Healthline: How to Balance Staying Informed and Not Being Overwhelmed By Stressful News
“Despite the stressful events, taking care of yourself should be a priority, experts say. The most important thing you can do is remember what you can control. Taking care of yourself can be the first step to feeling better overall. One of the ways we can do that is to cut the stress off at the source — turn off the news.
“It is crucially important to engage in self-awareness and check-in with yourself regarding how much news you are currently consuming, how repetitive it is versus presenting new information, and the impact it is having on your mental health,” said Spray. Ask yourself how your mood is at various points during the day, and see if you are still doing the things that bring you joy.
“A helpful strategy to improve feelings of hopelessness is to allow yourself to experience these feelings, connect these feelings to your values, and move toward values-aligned action,” Spray said.
Finding an activity that makes you feel like you are doing something about it can help you feel less powerless. For example, some individuals find that volunteering for an organization that supports causes they are interested in can help.
“It is important to talk about the distress you are experiencing with others,” she added. “Too often, we sit alone with discomfort because we worry about burdening others. However, in these cases, it is very likely we are experiencing the same distress and would welcome a chance to share with someone else.””
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Do you get stress from watching and hearing the news? How do you balance staying informed and managing stress associated with the news?
#Stress #StayingInformed #Management
@sunnyWriting4806
I often feel overwhelmed after watching or reading the news. I usually try to look at the news only once a week. When I see something too distressing, I try not to keep thinking about it for too long.
@globalBraid3744
Having a schedule of seeing news and mental routine when seeing distressing articles is great way to manage staying informed and not letting it overload you. Thanks for sharing!
@sunnyWriting4806
What about you? Do you sometimes feel stressed from watching/hearing the news? How do you balance it?
@globalBraid3744
I definitely feel a lot of emotions when watching the news. But I limit my amount my screen time in general so often I'm not exposed to too much negative outlets and news. Controlling my online consumption in general has been really helpful controlling my media consumption as well!
@globalBraid3744
My God like I could care less about what the news had to say. It just repeats the same story, same pictures on every channel. I'm sure there is so much more killing done, more places with weather system causing destruction, more happening on earth to worry which country spent the most money on a rocket going to outer space. Who needs the news, live in my atmosphere for one day and you will understand why the word stress is so life impacting. Damn I could probably report on different stories, drama, events, to keep the public entertained for a half hour everyday and everything would be from what is happening in my own life.
@Goddontloveme
I agree with you! There are so many things happening in the world and we only get a small fraction of it in news. I am fortunate enough not to experience such disasters personally, but I understand that people in harsh environments have too many other things on their shoulders.
@sunnyWriting4806
if people in a distressful state of mind could possibly think or feel the way others are sugar coating their ability to have strength to change the current life situation we are in, then you are more delusional than I am.