October 1, 2025 • 43 mins
Reclaiming Your Attention is essentially reclaiming your power. Many of us feel overwhelmed by all the things that need attention and this is by design. By examining how media and technology shape our attention, and by practicing strategies to ground ourselves in mindfulness and intentional focus, we can shift from being scattered and depleted to feeling aligned and resourced. From that place, we’re better prepared to take meaningful action in our lives.
In this episode of Mindset Unlimited, I share some insights and tips for reclaiming your attention to focus on what matters, even when you’re overwhelmed.
Some of what I explore in this episode includes:
- Understanding Attention and who’s driving it
- Parenting in an age of social media
- Shifting out of performance and into connection
- What to do to support aligned empowerment
Thoughts or questions?
Send me a voice memo: https://www.speakpipe.com/MindsetUnlimited
LINKS TO REFERENCES MADE IN THIS EPISODE:
5 Steps to Shift Habits of Perfectionism & People Pleasing with Beatriz Victoria Albina
Responsive Practices to Create a Supportive Relationship with Your Teen with Donna Lynne Booher
Cult of Personality – Living Colour
The Social Dilemma – Netflix Documentary
Stolen Focus: Why You Can’t Pay Attention – And How to Think Deeply Again – by Johann Hari
Frederic Joseph – The Death of Social in Social Media
NPR - Nihilistic Online Networks Groom Minors to Commit Harm
This Will Hold - Groyper and Steve Bannon’s Online Machine to Radicalize Boys
Therapy Jeff – Parents of White Boys, Don’t Want Your Kid Radicalized Online? Do These 5 Things
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This podcast was produced by Valerie Friedlander Coaching
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Valerie Friedlander (00:00):
Hello, my friends, and welcome to another
(00:02):
episode of Mindset Unlimited,mindset tips, tools and
inspiration for women in a timeof change. I'm your host.
Valerie Friedlander, ICFcertified coach, sociologist,
intersectional feminist artist,mom and nerd, and today we are
talking about reclaiming yourattention to focus on what
matters. And you may be like vali don't even know what matters
(00:25):
anymore or what matters most,what order to put what matters
into, because I'm sooverwhelmed. And if that sounds
familiar, then I want you toknow you're not alone. I feel
you. I am right there with you,and that's why I wanted to do
this episode, is I actually dida whole nother episode on a
(00:46):
similar topic of attention, butI got kind of lost in the weeds,
and I realized as I sat with it,luckily I had this space that I
was sitting with it, andrealized, Oh, that wasn't that's
not what's needed right now.
What's needed is, what do we dowith this information? And so I
(01:06):
have a lot of details in theshow notes like this, the
science, the writings that allthe things that you can read for
yourself if you want, is linkedthere, and I'm going to show up
with what I have to say aboutthese things, and I know that's
(01:27):
why you're here, and I'mrealizing that part of what I've
been doing is covering some ofmy own overwhelm with just data
and my own vulnerability. Andthat is kind of counter to what
I'm here to create. So we'rejust gonna dig in with with what
I have to say about thesethings. And I love to hear from
(01:49):
you. So if you have thoughts youwould like to share about this,
if you have questions, if youhave comments, concerns, topics
that you want me to explore.
Otherwise, I love to hear fromyou. I have created a new little
button where you can record alittle voice memo. You can do it
anonymously, or you can put yourinfo. If you put your info, I
(02:12):
can respond back to you, whichI'm I do anytime anybody sends
me anything that I can respondto. So whether it's my
newsletter or for the podcast, Ilove to hear from you, and I
will respond to every singlecomment. So please don't
hesitate to reach out. Now whatwe're going to talk about, just
(02:34):
as a little covering little,little outline, we're going to
talk about understandingattention and who's driving it,
parenting in the age of socialmedia shifting out of
performance and into connectionand what to do to support
aligned empowerment. So that'skind of the little outline. Now
(02:56):
without further ado, let's getstarted.
A lot of different things kindof converged in my life to have
me thinking about attention, andthis has been a topic for a
little while now in just theworld, especially, I think the
(03:21):
first time I heard the termattention capitalism was in the
Netflix documentary The socialdilemma, where it's talking
about the dynamics of socialmedia and what it was actually
doing, and how it was shiftinginto this consumption of our
Attention, or really where weare the product, right? So where
(03:43):
we are the ones being consumedbecause, or our attention is
being consumed because of howmarketing is working on these
social media platforms and sothat has been kind of in the
background, in the awareness andwatching what has been happening
(04:06):
over the past few weeks here inthe US. In particular, the song
cult of personality by livingcolor, from way back when I was
younger, has been coming tomind, and I'm just going to read
some of the lyrics to you. Youmay or may not be familiar with
it. I am going to link it in theshow notes if you want to go
(04:26):
listen to it. But the lyrics golook in my eyes. What do you
see? The cult of personality. Iknow your anger. I know your
dreams. I've been everything youwant to be. Oh, I'm the cult of
personality like Mussolini andKennedy, I'm the cult of
personality, neon lights, NobelPrize. When a mirror speaks, the
reflection lies. You won't haveto follow me. Only you can set
(04:50):
me free. I sell the things youneed to be I'm the smiling face
on your TV. Oh, I'm the cult ofpersonality. I exploit you.
Still you love. Me, I tell youone and one makes three. Oh, I'm
the cult of personality, likeJoseph Stalin and Gandhi. Oh,
I'm the cult of personality,neon lights, Nobel Prize. When a
(05:11):
leader speaks, that leader dies,you won't have to follow me.
Only you can set you free. Yougave me fortune, you gave me
fame, you gave me power in yourGod's name, I'm every person you
need to be. Oh, I'm the cult ofpersonality. That may sound
(05:31):
familiar and it's gotten bigger.
It's so much more powerful. Ireflect back on a book that I
read a while ago. I'vereferenced it in this podcast
before, and it's called stolenfocus by Johann Hari, and in it,
he talks about how the speed ofinformation has had an impact on
(05:52):
our focus. He talks about a lotof other things too, and that
stood out to me of even startingwith the printing press
information, or access toinformation, speeding up and
speeding up, and then going intolike the 24 hour news cycle, and
at that point, this is when westart to need more information,
more interest, right? Becauseit's 24 hours. So we need as
(06:15):
much news as possible, and weneed to hold people's attention
so that we have people who wantto advertise during all these
different time slots. So thelonger we can hold your
attention, the more money we canmake. And this is where we start
to I mean, it was probably evenbefore this, but we start to
really see that emphasis on howdo we keep people's attention,
(06:37):
and the increase in more andmore sensationalizing news and
information because it holdspeople's attention. Enter social
media, and now there's moreopportunity to make money off of
people's attention, and this isliterally how social media makes
(07:00):
money, is by holding yourattention, your eyeballs. I
mean, all the different facetsof the internet. It's who can
grab attention, hold attentionso that we can sell ads.
Essentially, we have become thecommodity. It started with
capitalism way back when, likeearly capitalism, was more
(07:22):
related to, like the wealthyluxury goods and such, and then
it has moved into the basicneeds. That's when the kind of
capitalism we're familiar withright now came into play, was we
are going to make money off ofbasic needs, off of the needs
that every everyday needs, andnow it's we're going to make
(07:45):
money off of our very attention.
And the thing that has stood outto me as I've been thinking
about attention is that thisemphasizes how valuable our
attention is. Yes, it's beenmonetized, which is kind of
gross, and this is where youhave power. You have so much
(08:08):
power because everybody wantsyour attention, they want your
eyeballs, they want your braintuned in. And they have people
who understand brains workingfor these products, these
systems, in order to maximizetheir ability to hold your
(08:32):
attention, essentially, youknow, to addict you so that you
stay fixated on these things,instead of on the things that
you might otherwise choose to befocused on. So I want to
emphasize the power that youhave. This is power that
everybody has. It doesn't matterhow much money you have or
(08:56):
resources or anything like that.
