We interrupt this broadcast
"To the man who is afraid, everything rustles."
Sophocles
Is your mind tweaking your body? Are your thoughts and attitudes hampering your performance? Do your beliefs weaken your tissue, create fatigue or make you sick? Does your perception of the world impact your immune system, your cardiovascular system or your nervous system?
Maybe so. Probably so. Almost certainly so. Especially if you're a heavy consumer of modern media. Especially if you're addicted to stories of terror, greed, dysfunction, injustice, corruption and catastrophe.
It's all around us now. Just push the button and you can hear the rap any time you want: Fear, violence, hate, conflict, disease, fear, anger, hate, corruption, fear, injustice, scandal, fear... On and on it goes, 24-7. Anxiety on tap–the modern news beat.
mind sculpts the body
As the discoveries of modern neuroscience are now making abundantly clear, mind has a powerful effect on the body. The stories that we hear have profound impacts, not just on our minds, but on our flesh.
Chronic fear and stress, even if virtual, remote and abstract, can cause substantial damage to tissue. Turn on your sympathetic nervous system for weeks and months on end, and you'll wind up with thousands of dead neurons and millions of shrunken muscle fibers to show for it. Plus you'll be an irritable grouch, spreading your bile throughout the tribe.
It makes no difference, by the way, whether the anxiety rap comes from NPR, Air America or Fox. It doesn't matter if the grim prognosis comes from Adbusters, The Nation or the American Heritage Foundation. It doesn't matter whether the hand-wringing comes from Michael Savage or Thom Hartman, Bill O'Reilly or Al Franken. It doesn't matter whether the name-calling comes from Ann Coulter or Randi Rhodes. Whatever the source, grim-speak still wreaks havoc with our minds and in turn, our bodies. Our brains don't know the difference between right wing bile or left wing angst; it's all the same tone and has all the same effects. Bitterness and cynicism are stressful, no matter which side of the spectrum they happen to come from.
adrenal media
Unfortunately, we now live in a world in which fear, stress and anxiety are piped into our homes and automobiles in a near-constant stream. In the process, modern media functions as a fear and anxiety amplifier; it sharpens our perceptions of danger. Epidemics, real and imagined, become epidemic. Disease is everywhere, systemic melt-down is imminent. Catastrophe looms, stalking our awareness, threatening to pounce at any moment.
For media and marketing wonks, this is all as it should be. Their objective is simple: attract ears and eyeballs to the channel in question and keep them there. Contrast, conflict and catastrophe are ideal for this purpose. The human nervous system loves danger and destruction; the draw is almost irresistible. Show me a fight, some escalating tension and some drama, and my senses will perk up. Give me some terror, some fear and a looming catastrophe, and I'll reward you with my attention.
By comparison, peace, health and happiness are dull; audience attention will drift and advertising money will go elsewhere. And so the programming decisions go in an entirely predictable direction: If it bleeds, terrifies or provokes, it leads. If it pumps cortisol into the bloodstream, it goes above the fold. In the meantime, stories of compassion, health, harmony and joy are left on the cutting room floor. In the world of fear media, happy, healthy people simply don't attract attention; for all practical purposes, they don't even exist.
our alien environment
Obviously, this state of technological fear amplification is unprecedented in human history. In our paleo world (life before media) there was plenty of stress to be had, but it was always local. A hyena might make a meal out of your best friend, a snake might sink his fangs into your leg and bad weather might chase your tribe across the grassland, but all of these challenges, however acute, tended to be temporary and were always in the moment.
Without media, there could be no awareness of remote emergencies or chronic catastrophes. The tribes on the other side of the world might be fighting epic battles against starvation, disease, tsunamis or one another, but you'd never know it. If all was well in your neighborhood, then all was well with your mind and body. Ignorance may not have been bliss, but it was almost certainly healthier.
In contrast, modern technology now allows us to feel anxious and upset over events that take place tens of thousands of miles away, out of reach of normal sensation. It even allows us to feel anxious and upset over events that are only projected to occur. The problem is compounded by the fact that most of the ugly news that we're exposed to, whether true or hyped, usually describes events that we have almost no control over. Global warming, Darfur, Iraq, the health care crisis: these problems are immense, far beyond the powers of most individuals to affect. And so, our relative sense of control actually decreases. The brain senses a predicament, but we're unable to exercise power and so our stress rises.
staying informed v. staying alive
In the early days of our republic, it used to be that "staying informed" was an essential requirement for good citizenship in a functioning democracy. But what if staying informed also means exposing ourselves to a relentless stream of needless anxiety? What if staying informed means putting our health at risk? What if "staying informed" is actually something else altogether – a distracting form of stimulation that serves some other psychological need?
A few years ago, Dr. Andrew Weil advocated an occasional "news fast" to help avoid the negative effects of over-stimulation. But that was before 9/11, before Iraq, before Katrina, before the daily flood of impossible problems that comes into our brains at the top of every hour. It's beginning to look like Weil was ahead of his time. So, is it time to turn off the fear machines? I think it is.
This is not to suggest that ignorance and denial are the order of the day. This is not to suggest that we simply disregard the problems of the modern world and give up our activism. Authentic anger is justified, even rage. But with an omnipresent, in-your-face information stream, there seems little danger that we might actually fall out of contact with world affairs. Indeed, it would take an impressive effort of isolation to really get ourselves out of the loop. Instead, we need an approach that maintains both our health and our activism. (Perhaps a sense of joyful outrage is called for.)
required reading
Fortunately, there are alternative world views that counter-balance the fear-mongering. Rob Brezsny's Pronoia is the Antidote for Paranoia is an excellent example. Brezsny takes on "the purveyors of despair" and presents a life-affirming opposite: a celebration of wonder, exuberance and possibility. There's plenty of hippie-witchcraft-New Age playfullness in this book, (check out the shamanic cheerleaders!) but there are profound nuggets of serious wisdom as well, enough to derail even the most entrenched cynic. The spirit comes through loud and clear; happiness is in large measure a choice, a matter of attention.
We find a parallel track in Barbara Ehrenreich's book, Dancing in the Streets. Ehrenreich reminds us that celebration, festivals and holidays are a regular feature of normal human life. When our Europeans ancestors set sail to conquer the world, they were astonished to see a near-universal expression of enthusiasm among indigenous peoples. Everywhere they went, there was dancing, drumming and singing. Festivals were common; labor was modest. Read this book and you'll come to realize that joyful celebration is the default for Homo sapiens. Happiness is the norm.
The Dali Lama gives us much the same message in his recent books. Human nature, he tells us, is fundamentally gentle, compassionate and joyful. In The Art of Happiness, he reminds us of a truth that we are in danger of forgetting. That is, we are good animals and good people. Given a chance, we prefer to live in harmony with one another. It is only through the cycle of fear that we turn ugly and reactive. The Dali Lama's message comes as a surprise to many of today's achieve-aholics, but there it is nonetheless: The purpose of life is to be happy.
beauty, joy, compassion, health, appreciation
So turn off the radio and tune out the fear. Stop pumping the cortisol channel. Forget about the imperialists, the corporatists, the fascists, the bushists and the anarchists, at least for awhile. Instead, be a joyful, intelligent activist– a joyist. Your body will thank you for it.
