Pause. Breathe. Relax. Because: Information Overload is Real

Mind is like space

Bombarded with information on a daily basis, it is important to pause. Photo of the peaceful bench beneath a wide open sky on the lookout point at Foothills park in Palo Alto by M.W.

“What is going on here?” It is an important question that points to a desire for the truth and for certainty in the moment. Today, it’s also about finding out what’s real and what is fake in the news, in human relationships, and maybe even in your own body. What is the information that is worth acting on? How to suss out good information amidst all the static and noise is the challenge right now.

Good and useful information still exists despite the great din of information and misinformation. It just seems to be harder and harder to find.

The Importance of the Pause

As a teacher of mindbody arts, I believe this great din of information overload is extraordinary motivation to practice, because the wise way to counter information overload is to pause before you act on it. The pause gives you time and space to understand what you are dealing with. Pausing is the essence of meditation and meditative movement practice: pausing on purpose. Pause for a few seconds before acting in real life or in the digital realm. Pause on purpose for a set time each day. Pause for weeks at a time. It is like getting away from the information bombardment on purpose so that it does not control you and make you fearful, sad or angry. But really what you are doing is creating space around what you perceive—in the world and in your own mind—space around the information and misinformation, so that clarity can arise.

“…[Simply] taking a pause before acting on information can help us combat the pull of misinformation,” says Timothy Caulfield, a Professor in the Faculty of Law and the School of Public Health, and Research Director of the Health Law Institute at the University of Alberta and author of the recently published book, The Certainty Illusion: What You Don’t Know and Why It Matters. In this book, Caulfield speaks to the experience many of us are having of getting bombarded on a daily basis by information, misinformation, and hype, particularly about scientific findings. The need to sort through the noise is real, and it can be a messy and stressful process.

This state of overload puts the human nervous system, our brains and bodies, on constant alert.

The human nervous system simply needs time to process thoughts and to handle feelings and reactions. Craving certainty is natural and as old as existence itself. But the desire for certainty can become a fixation on the chaos of information and misinformation, which is like being enslaved and oppressed by the chaos. Staring straight into chaos can be like facing the Great Unknown, and so it can be humbling and nerve-wracking. In the disciplines I have studied the Great Unknown is also known as the Great Mystery, and the invitation is to enter Great Mystery with grace and humility, mindful about what is feeling certain and willing to find out what is really happening. Pausing can be about listening deeply to the Great Mystery and cultivating patience about what gets revealed. It is a kind of alive and spacious perceiving. Below is a softer poetic description:

stepping willing into mystery

spacious grace

a timely revelation

then

clarity comes

So, join me in the most profound mindbody practice there is:

Pause. Breathe. Relax.

Be clear.

Repeat.