This is an old post from February 4, 2022. Now migrating to a new blog.
Today, I want to make myself accept the plainness of real life. Because at some point, I realized that I have been tamed by the information flow from the internet era.
Every day, I wake up anxiously and open my computer or phone to access a source of information to satisfy my craving to "hear some kind of information." Sometimes it's a novel, sometimes it's a live stream, sometimes it's a video on Bilibili. During college, there was a period of time when I was obsessed with Fangsita's videos, watching them over and over again. Later on, it was Xunfei Audiobooks, listening to those online novels that I had read many times before, or the videos by Kurzgesagt and John Khan that I started watching recently.
This is not a rational thirst for knowledge, it is compulsive, like an addiction. Whatever it is, I always want my brain to be processing certain information, even if it's videos that I have watched countless times, I still need them. This excessive amount of information has replaced my own thinking and become the fuel for my brain to function.
Gradually, I realized the importance of "stopping." For example, I gradually discovered that many things closely related to me have been scattered by these streams of information. The ray of sunlight outside the window that quietly appears after waking up from a nap, providing a beauty that cannot be provided by a small phone or computer screen. Just because it is not as easily accessible as those streams of information, it requires me to capture it, to imagine it, and these beautiful things are washed away by the information flood from the internet. But they may have great significance to me, they are a part of my real life.
In addition to capturing the details of life, these gaps themselves are also important, they are the habitat for my thinking. Occasionally, when I break free from the "information addiction," I sit on the subway or walk on the road, and I will calmly immerse myself in my memories, starting to piece together various fragments. When I wake up from this state, I am always amazed at these obvious connections and conclusions that can be obtained just by casually using my brain, but are only realized after a long time. When all the time is filled with an excessive amount of information, there may not be a chance to think about the context of communication with others.
I must admit that the videos on Bilibili with millions of views are hitting the weak points of human nature and are extremely interesting. And this flood of information has passed through me, bringing many interesting punchlines, but the excessive supply has also weakened my ability to discover interesting things on my own. For example, my friends around me can find funny things in life more clearly than I can. At first, I thought it was because of their good working memory, but now I realize that the source of this gap lies in how you spend your time every second.
So I see the loophole here. I hope to quit this dependence on excessive information like quitting any bad habit. And after that, I will face a relatively boring life that has been overshadowed by excessive information. Cars come and go outside the window, there are no ready-made, thrilling stories, no readily available stories with protagonist halos, no ready-made narrations that accompany life and are full of witty remarks.
But I know this is the real world. A voice in my heart whispers softly, "Welcome to the real world."