Image: Josh Eckstein
1 minute read
A baby is a loud noise at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other.
—Ronald Knox
Friends,
Sometimes, taking a small step can mean to stop doing something.
In late November (2024), amidst the noise of US elections and a growing sense of unease about social media, I closed my X (Twitter) account. You can’t ‘delete’ your account—X doesn’t allow that—but I deleted most of my posts and comments, deleted the app from all devices, and rendered the account inactive. I haven’t looked back.
Afterward, I felt an immediate sense of relief, like there was suddenly more…space around me. More calm. And I soon saw just how unimportant it all was, how little value it held, how ‘noisy’ it was. When I check news websites like CNN, it confirms what I already knew—a 24/7 stream of noise added nothing to my life, but instead made me more anxious, more stressed out, and less present in my own life and to everyone around me.
I find the concept of a ‘signal to noise’ ratio useful and apply it in many parts of my life. Like a radio, most of what you encounter on social media is static, but buried in the noise are signals. If you know the frequency, you can skip the noise and get the signal; if you don’t, you mostly hear noise while you search.
But social media—Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, all of it—is by design mostly noise. Random opinions, arguments, screeds, pornography, sales pitches, ads, public manifestos, outrage. Provocative stimulus to keep you clicking. And that noise is often the point: to get your attention, guide you into a sales funnel, or just manipulate your emotions.
For me, it’s not that social media doesn’t have any signal—it does—but once you’ve opened social media, it’s a full-volume blast that’s hard to calmly control and navigate.
And so I’ve come to realize that the only real way I can limit (or avoid) the noise is to avoid it altogether. And that means not participating at all.
I am losing precious days. I am degenerating into a machine for making money. I am learning nothing in this trivial world of men. I must break away and get out into the mountains to learn the news.
—John Muir