

Was the punishment for our inquisitive infraction eternal anxiety? 

Is our anxiety worth the information that we acquire through our continuing worries about the topics offered up by social network click bait? Are talking heads on the screens worth our time? Why do we listen to demagogic leaders and politicians? Why is it necessary for us to view and listen to news that are accompanied by dramatic music and alarming speech that heighten our fears?

Could pondering the challenges to which we are alerted, without a sense of proportion, without being present in the moment, send us on a neurotic path of worry, anxiety and/or delusion? 

For a good discussion of the dynamics of how we think and how cognitive bias affects us (negatively and positively) you may want to read Your Brain Has Tricked You Into Thinking Everything Is Worse.

Why not enjoy the wonders of the present and enable others to do the same in this beautiful yet enigmatic world?