Information vs. Transformation: How to Cut A Purposeful Path

One day, when cleaning my computer folders, I quickly realized I had an obscene number of eBooks, checklists, challenges, and other information related to everything from how to find your purpose in life to losing the last 10 pounds for summer. I was on the Internet for hours a day, every day, and I was a sucker for a good email newsletter freebie. As you can imagine, I quickly amassed a collection of these freebies that I opened no more than one to two times, and 99.9% of the information I never implemented.

I was addicted to information that didn’t initiate a real solution to my problem. I glanced at it and put it away to sit in the black hole of my computer never to be seen or thought about again. Take a second to consider what our Internet habits look like. In between emails, downloadable PDFs, chats, social media scrolling, and monitoring breaking news, we’re lucky if we can cram in 30 minutes of focused concentration per day. We’re constantly bombarded by conflicting information and opinions.

We’re in a state of overwhelm. We live in the golden age of information, with everything we could ever want to know at the tip of our fingers, but this easy access to knowledge isn’t actually helping us. It’s certainly not enabling us to live happy lives and become the best version of ourselves.

Let’s spend a little time sorting out the difference between information and transformation. If you’re seeking a genuine transformation in your life, such as a new career or a shift in your mindset, consuming a load of information on that topic may not be helping you at all. It could even be what’s holding you back from a transformation.

How most people approach a transformational goal

Once they’ve decided on a goal, most people begin researching how to achieve it. Or, it might happen the other way around: You could land on a goal after being inspired by something you see online. Either way, the end result is the same. Once you’ve locked your eyes on the prize, the motors of the Internet will bring up content similar to that which you’ve already watched or read, and suddenly you’re drowning in a sea of blogs, videos, articles, email sign-ups from experts, and social media posts.

Among all this, there may be some great pieces of advice or inspiration that could spur you on toward your goal. But how are you to know? The genuinely valuable content is competing against clickbait articles and a million other things bouncing around your mind, all vying for your attention. At a certain point, it becomes too much for you to sort out and objectively weigh the good against the bad.

This can end up impacting the decisions you make. The Information Overload Research Group, a global nonprofit fighting the rising tide of data, calls this state “intoxication”—the inability to process new information and to base decisions on it. This can lead to you becoming frustrated and demoralized in your quest to achieve the goal that started this journey off.

Research cited by Harvard Business Review says that we can even experience a drop in our IQ when faced with the tsunami of new information and distractions every day. And a drop in intelligence is unlikely to help you bag that promotion.

The problem is that reading pages of unfiltered Internet content is information, not transformation. The best you’ll get out of it is a little theoretical knowledge and maybe a few snappy quotes to tweet out to your followers. You’re still not that far from where you started.

So, let’s talk about transformation

Transformation is that real, fundamental change. It’s you leveling yourself up. You’ve taken all that knowledge you gained and you’ve applied it to yourself consistently. Little by little, day by day, you’ve broken old habits, molded new habits, and carved an evolved version of yourself. It’s the destination you’re striving to reach. Transformation doesn’t happen by mindlessly grazing at the Internet buffet. Quite the opposite. When you’re transforming, you need to approach your hunt for relevant content with intention.

An individual who’s seeking a real transformation will seek out expert advice and cut out the noise. They’ll keep a laser focus on their end goal and ignore everything that doesn’t serve it. Consequently, the information they consume is specific and curated. As SUCCESS notes, “The secret of concentration is elimination.” Eliminate the unnecessary, focus on the essentials and you’ll have the tools you need to get where you want to go.

Building transformative Internet habits

Living a transformative life is all about focusing on quality, not quantity. You can support your transformative journey by adjusting your Internet habits to find quality content that’ll inspire and motivate you. It’s important to note here that sometimes, the quality approach involves paying money to access the information you actually need. This might be in the form of hiring a coach to define your goals and to provide encouragement, or it might mean taking out a subscription to a reputable content source. But if this helps you to achieve your transformation, it’s worth the price.

Here are some other healthy Internet habits to support your transformative journey:

• Comb through your email inbox: Check which email marketing lists you’re subscribed to and which of those you actually read. Take yourself off any email lists that don’t align with your goals and send emails that are helpful but not time-sensitive to a separate folder to consult later. Be conscious about what you allow to interrupt the flow of your day. When considering a new email sign-up, ask yourself, “Am I really going to use this?”

• Conduct an audit of your social media channels and weed out accounts run by “influencers” who don’t have the credentials to back up what they’re saying. Also, unfollow the accounts that cause you to compare your everyday reality to their highlight reel. It’s easy to be swept up in having imposter syndrome when you see other people who’ve “made it”.

• Check your browsing data in your phone settings to see how much time you’re spending in each of your apps and on your phone overall. Does this time breakdown reflect the transformation you want? Adjust accordingly.

• Whenever you read advice or quality content that could help your transformation, take a second to consider how easy it would (or wouldn’t) be to apply it to your own life. Ideas can be beautiful and inspirational, but they’re not always grounded in reality.

Each of these actions forms a stepping stone from your present state to you in the future, helping you to walk that transformative journey with clarity and intention, with just the core information you need to hand.

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