worth currency

“Paula, I can’t read your stuff, it’s too long”.

“Paula you really need to make your videos less than 2 min long”.

I think it’s interesting how no one has an attention span anymore and, yet, what people seem to seek IS attention.

Part of me faces this by spouting off in my mind - WHAT IN THE ACTUAL FUCK is going on? And the other part of me feels deeply saddened for the state of humanity.

I don’t write this with immunity of what I speak witness to. I write this with my own personal understanding and experiences with lack of attention span and seeking attention for worth currency.

We have lost our way and lost our depth.

We are living in the shallows and yet say and act as though, we are searching for purpose and meaning.

We can’t even read something on social media that’s longer than a meme. YIKES!

We give our divided attention to quick fixes and anything that wants to lend us a helping hand to become EVEN MORE disconnected, fragmented and shallow.

We think Instagram determines how great we are. How loved we are and how powerful we, and others are. We praise followers and devalue humility. We seek to be seen and adored by influencers and ignore the beauty around us and within us.

We are constantly searching for someone to tell us how special we are or to say we are worthy, seen, powerful and liked. And strangely we are handing out love bomb comments to complete strangers on line, while we turn our eyes to the ground as we walk by our neighbours and local community members.

We think we should get and give attention for literally everything. You cleaned your kitchen today and you get the attention on social media of OMG you did such an amazing job! Come on folks, why?

We fell for the agreement trap to consumerize attention.

We have made the reward of attention into a tangible hot pink Stanly Cup (seriously though, I don’t get the hype). And in the end, after the attention is given, the love button is tapped, and your dopamine plummets back to emptiness, the hot pink cup means nothing at all. You still find yourself searching for the next love bomber willing to stroke your wounds for their own self fulfilling dopamine hits. And then cycle continues.

Seriously, isn’t it time we talk to tress instead? For real though, you are going to get a so much more wholeness and TRUE satisfaction from being in communion with nature, rather than a heart on your screen.

The currency of attention is a hidden poison, made only of surface level materials, designed to fragment you and disconnect you from who you actually are: A whole, loving, imperfect human being. Who is great, simply because you exist.

So…..how about….

1. Read the long posts.

2. Ask yourself what REALLY matters to you.

3. Find beauty in nature, animals, babies and silence.

4. Clean your kitchen, it’s a basic human need. It isn’t currency for likes.

5. Seek out real human connection, rather than connecting to 20K likes on a screen.

6. Look at your eyes in the mirror. Look deep into them. Hold that gaze for longer than feels comfortable or easy. Your soul is trying to connect you to your hearts depth.

7. Ask your neighbour for a cup of sugar.

Your hearts depth. This is what the world REALLY needs.

So, no I won’t shorten my depth to cater to the creation of a shallow, self centred, disconnected, dopamine addicted culture. In fact, I am going to make things longer and more in depth.

I am going to challenge myself to read for longer periods, and have WAY MORE conversations that are deep rather than surface level. And I am going to look people in the eye and smile, even if they think I am weird.

And I am going to get my attention from trees from now on ;)

Love Paula