Information Overload or Anxiety?
A friend sent me a copy of an article “Death by Information Overload” from the Harvard Business Review. I think the headline says it all.
It canvassed the usual complaints of living and working in a constantly connected state.
A study of Microsoft workers found that:
“…once their work had been interrupted by an email notification, people took, on average, 24 minutes to return to the suspended task… and more than half that time was spent after people were ready to return to their work: cycling through open applications; getting distracted by other work in progress; and reestablishing their state of mind.”
There are certainly plenty of productivity gurus now urging us to turn our backs on the evil of multi-tasking and go towards the light of perfect offline focus.
What I found more interesting was another aspect of information overload that the author, Paul Hemp, touched on in passing.
“…it’s not just the incoming tidal wave of email and RSS feeds… it’s also the vast ocean of information I feel compelled to go out and explore in order to keep up… we’re drawn toward information that in the past didn’t exist or that we didn’t have access to but, now that it’s available, we dare not ignore.”
I’ve suffered from this information anxiety.
Feeling compelled to research and research again other people’s experience, advice and 5-step programs before making a decision myself.
Worrying about systems for managing all this information gathering (AKA hoarding), and being so overwhelmed by the task of synthesizing the data to generate something actionable, that I freeze up.
And the comparing! The relentless consuming of other people’s words leave me wondering if I’ll ever have anything useful to say that hasn’t already been said a thousand times before.
It’s a creativity killer
The secret of life may be hidden in one of those many ebooks or bookmarks languishing in my ‘to read’ folder, but I probably wouldn’t recognise it if I saw it – I’d be too busy trying to process the next bit of information.
There’s no space to reflect, to absorb, to create my own connections and ideas.
That’s the bottom line. For better or for worse, I can’t create* in this barrage of STUFF. And if I can’t do that then what I am doing?
* For more on the create, consume, connect relationship check out Charlie Gilkey’s excellent article of the same title. He says:
…you can’t breathe in and breathe out at the same time. Taking in information is breathing in, and creating something is breathing out.
A new definition of useful
For the practical stuff, the how-to stuff, the build your business and change your life stuff, it’s not enough that it might be handy someday, it really must be something I can use now.
And that judgment involves not only assessing the content, but also assessing my capacity and need. Truth is, I’m sure I could spend at least a year simply going deeper into, and taking action on, what I already know.
Which is why, for at least the first part of 2010, I made a conscious decision to shut off the flow of how-to for a while. To turn inward and mine my own resources.
I suspect you probably know a lot more than you think you do.
When you next feel that moment of uncertainty, you might want to take a moment before you google, read the latest expert advice, buy another product, or check out what your colleagues are doing. Take a moment to call upon your own resources.
Refilling the creative well
Although I have mostly shut off the flow of how to information, I’m not actually on an information fast.
It’s more a matter of avoiding the pre-processed, pre-packaged stuff that’s produced to provide fast fixes.
I guess, to jump onto a popular trend, I’m trying out ‘slow’ information.
I still read blogs, but blogs written by thoughtful people I like. I find myself avoiding the ones I know are ‘laser-focussed’ and prescriptive – the ones that seem to consistently point out what you’re doing wrong and offer a 10 step process to fix everything, all in 350 words or less.
I’m savouring books. Books with broader themes I can digest slowly. Stuff that invites me to make my own connections. And podcasts with interesting people.
This isn’t a prescription for you
More an observation of how I interact with information, and an experiment in modulating that flow.
It seems to me that maybe there is something shifting here – from an initial stage of using productivity hacks to better manage the information overwhelm and do more in less time, to developing deeper relationships with information (and the people that share it) that better serve our individual capacities and needs (and so deal with the underlying anxiety).
I don’t have a neat, 350 word how-to for this process. But I think it may start by knowing yourself.
12 Responses
March 10th, 2010 at 7:24 pm
As you know Rebecca stories of many kinds prompt me to turn inward, reflect and do (nothing or something different). I can be prompted by a TV drama or a deep and insightful interview or conversation.
