The Importance of “Organic” Information

“Reading the news is making me so stressed.  But I don’t want to be the kind of person who doesn’t know what’s going on. That’s not who I am.”

When a client shared that sentiment with me the other day, I SO empathized with her. I too have been completely distressed and depressed by the news lately. And, I pride myself in being a well informed citizen.

I’ve been thinking more recently about how relevant the diet metaphor is for the information we consume. What is our information diet like? What are we putting into our body? How does that make us feel?

These days, if we are not careful, the information we are served is like sugary soda and salty potato chips.

The big social media and news corporations are pushing junk information on us. It's addicting junk. And we compulsively keep reaching for another bag or another drink.

It’s no wonder we feel like $&*#.

This reality puts us in a tricky situation though. Because just like food, it is really impractical to go cold turkey on information. That’s not a realistic way to operate in the world. Especially in a moment where the world is changing so fast.

This got me thinking. What is the information equivalent of “organic.”  What would it look like to consume healthier information?  Or to consume information in a healthier way.

Information that is not contaminated by an advertiser’s bids. Or by algorithmic manipulation. Or by AI slop.

I don’t have a magic solution here. I’m struggling with this question myself.

What strikes me though is that information transmitted from one human to another human in real time is the most organic you can get.

Not that everyone has Truth coming out of their mouths all the time. Or that they don’t have their own agendas. It’s just that we are wired to consume information this way, and we understand these human nuances innately.

Now I’m not saying we should all be doing our own reporting and trying to ONLY consume information directly from other humans that we know.

But I do wonder what an “organic” information movement would look like.  A movement that moves us away from all of this junk.

What do you think? What is one way to make our information diets a little bit healthier?