internet and tv

Torrie -

Here's my advice to myself that I think you might find something in...

I think part of your problem is internet and tv, and all the problems they bring. You talk a lot about daytime tv shows (Oprah, Montel, etc...). All those years of watching Oprah and what do you have to show for it? I think those shows are really entertainment and an escape from reality, they train us to become victims, and they are a substitute for the real relationships in life. It's like eating junk food all the time instead of hearty healthy satisfying whole foods - short term feels great but it deteriorates the mind and body and sabotages the long term because you aren't building or maintaining real relationships. At some point you have to pay for it. Then more junk food (tv/internet) to kill the pain and it snowballs until there is no life outside of tv/internet and just the idea of rebuilding what has been neglected for so long seems impossible.

You obviously spend a ton of time on the internet. That and tv both act as false relationships that are not real or fulfilling in the long run and keep you alone inside while there are millions of real live bodies out there. Computers and tv help our lonliness symptoms in the short term with artificial stimulation, but they destroy our future because we lose time and real relationships. Real relationships are hard work sometimes - not like on tv where the laugh track is non stop or there is always a resolution or solution at the end of the show. Meanwhile we are programmed to just watch as we sit there doing nothing - I think this programs us to do the same in real life - to do nothing and expect solutions and outcomes if we just wait, or expect others to do it for us. I find myself always asking others for advice and help when I think I really kow what I should do to solve my problems. Ever hear of when people say that they can give great advice but they can never give it to themselves? I think this is part of the passive programming that we grow up with - the tv, the Oprah/advice shows, the "professionals" that we see and pay to tell us what we mostly already know - the stuff deep inside us that we have ignored for so long.

Try turning off the computer and the tv for a whole week or two and force yourself to go outside and strike up conversations in the park with strangers. Get some sun. Get some exercize. Computers and tv = no sun and no exercise. Computers and tv are passive. Go out and use that language part of your brain that you were talking about in an earlier post and be active. Give out actively more than you take in and things will come back to you in ways that will fulfill your life. Get some people together to play scrabble instead of watching tv solo.

I have been there, done that... and try to keep from falling back into those bad lonely habits of tv and internet. I look back on life and do not miss tv or computers at all and have no real fond memories of them. I do not miss Bo and Like Duke, or Phebe and Chandler, or Bill Cosby. I don't even miss you all here on Curezone when I leave for a needed break from the net. No offense. What do I miss? I miss my neighbors and friends and my dog, playing board games and having cookouts and dinners with people on the block. Now and when I am 99 and dying, I will regret time wasted on tv and internet and entertainment. It would be good to die with people around who give a shit about me.

3 times in my life I have smashed my tv. Best thing I did at those points in my life. Seriously, take it outside and smash it (unplug it first). Or give it away. Smashing works better. Trust me. Tweet