And yes, attention is a resourceat this point, especially
because it's been commodified,and it's yours, it's fully
yours. So just to emphasize thatreal quick, because it's so easy
to forget, we are pulled in somany different directions, and
there is so much happening allat once, they are trying to make
(09:18):
us forget. And I keep sayingthey, I really don't like the
whole they, they, they thing. Itbugs me so much. So when I say
they, I am talking about theoligarchs, the people who are
running the companies that allof this is moving through. I'm
(09:39):
talking about the those who arein charge of the power
structures, the ones who havethe ability to make these
decisions about how ourattention is being manipulated.
Those are the days that I'mtalking about the people that
are making money off of ourattention. Basically now the.
That gets a little tricky, asI'm going to talk about in a
(10:01):
moment, because there are a lotof people making money off of
our attention that are helpingin some ways. What I mean by
that is there are people who aremaking really helpful content
online. So there are a number ofpeople that I follow that you
may follow that you find helpfulinformative, especially in this
(10:25):
space where there is so muchquestion and so much
misinformation, disinformation,being able to follow an actual
scientist, being able to followsomebody who was in a government
office who is now providinginformation about stuff, being
able to follow a doctor. Thosethings are helpful. And when we
(10:46):
are making money, other peopleare making money off of us too.
So I'm going to share a littlebit of a substack article by
Frederick Joseph that is calledthe death of social and social
(11:06):
media, and he talks about howpeople have gotten sucked into
the performance of social media.
I saw an example of this wherethere was someone who was
harassing a barista around,basically trying to get her to
(11:29):
say a particular name, andinstead, the woman brought her
her drink, and she is all upsetbecause the name wasn't said.
Anyway, I'm not going to go intothe details of that, but the way
it was done. And this was thevideo being done by the woman
she was talking to the camera asthough she has this giant
following. I have no idea ifthis woman has a giant
(11:49):
following, but it reminded me ofthis article by Frederick
Joseph, where he talks aboutsomeone that he follows, that he
was friends with back in I thinkhe said High School, where it
used to be where she would justgive updates and talk to
friends, and at a certain point,he realized that it had shifted
into this performance of herlife where she's sharing as
(12:14):
though she was a social mediainfluencer, and he says the same
circle she's talking to that shealways had only now recast as
spectators. Is if the point ofposting wasn't to keep in touch
with friends but to perform foran imagined crowd, she was the
(12:35):
logical product of what socialmedia has taught us to be, not
people in community, but brandsin circulation because we can
make money. We can make moneyoff of this space. But in the
process of making money off thisspace, we are being made money
off of it's like a real pyramidscheme sort of thing going on,
(13:01):
and I've seen it in the onlineentrepreneur world that's like
super pyramid schemey, even ifit's not like a direct do what I
do, though there's plenty ofthat. It is this, follow me, and
then I make money off of youfollowing me, and then other
people make money off of me, andthen there's all this talking
(13:27):
about what other people aretalking about, and reactions I'm
going to react to this person,reacting to this person. I mean,
it's, oh, it's a lot, it's a lotof attention. Anyway, Frederick
Joseph's article is reallypowerful, and I highly recommend
reading it's he's just, he's apoet, and you can hear it in
(13:47):
even his not poetry writing. AndI think even for people who
aren't trying to be influencers,it's an important article. The
reason I think it's an importantarticle for everybody is because
when we have so many peopleinteracting with social media in
(14:10):
this way, there's an energythere. And if you are on social
media, if you are on any ofthese platforms, searches,
YouTube, any of this stuff, whatpeople are talking about
determines what you focus on. Sothe more people talking about a
(14:32):
particular thing, the more focusyou have on that thing. This can
be beneficial for things thatreally need attention. And that
brings up the question, though,of what really needs attention,
and how do you decide? Becausethe way these spaces work is off
(14:54):
of your attention. What holdsyour attention so it is your
subconscious. This determiningwhat to pay attention to. In a
lot of aspects of this, it canbe the things that are actually
important to you, but it mightnot always be. So this is where
I want to bring in. What isattention. Let's talk really
(15:14):
quick about what attention isand what are the dynamics of
attention. This is where I got alittle lost in the weeds last
time. So I'm going to going totry not to do that and just link
to the article on BritannicaOnline if you want to get into
it. Because it really is, Idon't know. I think it's really
interesting, but I'm also agiant nerd. So so attention in
(15:37):
psychology is the concentrationof awareness on some phenomena
to the exclusion of otherstimuli, this creates a
condition of selective awarenesswhich governs the extent and
quality of one's interactionswith one's environment, and is
not necessarily held undervoluntary control. The other
(16:00):
important aspect of this is thathumans experience is determined
by the way people direct theirattention. And again, a reminder
that we don't have completecontrol over the direction.
There are so many things thatimpact our awareness. There are
(16:20):
things that happen around us,there's happenings inside of us,
all the things that areimpacting our senses and also
our memories, representations ofpast events that come to
awareness under appropriatecircumstances. Or you one could
say inappropriate circumstances.
We have incredible processingcapabilities, and there's a
(16:41):
limited capacity. And the partof our brain that has limited
capacity is the intentionalpart. So we have really two
parts of our brain. There's thecontrolled search or focal
attention that's consciouslyestablished, that's mostly under
our control. It demands a highamount of capacity and is
(17:03):
strongly dependent on stimulusload. So whether it's internal
stimuli or external stimuli, howmuch capacity our intentional
focus has is very much relatedto that. Then there's the
automatic detection or automaticprocessing. This is dependent on
long term memory, extensivelearning, and it comes into
(17:26):
operation without active controlor attention by you, the
individual, and it's virtuallyunaffected by load. So this is a
survival brain. We've talkedabout this before. I've talked
about like the frontal cortexand that taking more energy. And
then there's the survival brain.
Lots of details to be found inthis, but that's the important
(17:49):
thing. Is that the more load youare experiencing, the harder it
is to intentionally focus, whichmeans that when we're in these
online spaces that are designedto be addictive. They're
literally designed. They havepeople on staff figuring out how
(18:09):
to hold your attention. So theamount of stimuli coming in from
external and internal and all ofthat, the more likely our
subconscious brain, as it were,that automatic focus is going to
be in gear, and that's whatthey're playing on. And so how
(18:35):
much is it what you choose toprioritize, to be important,
versus all of these things thatwe are consuming, that are being
fed to us in ways that activateour system, that remind us again
that this is important, this isimportant. This is important,
(18:57):
and this is where we becomeoverwhelmed. Because if we're
paying attention, and a lot ofyou who are listening, I would
probably all of you really wantto be informed. You want to be
mindful. You want to show up anddo things that help. And in
these environments, it's verydifficult. Rehearsal is another
(19:21):
way that feeds into ourautomatic brain, the repetition
of incoming information overperiods of time. So our brains
are changed by the repetition ofthese dynamics. And this is, I
would imagine, part of how youget someone in this space, in
(19:42):
this social space where we'resharing and connecting, shifting
over into this space ofperformance because we're being
fed constantly. It's probablynot even a conscious thing. It's
this process that. But one mightsay it's the habituation, that's
(20:03):
when a person's response tonovelty wanes with a repeated
and regular presentation of thesame signal. So we get used to
it, it becomes normalized, andnow we don't even think about
it, because what signals ourbrain to actually pay attention,
like on our conscious attentionneeds to be a more and more loud
(20:23):
stimuli, otherwise it becomeshabituated. There's a lot more
information. I love thisarticle, just for the info. And
again, like I said, I got lostin the weeds the last time. So
it's linked in the show notes,if you want to nerd out too. And
this brings me back to FrederickJoseph's article where he
compares being in these spacesto being in a casino. I'm going
(20:49):
to quote a little bit more ofthis article where he says
watching is the whole point.
