Humans of New York on Attention
This -> Humans of New York on Attention
For anyone (like me), not logged into Instagram – here’s the text of his post. It’s a year old, but just as relevant for 2025.
The other day I was scrolling through Instagram. It was a moment of weakness. As a rule, whenever I catch myself mindlessly scrolling– I try to turn off the device. Of course Instagram fights back against these attempts at self-discipline, by serving me the exact sixty-second video that is most likely to keep me staring at the screen. This time it was a video about parenting. The video did its job. I stopped scrolling, and paid attention. A man on stage was giving advice on how to curb rebellious behavior in young children. ‘Don’t constantly point out when the child is behaving badly, the man advised. ‘Instead, try to acknowledge when the child is behaving well. Because what you pay attention to-expands.”
What you pay attention to-expands. This law goes far beyond parenting. It’s the basis for some of our most lasting folk wisdom: Look left, go left. See the glass half-full. Keep on the sunny side of life. At the very least these sayings suggest a psychological benefit to controlling what we pay attention to. But many philosophies go even further, and suggest that our attention carries a sort of spiritual power. Some claim that the world will magically serve us more of what we notice. Maybe there has always been some truth to that, maybe not. But it is certainly true now.
Our world has become hardwired to give us more of what we pay attention to. In the last few years this trend has rapidly accelerated. Every time we look at a screen, even if we are just mindlessly scrolling – artificial intelligence is watching what we pay attention to. More than watching, it is studying. More than studying, it is obsessively measuring, training itself, getting better at giving us more. More of what we pay attention to. It doesn’t care about our weaknesses, our insecurities, our blindspots, our biases, our addictions. It doesn’t want us to be better people in 2024 than in 2023. Admittedly, it doesn’t want us to be worse either. It only wants one thing: our attention.
So at the beginning of this new year, as we make plans to control our calories, our drinking, our smoking, our exercise, our generosity, our meditation-perhaps we should begin by controlling what we pay attention to. Because what you pay attention to expands. In 2024 you will be shown much more of what you choose to look at. So choose carefully. And if at any point you become conscious that you are not the one choosing- pause. Perhaps the most powerful choice you have left is to turn off the screen.
