The low information diet….

Posted on November 21, 2007
Filed Under 4 Hour Work Week, elimination, lifestyle design |

I started the “process of elimination” by going on what Ferriss calls “The Low Information Diet”. I started this “diet” a couple of days after finishing the book and I’m still on it.

Ever since I was a teenager I’ve been an information junkie. Prior to my “diet” I’d read at least 4 newspapers a day: The Wall Street Journal, Investor’s Business Daily, The New York Times and USA TODAY. In the car I’d have Bloomberg or CNBC radio playing on my satellite radio and at home I’d have them on the TV. At home it was usually worse than that–I’d have one network on the main screen, the other network in the picture in picture with the volume down and listening to the audio of one while watching the other.

I knew that not only would tripe like “Judge Joe Brown” and “Maury” rot my brain, but so would what passes for news on the various cable networks. I could only handle so much OJ, Brittney Spears and other “news stories” concerning celebrities I cared nothing about, interspersed with rednecks being pulled out of sinkholes or multi-car pileups after a semi jackknifes on a wet road in flyover country. My thinking was that if it was a big enough news story to effect the financial markets it was a big enough story that I should know about it.

In addition to TV, newspapers and radios I read at least 30 different magazines a month. I tried to do it in an “efficient” manner by quickly paging through them and tearing out articles of sufficient interest to read later. I downloaded books from Audible, as well as the daily Public Radio International show “Marketplace”. And of course I tried to keep up with a couple hundred RSS feeds, websites and discussion lists–all while checking a rotation of financial news sites on an almost hourly basis.

Not only did I have all of this information to process, I tried to file magazine articles and newspaper stories away for future reference. I attempted to do this in a variety of methods, including David Allen’s GTD method and a method that a consultant I had worked with swore by. This guy had worked for a number of years at the prestigeous McKinsey and Company consulting firm before starting his own shop. He had a BA from Yale, and a MBA from Harvard with a Masters in Philosophy thrown in for good measure. He was an information junkie too and managed to keep his files organized in a wall of metal cabinets and cross referenced on an Excel spreadsheet. What he didn’t mention is that his filing system was effective because he had a full time research assistant who’s primary duty was to keep the files moving in and out and the spreadsheet updated. He also had an administrative assistant who spent considerable time riding herd over the filing system. In other words, his system was effective not because of its intrinsic design but because he had two full time employees keeping it organized.

I have an almost obscene diversity of interests from management theory and economics to mixed martial arts and boxing. I’ve amazed many people at my wide range of knowledge on topics ranging from intellectual to trivial. My assumption had been that the fuel behind my diversity of knowledge was this endless pipeline of information from countless media sources. When I read Ferriss’ emphasis on “selective ignorance” and eliminating all most all media inputs I almost thought about giving up on the book then and there. Assuming that I *could* go cold turkey on my information inputs I was certain that either my brain would begin to atrophy within a matter of days and I’d begin to suffer intellectual withdrawal symptoms. My secondary concern was that even if I *could* swear off all media that I’d miss out on so much valuable information as to hurt me professionally, socially, intellectually and any number of other ways. I had always believed that what separated the intelligent and successful from the dull normal and mediocre was their ability to assimilate massive amounts of information.

Anyway, I made it through the rest of the book and was so impressed by it that I wanted to try the lifestyle design methodology he described. Figuring that if I was going to to it I’d do it right, I grudgingly made the decision to try the “low information diet”–maybe not for the week that Ferriss’ suggested but at least for a couple of days.

Here are Ferriss’ ground rules for the “media fast”:

–No newspaper, magazines, audio books or non music radio. Music is permitted at all times
–No news websites whatsoever
–No television at all, except for one hour of pleasure viewing each evening
–No reading books, except for 4HWW and 1 hour of fiction pleasure reading before bed
–No web surfing at the desk unless it is necessary to complete a task for that day

I modified these rules somewhat for my own circumstances without changing the intent of the “fast”. I decided that I wouldn’t watch TV at all. Since I am a working boxing/MMA journalist, however, I made an exception for televised boxing and MMA events. This seemed to fall under the same proviso as permitting mission critical web surfing. With the exception of that modification, however, I did exactly what he said. Instead of Bloomberg or CNBC on the radio I listened to music ranging from Frank Sinatra to Slayer depending on my mood at the time. I avoided news websites like the plague, didn’t read my usual profusion of newspapers and magazines and didn’t download any books from Audible. I thought that after a few days I’d be miserable, anxious and on edge–as well as poorly informed and intellectually malnourished.

Imagine my surprise when my reaction to the “media fast” was diametrically opposite to what I had feared would happen. I was happy and cheerful, more relaxed and actually felt like a weight had been lifted from my mind. I honestly didn’t miss any of it–I was more productive and effective in my work and actually felt more intellectually potent without the burden of processing the incoming barrage of media.

And even more amazingly I didn’t miss anything. I honestly didn’t feel less informed for not watching the news or following the minute by minute machinations of the financial markets. The only news story–and I use that term loosely–that I didn’t find out about until several days later was the near-fight between George Clooney and Fabio at a Los Angeles restaurant.

I’ve continued my media fast to this day. I’ve made a few more modifications–I allow myself to scan through magazines and non-fiction books when I’m in Barnes and Noble, but I don’t allow myself to buy them. Aside from that, however, I’m still doing the media fast as Ferriss outlined it: no newspapers, no magazines, no news websites, no TV, no non-music radio. I did allow myself to watch a few films, but they were all high quality (”Short Cuts” and “Godsford Park” by Robert Altman, Woody Allen’s “Match Point”, and a few others).

And just like Ferriss said its amazing how easily you can stay at least peripherally knowledgeable on news and current events without paying attention to them. The headlines on the top of the screen in my GMail account, listening to the conversations of others and when all else fails asking people “what’s going on in the world” kept me apprised of the major stories–assuming you call the Barry Bonds indictment and OJ Simpson’s legal woes important news.

Something funny began to happen then–I started to feel pity for those who’s lives were still driven by news, talk radio, TV shows, etc. It may have been a self rationalization, but I started to feel like I had reached some sort of higher understanding about the world that spun around me. Ignorance might not be bliss, but “selective ignorance” is a very pleasant way to go through life

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