Social media, in its currentstate, is simply a more
democratized, more efficient andinfinitely more invasive reality
TV. We are all contestants now.
The camera is always on. Theaudience is everyone else. The
prize is attention. Tiktokalgorithm doesn't even care who
(21:12):
you know. Only how long it cankeep your pupils dilated and
your thumb flicking, which meansthe experience is like channel
surfing in a casino, therandomness is not accidental. It
is engineered to maximizestickiness. Instead of a network
of friends, you get a slotmachine of content. Any one post
could be the jackpot. Viralityis one spin away. The
(21:35):
psychological effect of thiscannot be overstated, once you
internalize that every postcould be the one that blows up.
Every upload becomes a lotteryticket. You no longer post to
communicate. You post to win.
And I want to highlight herethat even if you are someone
who's just consuming any onepost, could be the post that
activates the feel goodhormones, the ones that excite
(21:57):
you. And maybe they don't feelgood, maybe they feel
activating, and it's still asystem impact, just like an
addiction. We're looking for thething that moves us, that
activates us, and it needs to bemore and more dramatic casinos
than to participate at all is toplay by the casinos rules, and
(22:20):
the house always wins. Theperformance is not an accident.
It's a product, The Truman Show,but with everyone simultaneously
playing Truman and the audience,what this emphasizes to me is
how much our focus is beingdictated by what we consume and
(22:43):
by what is happening around usinstead of what is actually
important to you, what youchoose to be important. And not
only that, but it erodes ourability to know what's important
to think, Oh, this must beimportant, but here's all these
important things, and now I'moverwhelmed, and I don't know
(23:06):
what to pay attention to. Idon't know what is actually
important, because my sense ofeverything is outside of myself.
We are not deciding what mattersanymore. We are being dragged
around because our brains can'tmove as fast as the news cycle
and all the information beingthrown at us by everyone and
(23:26):
everywhere, and we want to beinformed people. And the other
piece of this is that everyonethinks they have to have a take,
and it has to do with thiscycle, right? This attention,
this lottery ticket, becausehaving a take is what gets
attention. So we are performingfor the algorithms, because that
(23:50):
is what sparks the attention, asas Frederick Joseph says towards
this article, that really justhit me hard is who is actually
watching? If everyone is toobusy auditioning, the darker
possibility is that the onlytrue audience left is the
machine itself, that the gaze wespend our lives performing for
(24:12):
is already non human. And ifthat's the case, then the
deepest irony of all is this inour frantic effort to be seen,
to be witnessed, to berecognized, we may have
surrendered the last truly humanact of all a life unperformed.
And I share this again, it's notjust for those of us who are on
(24:35):
social media trying to share itis something for those consuming
it as well, because I know atleast for myself and a lot of
other people I have spoken with,we go on there looking for
resonance, to feel not so alone,to feel like, oh, other people
are seeing this too. And Italked about this in my episode
(24:56):
on empathy, about how. How wereally want to know that we are
not alone because of thedynamics of what's happening in
the gaslighting and all of thesethings, to be able to go, okay,
there are other people out therethat see this too, and it's not
just me really helps. So I'msharing this again, not to
(25:17):
criticize being on social media,I really want to highlight that
it's this is not to say don't beon there, but to be aware, and
we're talking about attentionand awareness here. So to be
aware that when you are onthere, you are spending
something valuable, or you'rereally giving away something
(25:38):
valuable, with the hopes thatyou're going to win the lottery,
you're going to find the thing,you're going to be shown, oh,
this is what to do. Or I'm goingto feel better because somebody
is doing something. Or, oh,that's helpful. I hope somebody
who needs to hear this hearsthis. Or maybe I'm the one who
needed to hear this, and it wasactually helpful. There's plenty
(25:59):
of that out there, and you haveto know that the house always
wins. And you are being shownwhat the system thinks is
important, because we are onthere and we are being
exploited. That is what'shappening on those platforms. So
(26:19):
whether you get some benefit outof it is a thing you can look
at, and you need to know thatthe house always wins. It's
driven by how many eyes you getbased on how quickly you can
jump on this thing that everyoneis talking about, how much
(26:42):
information you can get, whetheryou can have a take, a different
take, a more interesting takethat people want to hear about,
that you have to say and thenshare it. And that mentality
drives what we choose to focuson, and it is consuming us. You
are not a consumer. You are theconsumed. We are the consumed,
whether it is our attention orour content or both, we are the
(27:07):
consumed under attentioncapitalism, we are the
commodity. And there are peoplewho know how to exploit the
system and exploit you, andthere are people who know that
(27:27):
young people are more easilyexploited with their developing
brains, not to say that wearen't all susceptible to this.
So okay, all of that said, whatdo we do about it? And this is
where I I had a little bit, butI think we really need to focus
(27:48):
in on, what do you do? And thefirst thing is to connect these
spaces, these systems, thriveoff of our disconnection, and I
do mean with each other, but Ialso mean with yourself. We need
(28:08):
each other. I've talked aboutthis before, where we have Yes,
we don't want to overindividualize. We need
community. We need other people,and it's really hard to exist in
community if you don't know howto exist within yourself. So
stealing back being Robin Hoodwith your own attention, giving
(28:33):
it back to yourself, is oneunderstanding all the stuff I
just shared. The other thing isto connect with yourself, and it
is hard when, again, we have allof the stimuli around us going
pay attention to this, payattention to that. This is
important, that is important,and then activating that sense
you're not doing enough. And soyou need to be into doing and I
(28:55):
need to do things. I need to domore. I need to go and I then
you end up standing stillbecause it's so much, or maybe
you do end up doing, but maybeit's not the thing that you
needed to do, because there areso many things to be done, and
not all of them are for you todo. How do you know what it is
for you to do, and it's not fromwhat social media tells you that
(29:22):
is information. What is on thereis information. It is not
discernment. And that is the bigdifference that I want to
highlight, is that is notdiscernment to know what is
yours to do to reclaim yourpower in that process is to
(29:42):
learn discernment. So here are acouple of things that I want to
invite you to do to start withthat one is giving yourself a
little more space than you mightotherwise give yourself. Space
to journal. Give yourself spaceto sit and listen. And actually,
one thing, it might feel alittle weird. Maybe this is very
(30:06):
familiar to you, but move. Moveyour body and pay attention to
your movement. I find this alittle bit easier if you do like
a dance party sort of thing,find some music and move as your
body feels like moving. So maybeit's small movements, maybe it's
kind of bobbing your head, maybeit's leaning back and forth,
(30:29):
kind of rocking. Maybe it isfull on improvised dance
movements. You're on the ground,you're up in the air, whatever
it is, and you may get to thatpoint, allow it to evolve, but
listen to what your body says.
Maybe it is turning your headand swaying, whatever feels
(30:52):
good, but listen to the musicand really get present, because
that is the secret tomindfulness, is being present.
And the secret to discernmentis, in part, mindfulness. And
this is a reclamation of yourattention. It is pouring into
being super duper present. Sothat movement, what feels good
(31:18):
to move? I'm going to listen tosome music, and I'm just gonna
feel what feels good to move?