March 10th, 2010 at 9:27 pm
Hey thanks for stopping by Jo – that’s one of the things I love about the living savvy approach… making connections with different types of information and then asking *yourself* the important questions.
What am I creating? Where am I headed?
And the taking action is also important. To really know what you know, you must do it! Not get stuck in the consuming cycle.
March 11th, 2010 at 12:43 pm
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this, Rebecca. This is timely as I’m at a point where I really need to make changes to the way I relate to the wealth of information available, and so I need to craft a new definition of useful for myself. Yours gives me a helpful starting point.
Josiane´s last blog ..A (huge!) shift in perspective
March 11th, 2010 at 3:12 pm
The info and ‘stuff’ is certainly out there in plenty. Thanks for the gently do-able common sense. I like the way you put it, Bec!
March 12th, 2010 at 5:38 am
I’ve been feeling the urge to slow way down and go deeper this year too. I’m loving the “slow” movement. Slow food, slow information … I think you are right, we might be missing a lot of the juice the way we skim in our feeble attempts to catch everything.
Thanks for the great post.
:)
Danielle
March 12th, 2010 at 7:54 am
Hi Bec
Love your thoughtful content, which is so beautifully complemented by your writing style and presentation. Reading too many ‘opinions’ leaves me confused so that I end up doing nothing. Time to start looking within to find what will work for me … thank you.
March 12th, 2010 at 10:52 am
so glad to not be alone in this. I have unsubscribed from any blogs that make me feel bad – even the subtle ones that crow about how great everything is. It’s enough and I’ve had it! :)
March 12th, 2010 at 1:30 pm
Thanks so much for adding to the conversation everyone.
Glad to have provided a little encouragement to those wanting to slow down and reassess their relationship to the flow of information.
@Danielle – Yes, we drive ourselves mad trying to ‘catch everything’!
@Jennifer Oh yes, I hear you. Sometimes I feel guilty not reading certain blogs that I think I ‘should’ for any number of reasons, but then I gently remind myself they’re not useful for *me* right *now*. And that’s OK.
March 13th, 2010 at 7:29 am
Bec, this is perfect for me right now. Especially this part had me nodding a lot: “There’s no space to reflect, to absorb, to create my own connections and ideas.” I’ve been noticing how hard it is for me to disconnect from the noise, even though it feels numbing and bad to always be plugged in. It’s rather compulsive for me, I think, and I wonder what’s under the static of all the mental shopping mall… Anyhow, thank you! xo
Heidi Fischbach´s last blog ..Introducing my favorite superhero for oof-stories.
March 16th, 2010 at 7:20 am
Wow, Bec-this is amazing. It’s like you got inside my head and wrote my story here :)
I’m working on breaking this “information compulsion” as well as a few others, right now, and it is such a relief when I am able to say, “Thanks, but no thanks” to something.
Cranky Fibro Girl´s last blog ..Milestones
March 18th, 2010 at 10:48 am
I’m so glad I’m not alone in this. It’s impossible to consume the massive amounts of information swirling around out there – and unfortunately we often feel like if we don’t read it all, we’re missing out on something important.
I’ve gotten better at hitting “mark all as read” in my RSS reader, at unsubscribing from newsletters and blogs that add to my stress level, and just reducing the flow of information that comes to me on a daily basis.
And when you’re trying to be creative? Yes, all that stuff kills the flow. I can’t be creative when I’m worried about someone-who-wrote-it-first-or-better.
So thanks for this post. It’s nice to be in such great company.
Lisa Wood´s last blog ..Let’s Talk About Permission Marketing: A Lesson in What Not to Do
March 18th, 2010 at 11:35 am
@Heidi & @Cranky Fibro Girl: Compulsive – yes!
I feel this too and have thought about why that might be.
One thought I had is that when I’m feeling that very natural fear about creating and releasing my own voice (lizard brain! risk!) I immediately reach out to to fill in that space with other voices. Important pattern to notice :)
And yes, a relief when you can step back from it.
@Lisa: Yep, if it adds stress for whatever reason (even if that’s just my hang-up) it’s out of my inbox!
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