I was mindlessly consuming.

I realized I needed to stop and create an information diet after years of pain from mindless consumption.

I have repeatedly mindlessly consumed in my life, whether it was YouTube shorts, YouTube videos, video games, or something else.

I would struggle with focus as I would always have random thoughts and memories of other activities.

I would sit down to work but remember the dopamine-filled videos that I had watched and would not be able to do deep work.

I would feel overstimulated and exhausted, yet I hadn't done any physical or mental exertion.

Mindless consumption sapped all my energy, so I had no energy for meaningful activities.

In school, I often mindlessly consumed information. I got good grades, but getting good grades was based on hacking. I could memorize the information without a true understanding of what it meant.

I was mindlessly memorizing and regurgitating. I often did not have a deep understanding of the relationship between information and applying it.

While in my intense academic program, I wanted to leave because I felt I was just going through the motions. I was mindlessly consuming and regurgitating what I knew would give me a good grade. Sometimes, I would have a spark of creativity and veer from what the teacher wanted, but often, this caused me to be fearful that I would be punished with a bad grade for not following the script.

Once I left this program, I began creating.

This gave me a lens to view my consumption.

Now, all sensory and information input from the outside world could be turned into a form of creation, whether it was an analogy that I noticed while walking or an example of a marketing strategy presented in a movie.

I began to become more in control of my thoughts. The time I spent consuming had a purpose. And when it didn't have a purpose, I felt empty and depressed. I craved the act of mindful consumption.

I loved synthesizing and drawing connections between new information and my existing understanding.

I began listening to podcasts, reading newsletters, and exploring many areas. My love for learning has rekindled and reopened. Learning new information and understanding it became more fulfilling and exciting than scrolling.

The thing that excited me the most recently was that I began having novel ideas, realizations, and analogies. Now that I was creating, I was no longer only regurgitating what I had heard from others. I began to form my own conclusions and ideas through creation and experimentation.

Today, I am actively following an information diet.

With an information diet, I can control and influence:

My beliefs

My actions

My energy

My thoughts

My reactions

My understanding

An information diet allows you to apply what you learn, instead of consuming it and having it go in one ear and out the other.

The power of a good information diet:

How you can get a better education than going to Yale by using conscious consumption

You can get better information online than a degree from Yale. If you use the internet intentionally.

Anything taught in any university can be found online for free.

In courses, you pay not for the information but for the information to be actionable and streamlined.

You can find courses that teach specifically what you want at a fraction of the cost of university tuition.

You can choose exactly who and what you want to emulate. You can dive deep and explore. There are no rules, so you are free to explore your interests.

You will be unstoppable when you align your information diet with what feels like play to you but work for others.

You are what you consume

Just like you are what you eat.

You are what you consume.

You can change from a mindless consumer to an intentional learner.

You can input high-quality information rather than low quality.

Everything you consume programs you and eventually creates your life.

Our information consumption is our programming.

When we were young, we were put into a school system and told to sit for 8 hours a day. We were societally conditioned when we could barely consciously consume and create.

When we were mindfully consumed by questioning and being curious, we were shut down and told to follow the script. Once you finish kindergarten, you are fed information that getting a high-paying corporate job is the ultimate success. The only way to get a high-paying job is by getting good grades, doing extracurricular activities, and attending a good college. By the time you have gone through the school system, you can barely think for yourself. The programming has distorted your mind, and you have become a worker instead of a thinker.

Rockefeller(Major investor in the school system) - “I don't want a nation of thinkers. I want a nation of workers.”

You turn to mindless consumption of all kinds to escape your unfulfilling and robotic work and life. The news, sports, beer, food, video games, dessert, music, drugs, porn, social media, and more. You use mindless consumption to escape the problems and depression of your conscious mind. The easy pleasures of mindless consumption become your guiding joy and are the only thing that gets you through the monotonous tasks of the 9-5. You live your life in unconscious consumerism, and because of this, once you snap awake at 50, you have a mid-life crisis. You look back and wonder what life could have been like if you had followed your dreams and gone a different path. Eventually, you shut these "dreams" down because the information you consume informs you that these dreams are for fools.

If this isn't what you desire to happen to you. Or if you have experienced this firsthand.

The first step is to reprogram your mind with your information diet.

You have the power to control your information diet

It would be best to become aware of your current stimulus.

Are you constantly watching the news, scrolling, or watching sports?

Ask yourself why you're consuming them.

For the news, it is to be caught up with what is going on in the world.

Has that information ever helped to make you happier, more focused, and less stressed?

Next time you feel the urge to do one of these activities, just become conscious that you are doing it. Become aware of that feeling that you have right before you do it. Often, you mindlessly consume to escape the stressors and problems of the conscious mind. You escape mindless consumption because you don't want to confront your mind.

I want you to write down:

Beliefs: Could be about relationships, government, health, etc

Actions you take

Thoughts: - Sit with yourself and jot down what your mind thinks about.

What you were told was the right path.

A brutally honest reflection of what you doing feels like and what you want.

What are your major sources of information - What emotions do they create in you?

Your information diet

Before we discuss how to control your information diet, you must first stop the one you are currently on.

Removing your current diet

The first step to controlling your information diet is clarifying what you do not want.

Your anti-vision.

The life described above could be a version of your anti-vision. It is certainly my anti-vision.