Maybe it's moving my arm out tothe side and leaning over. Maybe
there's a stretch involved, butreally just listening to your
body without plan, withoutstructure, and moving, and that
is a way to start reclaimingyour focus. And then maybe,
(31:38):
after doing that for a littlebit journaling, or if you feel
comfortable to do that withanother person, do that with
another person, where you'redoing that together, not
necessarily at the same time,not necessarily synchronized,
but just moving to some musictogether, and then sit down and
share and talk to each Other.
(32:00):
This is a way to bring yourfocus back to present, to your
own awareness, so it's notcaught up in all of the external
stimuli, or even all of the paststimuli. It's really very
present in your body, present tothe moment. Now, if being in
your body feels reallyuncomfortable. Maybe there's
(32:22):
trauma there, getting present toyour space, to your
surroundings, touching things,feeling the texture, smelling
some smells. We talked aboutthis in the last episode with
Bea, where we talked aboutemotional outsourcing. She gave
some great strategies forgetting present and really
checking in. So use some ofthose. But this is where you
(32:42):
start to reclaim your attentionfrom the speed and all the
doings and everything the nextpiece of this that's extremely
powerful in and of itself. Andthen you may be like, Okay, now
what slowing down urgency is atool of this system to get us
into a space where we're notreally thinking, we're not
(33:03):
really present, we're not reallyaware of where we are. So the
next piece is being able tolisten to ourselves, to connect
with other people, and to knowourselves, to be prepared. So
the things that are in yourcontrol in this environment, are
(33:25):
preparing yourself, your nervoussystem, your being to be ready
to notice when it's your turn toact, and to be able To act when
it is time. And that takesintention, that takes presence,
and that takes support, supportto do the thing. I know the
(33:50):
things that scare me the most inall of this, everything that's
happening in the world, is onethat I won't notice, that I
won't do the thing or the rightthing at the right time. This
you notice the right wording ifyou've been listening for a
while, those are flags whenyou're like the right thing, the
right time, the right place,like all of these, the pressure
(34:10):
that gets placed on it that is aconstriction of our perception,
which means that we are not asopen to perceiving the
possibilities and the thingsthat we might be called to do,
or might be the opportunity forus. So that fear, and then the
fear that I won't be able to dothe thing, not that I won't be
(34:32):
able physically, but maybewilling, that I won't feel
supported, that I'll be tooafraid to do what I'm called to
do. And so that's wherecultivating the support to do
the things when they arerevealed to you as to what it is
that you are called to do. Andthis could be anything from
stuff at home to stuff in thewider world, social activism
(34:57):
type stuff. It's really beingpresent with yourself. Health
and not all the time. That's notreasonable in the world that we
live in. But having the capacitybuilding the capacity, which is
reclaiming your attention, doingthings that help you stay
connected to yourself, not justlost in the casino of the online
spaces. The last thing that Iwant to flag that relates to
(35:22):
this is particularly forparents. There's a lot out there
that is really going after, likewith intention, going after our
kids, it's impacting their selfesteem, particularly for girls
and those socialized as femaleand trying to indoctrinate young
(35:49):
boys. There's been a lot oftalk, a lot more awareness of
this. I've seen at least acouple posts that have really
been highly concerning that Iwill link in the show notes. But
I think as much as you might belike, Well, I don't want another
upsetting thing. It's important,especially if you're raising
boys like I am, to be aware ofwhat's out there. I also will
(36:11):
have a link to therapy Jeff, whohas a great post on Instagram on
tips for parents of white boyswho don't want our kids
radicalized online, and fivethings. Now, the thing is that
the five things that he teachesto be able to show up to those
(36:32):
require us to do our own work.
Interrupting the victim's storyvery hard to do if you haven't
interrupted your own and beaware of where it is in your
life, because we all have one.
This isn't a oh, well, I don'tI'm not a victim. I don't act
like a no, no. It's not aboutthat. We all have one because
it's cultivated in this space,and it often is tied to trauma,
(36:56):
not capital T trauma,necessarily, but lowercase t
trauma. And this is not to saythat anybody was at fault if you
had a traumatic incident andthat you weren't a victim, you
were a victim, and how we carryit forward does matter. The
other piece is teachingemotional literacy. If you are
not attuned to your own nervoussystem, it is really hard to
(37:22):
teach emotional literacy. And Isay this as someone who has
struggled because of being in myown process of learning layers
of emotional literacy, and I'vehad a lot of it over the years.
If you heard my story, I havebeen fairly emotionally
literate. And again, living inthis society, we are conditioned
not to have emotional literacy,and so it's really hard with our
(37:46):
kids, because they tend toactivate all of our stuff. If
we're not solid in our emotionalliteracy, we can't show up to
theirs, modeling healthymasculinity, and that can be for
any gender parent, there aredynamics that tend to be imposed
upon boys. I will give anexample of one of mine. I read
(38:10):
an article talking about howpeople stop touching young boys
at a certain age, and Irealized, oh my gosh, I have
stopped hugging and cuddling mykids, even as young as, like
four, and so I stopped that. Iwas like, No, we get back to
these hugs. How did I lose that?
Why did I stop doing that? Thesesorts of things are part of
(38:33):
modeling healthy masculinities,treating them in healthy ways
for growing into their ownmasculinity, teaching digital
literacy. If you don't havedigital literacy, and you have
to have a whole lot more thanmost of us have, those of us who
didn't grow up as digitalnatives, and even if you did,
(38:57):
there's so much to know andunderstand about the dynamics
online that if you don't lookfor it, you won't know, because
you're only fed the things thatpeople think you need to know.
So it's hard to teach digitalliteracy if you don't have it.
So having that and then buildingbelonging that isn't online.
(39:19):
Where do you have spaces ofbelonging? What do those spaces
look like? So really cultivatingyour own spaces of belonging so
that you can help them cultivatespaces of belonging. This is not
easy. I say none of this to belike it's super easy. Just go do
it now that I said it, no, it isa lot as a parent, as a human
(39:44):
being in the world right now,these are not easy things, and
they're probably some of themost important things, being
able to show up and haveconversations and. You can put
as many restrictions on devicesas you want, and if you're not
having the conversations,there's only so much those
(40:10):
things are going to do, becausethey're going to be exposed to
things from friends, fromteachers, from other adults,
from the internet at a friend'shouse or at school, even there's
so much being able to have thoseconversations, and it's never
too late to cultivate thoseconversations. I had a great
episode with Donna a while backtalking about teen stuff that I
(40:35):
will also link in the shownotes. If you missed it. If this
pertains to you, I highlyencourage you to go listen to it
and to reach out to her if youneed help with a teen. And these
are the things that we need tobe able to connect with
ourselves, to hear ourselves, tobe present with ourselves, and
(40:55):
doing some if you need a doing.
You know, if you can sit inmeditation, cool, I find it
helpful to sit in silence.
That's one way that I give focusto what matters, which is
listening, listening for thedivine, listening to the divine
in myself, listening for thedivine through other people,
(41:16):
really sitting and listening.
This is part of what being aQuaker, for me is about. That's
our meeting for worship onSundays. Is that listening
process? But I also recognizethat not everybody sits in
silence really well. So again,dancing, moving, touching,
(41:37):
senses, all of those things tobring yourself present and then
be able to be in conversation,in conversation with yourself,
for discernment, in conversationwith others, for discernment,
for your discernment, for theirdiscernment, for support
connecting so that You can be incharge of that most precious and
(42:03):
apparently quite valuablecommodity that you own that is
yours to choose what to do withyour attention. I hope this
episode has been helpful foryou. Again. If you have any
questions, any insights thathave come forward for you,
(42:24):
thoughts you want to share,topics you want me to cover,
please don't hesitate to reachout through any of the ways that
I've listed in the show notes.
