Source: pixabay.com

Let me start with a confession “I SUFFER FROM INFO-OBESITY!"

Right from social media to news channels to WhatsApp forwards to people around (who discuss whatever information they get exposed to) makes my head spin. I often wonder if I really need to know so much and most of it is not even true, most of it is just random assumption by random people. Moreover, this overdose of information even if it's factual and true is it really benefiting me or it's suppressing my intelligence and taking away my power to use my brain. It's like when we didn't have mobile phones we remembered all the phone numbers (at least the most dialed ones) by heart, the times when we used our brain to calculate day to day math and now we use the calculator on our phone even for basic additions of two products bought at a grocery store, for spellings we have auto correct, I struggle with basic spellings when I try to write something on paper because I’m so used to getting assistance from technology to complete my words with correct spelling the movement I type the first 2-3 alphabets.

Isn't technology making us dumb in a way?

I know so many of us (me included) read or hear things and then repeat the same in front of others, how much of our own brain are we really using in our everyday life.

We as humans were sharper when we had lesser sources of information. I feel we have become like those caged animals in the zoo who have lost their inherent hunting power because the food is handed over to them. We have lost our power to think to find solutions to discern what's right for us because we are constantly bombarded with information all the time.

We tend to confuse Information with Intelligence. Information gives us a false feeling of knowing everything. Once we heap ourselves into too much information, attention becomes a problem. Once we have no ability to hold our attention, we have lost our ability to access intelligence. We then just churn out information from your memory. The process of exploring new opportunities/possibilities is possible through intelligence. Information is not ours, we attach it to our memories and identify ourselves with it, the more we do this the less effective we become. Intelligence helps us to function at our full potential.

It's necessary to be informed to a certain extent but it's high time that we take control of how much information we expose ourselves to and keep it limited to whatever is necessary. Our superior brain is what makes us humans the superior species and we should protect our most precious asset by identifying the biggest existing threat which is "Info-obesity". 

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