A Facebook Move That Gave Lot Of Mental Clarity And Peace
I use Facebook in two ways.
On my personal account, I do normal activities like liking, posting tour pics, sharing interesting stories etc.
On my official Facebook page, I share the excerpts of articles that I publish, I also put questions and answers that I reply to the article comments. If you have not yet liked my Facebook page, I request you to visit and like the page here. This way, you can be up to date with Ayurveda information that I share in different platforms. For example, if someone comments with an inquiry about a product description, I post that question with my answer in my Facebook page. So that, you can avoid visiting my website again and again, but still get my updates in your wall.
An example of such question and answer – (Click on like page button)
https://www.facebook.com/DrHebbar/posts/10152342985607178
The topic for today is about a change in activity that I did in my personal account that brought me a lot of mental peace and concentration.
Just a few weeks ago, I was a very socially active person in Facebook. I used to like all the patriotic pages, personalities, I also used to have a lot of fun and had liked lot of troll – pages, and joke – pages, and those that make fun of others.
My patriotic quotient increased, I became more sensitive to sensitive social issues like Nirbhaya rape and murder, Amanda Todd online harassment and suicide etc.
This was a lot of fun even. Pages like Jobless Jack was a big time pass.
But unknowingly, these kind of pages used to take away a lot of positive energy from me. After reading a sad story, my mind used to be so engaged in it that, getting back to work was almost impossible. It used to drain my energy and concentration.
So, I unfollowed all these pages, un-friended people whom I did not know in person, instead, liked a few positive and constructive pages that interests me, like Mashable, GigaOm, TechCrunch, Richard Branson, Interesting Engineering, Interior Designing, ArchDaily etc.
I get pumped up when I see a beautiful car, by reading tech news, by seeing beautiful buildings, by seeing nature’s pics from across the world. Now, these kind of things fill my Facebook wall. Now, every time I see my wall, the energy to work harder, positive attitude, knowledge about recent advancement etc give a kick and I get back to work with a lot more of focus, intent and concentration.
Being less involved in national issues on Facebook does not make me less patriotic. I read newspapers, watch TV and keep myself well informed. But avoiding the same activity on Facebook helped me avoid the brain drain.
Let me know in comments, what you do, to keep your mind sane, in this hustling and bustling online world.
In case, you have not yet liked my Facebook page, please do so here. Thanks.
15 comments on “A Facebook Move That Gave Lot Of Mental Clarity And Peace”
Sumathi
It’s true that, sometimes, what you enter into as just another activity could draw you in and drain you of positive energy.
But, nothing ventured, nothing gained. Your experience has taught many to be wary of certain pages. Positive mindset is mostly by counseling ourselves, exposing oneself to writings, music. Sathsangam is good. Thanks for sharing your experience, Doctor.
Dr J V Hebbar MD(Ayu)
Very well presented thoughts. Thanks. Sometimes, the realization that we are drowning ourselves in some junk activity takes a very long time. Hence, avoidance is the best remedy.
Gaurav
Glad to know that I’m not unique! I automatically stopped reading the newspapers as soon as I entered college since I felt very hard hit by the exact same effects on the mind that you described.
Our mind (in Kaliyuga) is not so strong that it can fight the ‘stickiness’ to what it comes by. So we have to careful what and how much we feed it, just like feeding the body with food. Too much can cause indigestion – actually if I’m not mistaken, per Ayurveda, even thoughts/sights/sounds/etc undergo a process of ‘digestion’ once they hit our sense organs. That is why sometimes we cannot take too much of it, because we don’t have the capacity to digest them.
There is a lot of information in the world. It is unnecessary to get ‘as much as possible’ of it. We need to maintain our focus on important things since we don’t have infinite time. The litmus test I try to use is: How much time did I spend towards furthering my life’s goals (as if today were the last day I had). If I see that I’m “wasting time” by this criteria, I try to bring the focus back. Basically, if I feel I have not “wasted time” doing unproductive activities, in other words if I feel like I have worked towards my life’s goals and positive activities, it keeps me sane.
I think that if I spend time on my soul, the nation will automatically benefit. What is a nation after all, if not a collection of souls? Isn’t that why India is still the spiritual powerhouse that the world today looks for guidance? If we as individuals lose that focus, we can imagine where the ‘nation’ will go…
Dr J V Hebbar MD(Ayu)
“I think that if I spend time on my soul, the nation will automatically benefit.” – That was the message that I wanted to convey through the article. Swami Vivekananda once said, do not bother about correcting others. Correct yourself alone. Society will have one less idiot. 🙂
Gaurav
Swami Vivekanandaji’s words were always very bold and inspiring and motivating. Moreover, since he had immense spiritual power, if we read what he says, it actually has the ‘prabhava’ of entering deep within us and actually helping us imbibe those qualities (compared to the prabhava of reading the same things said by someone else).
He also wrote or said that we should just take up 3 or 5 ideas and make them our life’s ideals and work towards them. We don’t need to do anything else… (not verbatim).
Gaurav
Regarding:
“So that, you can avoid visiting my website again and again, but still get my updates in your wall.”
…I still like to visit this website and do the google custom search on any topic or keyword of interest to me every once in a while. I am pleasantly surprised to find many *older* articles for which I have not seen updates since after I subscribed to the website notifications.
Dr J V Hebbar MD(Ayu)
Still that would not ensure that you will not miss all the comment replies. Hence, I have made this habit of re-posting the comment replies to fb.
Gaurav
Good point. Actually, that reminds me of something I was wondering about: Ideally there should be a feature that one can ‘subscribe’ to an article (and all its subsequent comments). Today this is possible only if one posts a comment, but not otherwise. I think this should solve the problem, right?
Dr J V Hebbar MD(Ayu)
Hi, there is already follow comment option in my blog. So, when you make a comment, at the bottom, you can tick follow comment, to get notified on further comments on that post. But we can not expect every reader to be tech-savvy and make note of such things.
There are many tools which notify when extra content is added to a website. But those will be too demanding for a common man.
Gaurav
Thanks for reminding about the facebook page. It looks like the facebook page can have Q&A that is not available on the website pages. So one would have to read both to ensure that one is not missing anything.
Would it be possible to keep the website as the ‘core’/authoritative source that includes all discussions from the facebook page somehow? For example, if you could create a user id ‘Facebook Dr Hebbar’ and post the facebook Q&A on the relevant article here, that might work. Of course that’ll be more work, so I leave it to your best judgement.
thank you
Dr J V Hebbar MD(Ayu)
Many of my website readers are elders who do not have fb account. If I post exclusive q and a in fb, they will miss it. I get more qs in website than on facebook. When someone asks q on facebook, I answer it there only. It is not re-published in website.
Deepak
Same experience here…Actually I went ahead and did the same with TV too.News is only for the end of the day. Morning is for Bhajans or nice talk…Stay away from Live updates especially whatsapp etc
haseena
well nice article … and i think a lot google account integration for commenting will work
Buddha Zorba
When we help ourselves and become happy, the surplus happiness which you experience is to be shared with the world. If you yourself are not happy, then what will you share ? So it is important to be selfish, only then you ll become self less. Essentially you are not being selfish, even if the world thinks you are.
A person who is not happy and trying to make the world happy is the very wrong thing happening in the world. Our ancient seers and saints achieved bliss and then shared it with the world. Other way round is just madness.
Dr J V Hebbar MD(Ayu)
True sir.