And if you want support with anyof these pieces, with the
discernment process, withgetting present, with the
somatic work, the emotionalwork, all of those pieces I'm
(42:45):
here to help you with. So if youare looking for support, please
don't hesitate to reach out.
Grab a spot on my calendar for afree exploration. Call. There is
no obligation attached to that.
We can really just check in onyou. Discernment is the core of
what I'm here to help you do,whatever aspect that is, so that
(43:09):
you can then move forward theway you choose, not the way
You're conditioned to choose ormanipulated to choose or
whatever, is really knowingyourself and moving in alignment
with yourself and healing thosepieces that are trying to stop
(43:29):
you from doing that. That's whatI'm here to do. So please don't
hesitate to reach out and I willtalk to you all next time.
Hello, my friends, and welcome to another
(00:02):
episode of Mindset Unlimited,mindset tips, tools and
inspiration for women in a timeof change. I'm your host.
Valerie Friedlander, ICFcertified coach, sociologist,
intersectional feminist artist,mom and nerd, and today we are
talking about reclaiming yourattention to focus on what
matters. And you may be like vali don't even know what matters
(00:25):
anymore or what matters most,what order to put what matters
into, because I'm sooverwhelmed. And if that sounds
familiar, then I want you toknow you're not alone. I feel
you. I am right there with you,and that's why I wanted to do
this episode, is I actually dida whole nother episode on a
(00:46):
similar topic of attention, butI got kind of lost in the weeds,
and I realized as I sat with it,luckily I had this space that I
was sitting with it, andrealized, Oh, that wasn't that's
not what's needed right now.
What's needed is, what do we dowith this information? And so I
(01:06):
have a lot of details in theshow notes like this, the
science, the writings that allthe things that you can read for
yourself if you want, is linkedthere, and I'm going to show up
with what I have to say aboutthese things, and I know that's
(01:27):
why you're here, and I'mrealizing that part of what I've
been doing is covering some ofmy own overwhelm with just data
and my own vulnerability. Andthat is kind of counter to what
I'm here to create. So we'rejust gonna dig in with with what
I have to say about thesethings. And I love to hear from
(01:49):
you. So if you have thoughts youwould like to share about this,
if you have questions, if youhave comments, concerns, topics
that you want me to explore.
Otherwise, I love to hear fromyou. I have created a new little
button where you can record alittle voice memo. You can do it
anonymously, or you can put yourinfo. If you put your info, I
(02:12):
can respond back to you, whichI'm I do anytime anybody sends
me anything that I can respondto. So whether it's my
newsletter or for the podcast, Ilove to hear from you, and I
will respond to every singlecomment. So please don't
hesitate to reach out. Now whatwe're going to talk about, just
(02:34):
as a little covering little,little outline, we're going to
talk about understandingattention and who's driving it,
parenting in the age of socialmedia shifting out of
performance and into connectionand what to do to support
aligned empowerment. So that'skind of the little outline. Now
(02:56):
without further ado, let's getstarted.
A lot of different things kindof converged in my life to have
me thinking about attention, andthis has been a topic for a
little while now in just theworld, especially, I think the
(03:21):
first time I heard the termattention capitalism was in the
Netflix documentary The socialdilemma, where it's talking
about the dynamics of socialmedia and what it was actually
doing, and how it was shiftinginto this consumption of our
Attention, or really where weare the product, right? So where
(03:43):
we are the ones being consumedbecause, or our attention is
being consumed because of howmarketing is working on these
social media platforms and sothat has been kind of in the
background, in the awareness andwatching what has been happening
(04:06):
over the past few weeks here inthe US. In particular, the song
cult of personality by livingcolor, from way back when I was
younger, has been coming tomind, and I'm just going to read
some of the lyrics to you. Youmay or may not be familiar with
it. I am going to link it in theshow notes if you want to go
(04:26):
listen to it. But the lyrics golook in my eyes. What do you
see? The cult of personality. Iknow your anger. I know your
dreams. I've been everything youwant to be. Oh, I'm the cult of
personality like Mussolini andKennedy, I'm the cult of
personality, neon lights, NobelPrize. When a mirror speaks, the
reflection lies. You won't haveto follow me. Only you can set
(04:50):
me free. I sell the things youneed to be I'm the smiling face
on your TV. Oh, I'm the cult ofpersonality. I exploit you.
Still you love. Me, I tell youone and one makes three. Oh, I'm
the cult of personality, likeJoseph Stalin and Gandhi. Oh,
I'm the cult of personality,neon lights, Nobel Prize. When a
(05:11):
leader speaks, that leader dies,you won't have to follow me.
Only you can set you free. Yougave me fortune, you gave me
fame, you gave me power in yourGod's name, I'm every person you
need to be. Oh, I'm the cult ofpersonality. That may sound
(05:31):
familiar and it's gotten bigger.
It's so much more powerful. Ireflect back on a book that I
read a while ago. I'vereferenced it in this podcast
before, and it's called stolenfocus by Johann Hari, and in it,
he talks about how the speed ofinformation has had an impact on
(05:52):
our focus. He talks about a lotof other things too, and that
stood out to me of even startingwith the printing press
information, or access toinformation, speeding up and
speeding up, and then going intolike the 24 hour news cycle, and
at that point, this is when westart to need more information,
more interest, right? Becauseit's 24 hours. So we need as
(06:15):
much news as possible, and weneed to hold people's attention
so that we have people who wantto advertise during all these
different time slots. So thelonger we can hold your
attention, the more money we canmake. And this is where we start
to I mean, it was probably evenbefore this, but we start to
really see that emphasis on howdo we keep people's attention,
(06:37):
and the increase in more andmore sensationalizing news and
information because it holdspeople's attention. Enter social
media, and now there's moreopportunity to make money off of
people's attention, and this isliterally how social media makes
(07:00):
money, is by holding yourattention, your eyeballs. I
mean, all the different facetsof the internet. It's who can
grab attention, hold attentionso that we can sell ads.
Essentially, we have become thecommodity. It started with
capitalism way back when, likeearly capitalism, was more
(07:22):
related to, like the wealthyluxury goods and such, and then
it has moved into the basicneeds. That's when the kind of
capitalism we're familiar withright now came into play, was we
are going to make money off ofbasic needs, off of the needs
that every everyday needs, andnow it's we're going to make
(07:45):
money off of our very attention.
And the thing that has stood outto me as I've been thinking
about attention is that thisemphasizes how valuable our
attention is. Yes, it's beenmonetized, which is kind of
gross, and this is where youhave power. You have so much
(08:08):
power because everybody wantsyour attention, they want your
eyeballs, they want your braintuned in. And they have people
who understand brains workingfor these products, these
systems, in order to maximizetheir ability to hold your
(08:32):
attention, essentially, youknow, to addict you so that you
stay fixated on these things,instead of on the things that
you might otherwise choose to befocused on. So I want to
emphasize the power that youhave. This is power that
everybody has. It doesn't matterhow much money you have or
(08:56):
resources or anything like that.
And yes, attention is a resourceat this point, especially
because it's been commodified,and it's yours, it's fully
yours. So just to emphasize thatreal quick, because it's so easy
to forget, we are pulled in somany different directions, and
there is so much happening allat once, they are trying to make
(09:18):
us forget. And I keep sayingthey, I really don't like the
whole they, they, they thing. Itbugs me so much. So when I say
they, I am talking about theoligarchs, the people who are
running the companies that allof this is moving through. I'm
(09:39):
talking about the those who arein charge of the power
structures, the ones who havethe ability to make these
decisions about how ourattention is being manipulated.
