It is a form of insanity, what the Buddha would call hardcore addiction were he to use the vernacular. We are in a riptide of obsessive compulsive behavior that has left mainstream media culturally bankrupt; everything is post-source to a degree that we are mashing up a mashup culture. Every news source now has a dedicated Britney block that is set to follow Britney, and any incoming reports on the subject trump all others. One tabloid promotes its cautionary tale examining what it is to live with mental illness with Britney Spears as its focus. beside it, another tabloid gleams about how you can learn how Britney lost 15 lbs in a month. Hrm. Mental instability / weight loss. I wonder if there is a co-relation in this case? Could it be the girl wouldn’t be half crazy if she wasn’t being followed around by a bunch of lecherous spectacle vultures all day?

As South Park eloquently illustrated, she is this year’s sacrificial lamb, whom they wait to execute in the town square so they can move onto their next virgin. Hannah Montana anyone? The druids did it because they wanted to please the gods, but what do we gain from this mania other than to stuff the holes in our psyches, those perturbed emotions and over-stimulated nervous systems, than junkie-level distraction?

But I turn this lens around on you now: how ya feelin? Little kooky?

If you want to know how to scratch that itch, check out nature. Try silence. Take a vow of silence for a week – don’t comment, don’t talk, don’t attempt to mitigate. Just focus on impartial awareness. If you embark upon this, I further recommend at least temporarily discontinuing exposure to the noise – of the radio, the internet, the television, the game console. Check in with your self and register What’s Up. This will be hard. It will feel like you are going crazy for a day or two or three as your mind grasps for something to satisfy its insatiable hunger for information. And then something will shift. You will begin to detox your nervous system and perhaps even, in recognizing your aversion to the mental clutter, begin to abhor it the way an ex-smoker abhors cigarette smoke.

I am not presenting anything here that you do not already know. I am simply substantiating that it is going on. Here. Now. Here. Again. Now. Like knitting. Loop in. Now here. Loop in. When you have reconnected to the immense richness of all the things around you in the present, your junkie-mode for all the attention grabbing drivel of the mainstream media will begin to appear as it really is – a desperate and petulant child crying out for your attention. You can either feed it, or let it exhaust itself and restore some equilibrium and have a good life.

And from that place, you will create. You will become a source. And then, I will blog about you.

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I am attending the National Association of Broadcasters convention this week. This year’s conference has a heavy focus on content creators. I am interested in hearing with what they want to populate the multiplicity of broadcast “solutions.” I do not have any disdain for the content creators; they have stories to tell and they need your attention to get the funding to tell them. some will bail out and fall prey to sensationalism. some will figure out a way to transcend that and win you over by virtue of a virally active word of mouth based on merit and innovation/genius. I look forward to reporting back to you.