Consume, curate, create | 5 minute read

School’s out. My kids are home. No camps this week. Screens are on, or, they were.

The days start like all the others — wake up, brush teeth, breakfast, until we got to the inevitable: “What are you going to do today?”

I don’t know.

As a parent, the burden is on you to plan, yet we over-optimize our kids' lives. We need to give boredom time and space to breathe.

We take the easy way out.

We hand them a screen. We take one too.

Because it’s easier.

We’re wired to do that — to take the path of least resistance or “be lazy.”

In the business world, we refer to it as the low-hanging fruit.

“Our brain tricks us into believing the low-hanging fruit really is the ripest,” said author Nobuhiro Hagura, Ph.D., who began this research at University College London. “We found that not only does the cost to act influence people’s behaviour, but it even changes what we think we see.”

Right now, we see AI as a game changer, a problem solver, our destiny; yet it’s still not washing dishes or folding laundry. For now, it’s taking jobs from writers, graphic designers, and content creators, and it’s coming for whatever you add into this world, too.

There's an avalanche of content coming, also known as AI-generated slop.

Because it’s easier to doom scroll, it’s easier to binge, it’s easier to stream that program you used to have to wait until Thursday at 8pm to watch.

It’s all easier, and that’s the problem. This ease of consumption is increasing depression, lowering self-esteem and giving us greater feelings of isolation (Verduyn, P., et al., 2017, Current Opinion in Psychology).

How do we fight back? From consumption to creation.

Creativity gives us a mental health boost. A 45-minute art-making session significantly reduces cortisol levels, regardless of artistic skill (Kaimal, G., et al., 2016, Art Therapy). Creativity helps build psychological resilience and is linked to lower depressive symptoms. (Forgeard, M., & Elstein, J., 2014, Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts)

Creating something puts you in a state of flow, which boosts happiness, focus, and a sense of meaning.

Consumption without creation leads to depression.

Consuming is fine, so long as, along the way, you’re making room to create.

The pebble

The challenge

Make something. Create anything for anyone, including yourself.

Here are some ideas:

• Make a playlist of your favourite songs from when you were in a particular grade.

• Write a one-page love letter to your inner self, your significant other, parent or sibling.

• Re-arrange your room for no reason other than to move things around.

• Write a Haiku and drop it in someone’s mailbox.

• Sketch a weird-looking bird.

• Plant a garden, even a small one, in a tiny container and try to keep it alive.

• Cook something with a weird ingredient you found at the grocery store.

• Build a box with an old plaque as its lid.

• Text your best friend with a made-up word and have fun while they try to figure out what you’re talking about.

Realize that you’re alive. AI can’t replace human connection, vulnerability and the mess we are. In this chaotic world, creating gives you control.

I know you’re spending time trying to find happiness through meditation, working out, meal planning, and other self-improvement activities, but maybe what you need is 45 minutes of art to reduce your stress.

Do you need a prompt like the AI robot?

“If I weren’t afraid of looking stupid, I would…”

Here’s why I love Saving Sundays. It’s my forcing function to create. I’m creating something to share with whoever signed up with your email, not something you stumble upon in your algorithmic feed meant to create desire for a product to make your life easier but just racks up credit card debt with ease.

We’re not beating an algorithm. We exist in your inbox because you chose it.

You opened it because some part of you wants to feel alive.

Thank you for doing that. Thank you for being a part of this journey.