Now, the next step is to determine your ideal future vision. Make this vision unrealistic, and if people don't tell you it's unrealistic, then you need to dream bigger. We only have one life. You might as well shoot for the stars. You can determine your vision by reverse engineering your anti-vision. We start with the anti-vision because the brain is better at finding what it doesn't want rather than what it wants.

Once you have your long-term vision, write it down with pen and paper and experience it.

Now, you want to break down your long-term vision into a one-year vision.

Now that you have your one-year vision break it down into a 90-day actionable input goal. I suggest choosing a project as a 90-day goal to get the best information diet. For me, it is creating my first course and launching it on July 1st of this year.

We created a vision of the future and then broke it down to a 90-day goal so that you now have a lens through which to view your life. You chose a project, so now you are a vessel of creation. Everything you consume is seen through the lens of this project. You now have a better understanding of what information serves you. You have become conscious.

You are no longer unaware.

You are awake.

You have an idea of what you want and don't want. Now, you can experiment with what information you consume and what aligns with your larger vision.

Searching for a different diet

If you have done the writing and vision exercises, you should be ready to begin searching for a new diet. The key is awareness. Go throughout your day and set the intention to become aware of what you consume and when you slip into mindless consumption. Write down what you escape into and what you're escaping from.

Write down the thoughts that come up throughout the day that align and don't align with your vision.

Find the people who align with the values and life that you want to create

Experiment with your information diet and notice what feels aligned and what doesn't.

7 steps for Implementing your new diet

Before we dive into the steps, it is crucial to understand the four pillars of your diet.

• Beliefs

• Thoughts

• Behaviors

• Character Traits

You want to consume information that aligns these four pillars with the person you want to become. You want information that forms beliefs that align. You want the information you consume to create dominating thoughts that align with your vision. You want the info + beliefs, + thoughts to develop character traits that align with your vision.

Step 1: Adopt the identity of a Conscious Consumer

A Conscious Creator and a mindless consumer is the difference between building a disciplined, strong, organized mind versus a chaotic, undisciplined, disturbed mind.

Step 2: Finding where you are still Mindlessly Consuming

Now that we have eliminated mindless consumption on the macro scale, we need to eliminate it on a micro-scale.

One practice you can implement is setting the alarm/reminder every hour or a couple of hours to check-in. When the alarm goes off, ask if you were mindlessly consuming, mindfully consuming, or creating. If you were mindlessly consuming, note down the activity you escaped to and why. If you were mindfully consuming, bring awareness that you were drawing connections and engaging. If you were creating, note down what information inspired you or used for your creation.

Do this for a couple of days to a week.

Step 3: Eliminating your Mindless Consumption

The next step is to look at the information that you mindlessly consume.

You need to delete the app if you were scrolling reels twice a day when you checked in.

Do the same with other information if it's negativity on the news or a certain YouTube channel.

Step 4: Finding your misaligned information

Now that you're not mindlessly consuming, it is crucial to ensure you're mindfully consuming information that supports the 4 pillars by aligning with your vision.

For example, stop if you listen to a mentor who exhibits character traits that don't resonate with your vision. Similarly, if you read blogs, newsletters, or information sources that instill thoughts and beliefs that don't align with your vision, eliminate them.

This is an ongoing process. The key is not to eliminate after the first interaction with the information. You must consciously experiment with the information to know if it does not align.

Step 5: Eliminating your misaligned information

Once you have experimented with information consumption, it is time for reflection.

Understand the beliefs, behaviors, and thoughts while experimenting.

For example, if you want to have a healthy body and mind. You might come across someone who recommends canola oil as the best oil for health. You might have heard that seed oils are bad, but you must experiment to avoid becoming closed off to ideas. Once you have experimented, you want to see if your behavior has changed. Suppose you felt more sluggish or worse.

If you felt worse after experimentation, it makes sense to eliminate the sources that suggest this information is not aligned.

Step 6: Finding aligned information

Now that you have begun to eliminate misaligned information. It is good to try the opposite or dissimilar approaches to the misaligned. For example, if one source of information suggests that you work as soon as you wake up. Try doing a 2-hour morning routine.

Or after listening to someone talk about SMMA and experimenting with it. Instead, listen to somebody talk about Twitter ghostwriting and experiment with that.

Step 7: Learning from aligned information

After doing a two-hour morning routine and experimenting, it is time to become aware of the person you were while doing the activity and whether it aligned with your vision.

This same process can be done with mentors, courses, and information.

The key is to experiment and reflect.

When you do these two steps, you ensure you aren't becoming mindless because you are always expanding your consciousness.

Bonus:

Tools to use to stay mindful:

• Cold Turkey: Blocks any websites that you don't want to consume information from

• Awareness Alarm Every Hour/Couple Hours: Helps you to notice when you unconsciously consume.

• Meditation: Helps you to build awareness of your mind

• Journaling: Helpful tool for reflection

• Open Mind: Needed to experiment and grow

More recommendations

• Pick 5-10 mentors you want to emulate

• Determine the character traits you need to create your vision

• Treat your mind like an athlete treats their body - Only give nutrient-dense information

Suggested Restrictions:

• No news

• Eliminate politics

• Don't look at celebrity drama

• No short-form content - Only long-form content

• Eliminate areas where you are not allowed to question out loud and experiment

Recap:

• Remember to be an intentional learner and a conscious creator rather than a mindless consumer.

• Remember to align your five pillars with your information and your vision

• Your future is the result of your dominating thoughts and beliefs

• The first step to stop being a mindless consumer is awareness

• Your information diet is your programming. Choose it wisely

All the best,

Christian