Yes, of course it works when someone yells fire. They get our attention immediately. When that newspaper headline shouts terror and disaster; we stop and read. Maybe we don’t stop and buy these days, but at least we Google-up a news feed and check it out. Perhaps the best warning is from Tolkien. “Fear! Fire! Foes!” the Hobbits shout.
But really, why do we pay attention? We know better. It is very seldom that a real and immediate disaster is coming our way. And, it is even more seldom that we need to react suddenly. So, why are we wired this way?
If you take an evolutionary perspective, it is pretty simple. As omnivores we are both predator and prey. We are designed to notice both the Lion in the Underbrush and the Gazelle in the Grass. The Lion in the underbrush is that sudden life ending danger. If we don’t take swift and effective action to avoid the Lion, we are likely to be lunch. Its pretty simple; one-on-one, in hand-to-claw-combat we are pretty underprepared to handle that Lion. On the other hand, if we know he is there and we have a little time to plan, a Lion is not really a large problem to a community of people.
The Gazelle is the other side of the problem. Vegetables pretty much stay where we put them. But the protein we omnivores crave tends to be fast and agile. Ever try to catch a squirrel or a gazelle by hand. Even the best of hunters are mostly inadequate to this task, but give us a plan and a bit of community and acquiring the desired protein is not a problem.
What can we learn from this? Bad News is fascinating. Why? Because really Bad News is the most critical AND time sensitive information that exists. It demands immediate attention. Not knowing could kill us… and very quickly. Very quickly.
So we must look. We are hardwired to look for the Lion in the Underbrush first, and our logic and experience supports this.
On the other hand, in a modern society where we are often inundated by Bad News from around the block and around the World, we constantly face adrenaline overload. Ask any psychologist.
This becomes a version of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder light. More Lions in the Underbrush are presented to us in any one day, than we can handle in a decade. Ultimately we give up… how can we possibly handle this? Some of the most well informed people I know are the most depressed. They keep the TV on and they are connected to their news feeds 24/7. They accept no break in the Bad News, manufactured or real. In their obsession to be well informed they forget that there is anything but bad news… still they persist in having food, shelter and many of our modern luxuries.
Often included in this group are some of my favorite people; aficionados of the Objectivist / Libertarian philosophies. They tend to obsess over the non-freedom messages found everywhere in the news. What happens to these well meaning friends-of-freedom? Over the years they often grow bitter and depressed. Many of them curl in on themselves and give up. They cannot handle the constant unremitting exposure to a Lion in the Underbrush everywhere they turn, and in every moment. No one could.
Your subconscious needs rest. Everyone needs recovery time. Have you ever watched the late news, and woke up depressed in the morning to find a bright sunny day? Ever feel surprised that it was sunny, that it wasn’t as cold and damp and depressing as you feel it should be. Has it ever seemed like the sunlit sky was being unrealistic? It has to me.
The moral of my little story is this: save your adrenaline for the real Lion in the Underbrush. Manage your input. Manage both kinds of input. Manage the input that you receive from outside sources AND manage the input that you give yourself. Then choose your action, don’t just react.
The final two articles of this series will be “The Lion Without” and “The Lion Within.” Guess which is the hardest… Handling the Lion on the Outside or the Lion on the Inside? The winner will receive a (re-animated version) of Marvel’s old “No-Prize!”
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