In a positive way, my interest in politics, the stock market, to some degree sports–my pandemic era addictions—I'm relearning not to care about. I have to admit that Twitter, which I joined during the pandemic, moreover, made me prone to see everything in terms of imminent crisis (doom-pilled, so to speak). And... I think Twitter certainly helped me navigate the pandemic itself rationally (i.e. without panicking)—it has made everything else foggier and more confusing; aggregating voices hasn't really made me wiser or better at investigating reality or anything. I feel palpably dumber.
A lot of habits are dovetailing: I’ve stopped using Tinder (another addiction); I’ve stopped using Robinhood; and I can't even say I really use Twitter as much (hopping in for a few minutes a day at this point, although admittedly getting sucked into scrolls–but even then, less… just naturally less…). There's been a diminishing return for all this junk. There was a time when there were interesting real world relationships and friendships and values that could form out of interactions had on apps–but that just seems… over… I can’t put my finger on it, but it’s over.
So... I think at this point my stance is something like, if something—some news flash,