Those are the days that I'mtalking about the people that
are making money off of ourattention. Basically now the.
That gets a little tricky, asI'm going to talk about in a
(10:01):
moment, because there are a lotof people making money off of
our attention that are helpingin some ways. What I mean by
that is there are people who aremaking really helpful content
online. So there are a number ofpeople that I follow that you
may follow that you find helpfulinformative, especially in this
(10:25):
space where there is so muchquestion and so much
misinformation, disinformation,being able to follow an actual
scientist, being able to followsomebody who was in a government
office who is now providinginformation about stuff, being
able to follow a doctor. Thosethings are helpful. And when we
(10:46):
are making money, other peopleare making money off of us too.
So I'm going to share a littlebit of a substack article by
Frederick Joseph that is calledthe death of social and social
(11:06):
media, and he talks about howpeople have gotten sucked into
the performance of social media.
I saw an example of this wherethere was someone who was
harassing a barista around,basically trying to get her to
(11:29):
say a particular name, andinstead, the woman brought her
her drink, and she is all upsetbecause the name wasn't said.
Anyway, I'm not going to go intothe details of that, but the way
it was done. And this was thevideo being done by the woman
she was talking to the camera asthough she has this giant
following. I have no idea ifthis woman has a giant
(11:49):
following, but it reminded me ofthis article by Frederick
Joseph, where he talks aboutsomeone that he follows, that he
was friends with back in I thinkhe said High School, where it
used to be where she would justgive updates and talk to
friends, and at a certain point,he realized that it had shifted
into this performance of herlife where she's sharing as
(12:14):
though she was a social mediainfluencer, and he says the same
circle she's talking to that shealways had only now recast as
spectators. Is if the point ofposting wasn't to keep in touch
with friends but to perform foran imagined crowd, she was the
(12:35):
logical product of what socialmedia has taught us to be, not
people in community, but brandsin circulation because we can
make money. We can make moneyoff of this space. But in the
process of making money off thisspace, we are being made money
off of it's like a real pyramidscheme sort of thing going on,
(13:01):
and I've seen it in the onlineentrepreneur world that's like
super pyramid schemey, even ifit's not like a direct do what I
do, though there's plenty ofthat. It is this, follow me, and
then I make money off of youfollowing me, and then other
people make money off of me, andthen there's all this talking
(13:27):
about what other people aretalking about, and reactions I'm
going to react to this person,reacting to this person. I mean,
it's, oh, it's a lot, it's a lotof attention. Anyway, Frederick
Joseph's article is reallypowerful, and I highly recommend
reading it's he's just, he's apoet, and you can hear it in
(13:47):
even his not poetry writing. AndI think even for people who
aren't trying to be influencers,it's an important article. The
reason I think it's an importantarticle for everybody is because
when we have so many peopleinteracting with social media in
(14:10):
this way, there's an energythere. And if you are on social
media, if you are on any ofthese platforms, searches,
YouTube, any of this stuff, whatpeople are talking about
determines what you focus on. Sothe more people talking about a
(14:32):
particular thing, the more focusyou have on that thing. This can
be beneficial for things thatreally need attention. And that
brings up the question, though,of what really needs attention,
and how do you decide? Becausethe way these spaces work is off
(14:54):
of your attention. What holdsyour attention so it is your
subconscious. This determiningwhat to pay attention to. In a
lot of aspects of this, it canbe the things that are actually
important to you, but it mightnot always be. So this is where
I want to bring in. What isattention. Let's talk really
(15:14):
quick about what attention isand what are the dynamics of
attention. This is where I got alittle lost in the weeds last
time. So I'm going to going totry not to do that and just link
to the article on BritannicaOnline if you want to get into
it. Because it really is, Idon't know. I think it's really
interesting, but I'm also agiant nerd. So so attention in
(15:37):
psychology is the concentrationof awareness on some phenomena
to the exclusion of otherstimuli, this creates a
condition of selective awarenesswhich governs the extent and
quality of one's interactionswith one's environment, and is
not necessarily held undervoluntary control. The other
(16:00):
important aspect of this is thathumans experience is determined
by the way people direct theirattention. And again, a reminder
that we don't have completecontrol over the direction.
There are so many things thatimpact our awareness. There are
(16:20):
things that happen around us,there's happenings inside of us,
all the things that areimpacting our senses and also
our memories, representations ofpast events that come to
awareness under appropriatecircumstances. Or you one could
say inappropriate circumstances.
We have incredible processingcapabilities, and there's a
(16:41):
limited capacity. And the partof our brain that has limited
capacity is the intentionalpart. So we have really two
parts of our brain. There's thecontrolled search or focal
attention that's consciouslyestablished, that's mostly under
our control. It demands a highamount of capacity and is
(17:03):
strongly dependent on stimulusload. So whether it's internal
stimuli or external stimuli, howmuch capacity our intentional
focus has is very much relatedto that. Then there's the
automatic detection or automaticprocessing. This is dependent on
long term memory, extensivelearning, and it comes into
(17:26):
operation without active controlor attention by you, the
individual, and it's virtuallyunaffected by load. So this is a
survival brain. We've talkedabout this before. I've talked
about like the frontal cortexand that taking more energy. And
then there's the survival brain.
Lots of details to be found inthis, but that's the important
(17:49):
thing. Is that the more load youare experiencing, the harder it
is to intentionally focus, whichmeans that when we're in these
online spaces that are designedto be addictive. They're
literally designed. They havepeople on staff figuring out how
(18:09):
to hold your attention. So theamount of stimuli coming in from
external and internal and all ofthat, the more likely our
subconscious brain, as it were,that automatic focus is going to
be in gear, and that's whatthey're playing on. And so how
(18:35):
much is it what you choose toprioritize, to be important,
versus all of these things thatwe are consuming, that are being
fed to us in ways that activateour system, that remind us again
that this is important, this isimportant. This is important,
(18:57):
and this is where we becomeoverwhelmed. Because if we're
paying attention, and a lot ofyou who are listening, I would
probably all of you really wantto be informed. You want to be
mindful. You want to show up anddo things that help. And in
these environments, it's verydifficult. Rehearsal is another
(19:21):
way that feeds into ourautomatic brain, the repetition
of incoming information overperiods of time. So our brains
are changed by the repetition ofthese dynamics. And this is, I
would imagine, part of how youget someone in this space, in
(19:42):
this social space where we'resharing and connecting, shifting
over into this space ofperformance because we're being
fed constantly. It's probablynot even a conscious thing. It's
this process that. But one mightsay it's the habituation, that's
(20:03):
when a person's response tonovelty wanes with a repeated
and regular presentation of thesame signal. So we get used to
it, it becomes normalized, andnow we don't even think about
it, because what signals ourbrain to actually pay attention,
like on our conscious attentionneeds to be a more and more loud
(20:23):
stimuli, otherwise it becomeshabituated. There's a lot more
information. I love thisarticle, just for the info. And
again, like I said, I got lostin the weeds the last time. So
it's linked in the show notes,if you want to nerd out too. And
this brings me back to FrederickJoseph's article where he
compares being in these spacesto being in a casino. I'm going
(20:49):
to quote a little bit more ofthis article where he says
watching is the whole point.
Social media, in its currentstate, is simply a more
democratized, more efficient andinfinitely more invasive reality
TV. We are all contestants now.
