I Stopped Following the News

Summary

If I have to pick my favourite German word, I would probably pick “neugierig” because it describes me very well. It means curious, but that is not the literal meaning. Like many German words, it comes from two parts: neu and gierig. Neu means new, and gierig means greedy. So the literal idea behind neugierig is being greedy for new things. That fits me well. I really enjoy learning new things. That is why I read a lot, watch documentaries, and explore different topics. I am greedy for new information. This also includes what is happening around the world. For years, I followed the news to keep an eye on what was happening in my country, in the world, and in the tech industry. I curated a list of sources that matched my taste, from international newspapers to YouTube channels, Reddit, and tech-focused websites. Every day, I checked these sources through their websites or my RSS reader to stay up to date. At the end of last year, I had some time to reflect on my habits. I thought about what makes me happy, what makes me stressed, and how the things I do every day contribute to my goals. When I looked at the time I spent reading the news and how I felt afterward, I realised it was not helping me at all. Most of the time, I felt more stressed than informed. I also noticed that almost every source focuses heavily on negative stories, simply because those attract more attention and clicks. When it comes to world news, I started to see the same patterns repeating. A lot of headlines about political figures, conflicts far away, and problems I have no control over. I asked myself how much of this actually affects my daily life, and I could not come up with a good answer. Many things are happening in the world, but they rarely change anything in my day-to-day routine. That made me question why I was following them so closely. The same applies to tech news. Most of it revolves around big personalities, constant AI updates, startups getting acquired, people becoming rich, hardw...