Outrage gets the most views, so your feed makes the world look angrier than your actual street.
REFLECTION
WHAT THIS MEANS
Feeds are sorted by whatever holds people, and nothing holds like anger, so what reaches you is the loudest fraction of the loudest hour. Your street is doing something much duller: carrying shopping, nodding, letting each other through doors. Both are real, and only one is being selected for and delivered to you a thousand times a day.
Test it this week. After half an hour of scrolling, go outside for ten minutes and count how many people are behaving the way your feed suggested. The gap is the measurement. Keep it in mind next time a post convinces you everybody has lost it.
A QUESTION TO SIT WITH
Is your street as angry as your feed suggests?
MORE IN PERCEPTION & ATTENTION
- One thing at a time sounds slow. It’s actually how anything gets finished.
- The crossed-out words in an old letter tell you more than the clean ones. Pay attention to what people almost said.
- When your gut says something’s off, pause and look for evidence. Sometimes it’s right. Sometimes it’s just tired.
Free, with nothing to buy inside it.