The camera is always on. Theaudience is everyone else. The
prize is attention. Tiktokalgorithm doesn't even care who
(21:12):
you know. Only how long it cankeep your pupils dilated and
your thumb flicking, which meansthe experience is like channel
surfing in a casino, therandomness is not accidental. It
is engineered to maximizestickiness. Instead of a network
of friends, you get a slotmachine of content. Any one post
could be the jackpot. Viralityis one spin away. The
(21:35):
psychological effect of thiscannot be overstated, once you
internalize that every postcould be the one that blows up.
Every upload becomes a lotteryticket. You no longer post to
communicate. You post to win.
And I want to highlight herethat even if you are someone
who's just consuming any onepost, could be the post that
activates the feel goodhormones, the ones that excite
(21:57):
you. And maybe they don't feelgood, maybe they feel
activating, and it's still asystem impact, just like an
addiction. We're looking for thething that moves us, that
activates us, and it needs to bemore and more dramatic casinos
than to participate at all is toplay by the casinos rules, and
(22:20):
the house always wins. Theperformance is not an accident.
It's a product, The Truman Show,but with everyone simultaneously
playing Truman and the audience,what this emphasizes to me is
how much our focus is beingdictated by what we consume and
(22:43):
by what is happening around usinstead of what is actually
important to you, what youchoose to be important. And not
only that, but it erodes ourability to know what's important
to think, Oh, this must beimportant, but here's all these
important things, and now I'moverwhelmed, and I don't know
(23:06):
what to pay attention to. Idon't know what is actually
important, because my sense ofeverything is outside of myself.
We are not deciding what mattersanymore. We are being dragged
around because our brains can'tmove as fast as the news cycle
and all the information beingthrown at us by everyone and
(23:26):
everywhere, and we want to beinformed people. And the other
piece of this is that everyonethinks they have to have a take,
and it has to do with thiscycle, right? This attention,
this lottery ticket, becausehaving a take is what gets
attention. So we are performingfor the algorithms, because that
(23:50):
is what sparks the attention, asas Frederick Joseph says towards
this article, that really justhit me hard is who is actually
watching? If everyone is toobusy auditioning, the darker
possibility is that the onlytrue audience left is the
machine itself, that the gaze wespend our lives performing for
(24:12):
is already non human. And ifthat's the case, then the
deepest irony of all is this inour frantic effort to be seen,
to be witnessed, to berecognized, we may have
surrendered the last truly humanact of all a life unperformed.
And I share this again, it's notjust for those of us who are on
(24:35):
social media trying to share itis something for those consuming
it as well, because I know atleast for myself and a lot of
other people I have spoken with,we go on there looking for
resonance, to feel not so alone,to feel like, oh, other people
are seeing this too. And Italked about this in my episode
(24:56):
on empathy, about how. How wereally want to know that we are
not alone because of thedynamics of what's happening in
the gaslighting and all of thesethings, to be able to go, okay,
there are other people out therethat see this too, and it's not
just me really helps. So I'msharing this again, not to
(25:17):
criticize being on social media,I really want to highlight that
it's this is not to say don't beon there, but to be aware, and
we're talking about attentionand awareness here. So to be
aware that when you are onthere, you are spending
something valuable, or you'rereally giving away something
(25:38):
valuable, with the hopes thatyou're going to win the lottery,
you're going to find the thing,you're going to be shown, oh,
this is what to do. Or I'm goingto feel better because somebody
is doing something. Or, oh,that's helpful. I hope somebody
who needs to hear this hearsthis. Or maybe I'm the one who
needed to hear this, and it wasactually helpful. There's plenty
(25:59):
of that out there, and you haveto know that the house always
wins. And you are being shownwhat the system thinks is
important, because we are onthere and we are being
exploited. That is what'shappening on those platforms. So
(26:19):
whether you get some benefit outof it is a thing you can look
at, and you need to know thatthe house always wins. It's
driven by how many eyes you getbased on how quickly you can
jump on this thing that everyoneis talking about, how much
(26:42):
information you can get, whetheryou can have a take, a different
take, a more interesting takethat people want to hear about,
that you have to say and thenshare it. And that mentality
drives what we choose to focuson, and it is consuming us. You
are not a consumer. You are theconsumed. We are the consumed,
whether it is our attention orour content or both, we are the
(27:07):
consumed under attentioncapitalism, we are the
commodity. And there are peoplewho know how to exploit the
system and exploit you, andthere are people who know that
(27:27):
young people are more easilyexploited with their developing
brains, not to say that wearen't all susceptible to this.
So okay, all of that said, whatdo we do about it? And this is
where I I had a little bit, butI think we really need to focus
(27:48):
in on, what do you do? And thefirst thing is to connect these
spaces, these systems, thriveoff of our disconnection, and I
do mean with each other, but Ialso mean with yourself. We need
(28:08):
each other. I've talked aboutthis before, where we have Yes,
we don't want to overindividualize. We need
community. We need other people,and it's really hard to exist in
community if you don't know howto exist within yourself. So
stealing back being Robin Hoodwith your own attention, giving
(28:33):
it back to yourself, is oneunderstanding all the stuff I
just shared. The other thing isto connect with yourself, and it
is hard when, again, we have allof the stimuli around us going
pay attention to this, payattention to that. This is
important, that is important,and then activating that sense
you're not doing enough. And soyou need to be into doing and I
(28:55):
need to do things. I need to domore. I need to go and I then
you end up standing stillbecause it's so much, or maybe
you do end up doing, but maybeit's not the thing that you
needed to do, because there areso many things to be done, and
not all of them are for you todo. How do you know what it is
for you to do, and it's not fromwhat social media tells you that
(29:22):
is information. What is on thereis information. It is not
discernment. And that is the bigdifference that I want to
highlight, is that is notdiscernment to know what is
yours to do to reclaim yourpower in that process is to
(29:42):
learn discernment. So here are acouple of things that I want to
invite you to do to start withthat one is giving yourself a
little more space than you mightotherwise give yourself. Space
to journal. Give yourself spaceto sit and listen. And actually,
one thing, it might feel alittle weird. Maybe this is very
(30:06):
familiar to you, but move. Moveyour body and pay attention to
your movement. I find this alittle bit easier if you do like
a dance party sort of thing,find some music and move as your
body feels like moving. So maybeit's small movements, maybe it's
kind of bobbing your head, maybeit's leaning back and forth,
(30:29):
kind of rocking. Maybe it isfull on improvised dance
movements. You're on the ground,you're up in the air, whatever
it is, and you may get to thatpoint, allow it to evolve, but
listen to what your body says.
Maybe it is turning your headand swaying, whatever feels
(30:52):
good, but listen to the musicand really get present, because
that is the secret tomindfulness, is being present.
And the secret to discernmentis, in part, mindfulness. And
this is a reclamation of yourattention. It is pouring into
being super duper present. Sothat movement, what feels good
(31:18):
to move? I'm going to listen tosome music, and I'm just gonna
feel what feels good to move?
Maybe it's moving my arm out tothe side and leaning over. Maybe
there's a stretch involved, butreally just listening to your
body without plan, withoutstructure, and moving, and that
is a way to start reclaimingyour focus. And then maybe,
(31:38):
after doing that for a littlebit journaling, or if you feel
comfortable to do that withanother person, do that with
another person, where you'redoing that together, not
necessarily at the same time,not necessarily synchronized,
but just moving to some musictogether, and then sit down and
share and talk to each Other.
(32:00):
This is a way to bring yourfocus back to present, to your
own awareness, so it's notcaught up in all of the external
stimuli, or even all of the paststimuli. It's really very
present in your body, present tothe moment. Now, if being in
your body feels reallyuncomfortable. Maybe there's
(32:22):
trauma there, getting present toyour space, to your
surroundings, touching things,feeling the texture, smelling
some smells. We talked aboutthis in the last episode with
Bea, where we talked aboutemotional outsourcing. She gave
some great strategies forgetting present and really
checking in. So use some ofthose. But this is where you
(32:42):
start to reclaim your attentionfrom the speed and all the
doings and everything the nextpiece of this that's extremely
powerful in and of itself. Andthen you may be like, Okay, now
what slowing down urgency is atool of this system to get us
into a space where we're notreally thinking, we're not
(33:03):
really present, we're not reallyaware of where we are. So the
next piece is being able tolisten to ourselves, to connect
with other people, and to knowourselves, to be prepared. So
the things that are in yourcontrol in this environment, are
(33:25):
preparing yourself, your nervoussystem, your being to be ready
to notice when it's your turn toact, and to be able To act when
it is time. And that takesintention, that takes presence,
and that takes support, supportto do the thing. I know the
(33:50):
things that scare me the most inall of this, everything that's
happening in the world, is onethat I won't notice, that I
won't do the thing or the rightthing at the right time. This
you notice the right wording ifyou've been listening for a
while, those are flags whenyou're like the right thing, the
right time, the right place,like all of these, the pressure
(34:10):
that gets placed on it that is aconstriction of our perception,
which means that we are not asopen to perceiving the
possibilities and the thingsthat we might be called to do,
or might be the opportunity forus. So that fear, and then the
fear that I won't be able to dothe thing, not that I won't be
(34:32):
able physically, but maybewilling, that I won't feel
supported, that I'll be tooafraid to do what I'm called to
do. And so that's wherecultivating the support to do
the things when they arerevealed to you as to what it is
that you are called to do. Andthis could be anything from
stuff at home to stuff in thewider world, social activism
(34:57):
type stuff. It's really beingpresent with yourself. Health
and not all the time. That's notreasonable in the world that we
live in. But having the capacitybuilding the capacity, which is
reclaiming your attention, doingthings that help you stay
connected to yourself, not justlost in the casino of the online
spaces. The last thing that Iwant to flag that relates to
(35:22):
this is particularly forparents. There's a lot out there
that is really going after, likewith intention, going after our
kids, it's impacting their selfesteem, particularly for girls
and those socialized as femaleand trying to indoctrinate young
(35:49):
boys. There's been a lot oftalk, a lot more awareness of
this. I've seen at least acouple posts that have really
been highly concerning that Iwill link in the show notes. But
I think as much as you might belike, Well, I don't want another
upsetting thing. It's important,especially if you're raising
boys like I am, to be aware ofwhat's out there. I also will
(36:11):
have a link to therapy Jeff, whohas a great post on Instagram on
tips for parents of white boyswho don't want our kids
radicalized online, and fivethings. Now, the thing is that
the five things that he teachesto be able to show up to those
(36:32):
require us to do our own work.
Interrupting the victim's storyvery hard to do if you haven't
interrupted your own and beaware of where it is in your
life, because we all have one.
This isn't a oh, well, I don'tI'm not a victim. I don't act
like a no, no. It's not aboutthat. We all have one because
it's cultivated in this space,and it often is tied to trauma,
(36:56):
not capital T trauma,necessarily, but lowercase t
trauma. And this is not to saythat anybody was at fault if you
had a traumatic incident andthat you weren't a victim, you
were a victim, and how we carryit forward does matter. The
other piece is teachingemotional literacy. If you are
not attuned to your own nervoussystem, it is really hard to
(37:22):
teach emotional literacy. And Isay this as someone who has
struggled because of being in myown process of learning layers
of emotional literacy, and I'vehad a lot of it over the years.
If you heard my story, I havebeen fairly emotionally
literate. And again, living inthis society, we are conditioned
not to have emotional literacy,and so it's really hard with our
(37:46):
kids, because they tend toactivate all of our stuff. If
we're not solid in our emotionalliteracy, we can't show up to
theirs, modeling healthymasculinity, and that can be for
any gender parent, there aredynamics that tend to be imposed
upon boys. I will give anexample of one of mine. I read
(38:10):
an article talking about howpeople stop touching young boys
at a certain age, and Irealized, oh my gosh, I have
stopped hugging and cuddling mykids, even as young as, like
four, and so I stopped that. Iwas like, No, we get back to
these hugs. How did I lose that?
Why did I stop doing that? Thesesorts of things are part of
(38:33):
modeling healthy masculinities,treating them in healthy ways
for growing into their ownmasculinity, teaching digital
literacy. If you don't havedigital literacy, and you have
to have a whole lot more thanmost of us have, those of us who
didn't grow up as digitalnatives, and even if you did,
(38:57):
there's so much to know andunderstand about the dynamics
online that if you don't lookfor it, you won't know, because
you're only fed the things thatpeople think you need to know.
So it's hard to teach digitalliteracy if you don't have it.
So having that and then buildingbelonging that isn't online.
(39:19):
Where do you have spaces ofbelonging? What do those spaces
look like? So really cultivatingyour own spaces of belonging so
that you can help them cultivatespaces of belonging. This is not
easy. I say none of this to belike it's super easy. Just go do
it now that I said it, no, it isa lot as a parent, as a human
(39:44):
being in the world right now,these are not easy things, and
they're probably some of themost important things, being
able to show up and haveconversations and. You can put
as many restrictions on devicesas you want, and if you're not
having the conversations,there's only so much those
(40:10):
things are going to do, becausethey're going to be exposed to
things from friends, fromteachers, from other adults,
from the internet at a friend'shouse or at school, even there's
so much being able to have thoseconversations, and it's never
too late to cultivate thoseconversations. I had a great
episode with Donna a while backtalking about teen stuff that I
(40:35):
will also link in the shownotes. If you missed it. If this
pertains to you, I highlyencourage you to go listen to it
and to reach out to her if youneed help with a teen. And these
are the things that we need tobe able to connect with
ourselves, to hear ourselves, tobe present with ourselves, and
(40:55):
doing some if you need a doing.
You know, if you can sit inmeditation, cool, I find it
helpful to sit in silence.
That's one way that I give focusto what matters, which is
listening, listening for thedivine, listening to the divine
in myself, listening for thedivine through other people,
(41:16):
really sitting and listening.
This is part of what being aQuaker, for me is about. That's
our meeting for worship onSundays. Is that listening
process? But I also recognizethat not everybody sits in
silence really well. So again,dancing, moving, touching,
(41:37):
senses, all of those things tobring yourself present and then
be able to be in conversation,in conversation with yourself,
for discernment, in conversationwith others, for discernment,
for your discernment, for theirdiscernment, for support
connecting so that You can be incharge of that most precious and
(42:03):
apparently quite valuablecommodity that you own that is
yours to choose what to do withyour attention. I hope this
episode has been helpful foryou. Again. If you have any
questions, any insights thathave come forward for you,
(42:24):
thoughts you want to share,topics you want me to cover,
please don't hesitate to reachout through any of the ways that
I've listed in the show notes.
And if you want support with anyof these pieces, with the
discernment process, withgetting present, with the
somatic work, the emotionalwork, all of those pieces I'm
(42:45):
here to help you with. So if youare looking for support, please
don't hesitate to reach out.
Grab a spot on my calendar for afree exploration. Call. There is
no obligation attached to that.
We can really just check in onyou. Discernment is the core of
what I'm here to help you do,whatever aspect that is, so that
(43:09):
you can then move forward theway you choose, not the way
You're conditioned to choose ormanipulated to choose or
whatever, is really knowingyourself and moving in alignment
with yourself and healing thosepieces that are trying to stop
(43:29):
you from doing that. That's whatI'm here to do. So please don't
hesitate to reach out and I willtalk to you all next time.
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