pay attention to what you pay attention to

are you aware of what you consume? are you aware of it's affect on you?

this topic's been a bit on my mind lately and it ties directly into our journeys- if we are who we surround ourselves with in our physical environments, then the same must be true for our digital environments.

in today's episode, let's talk about how what you pay attention to, especially in the digital social media world, can be a double-edged sword or just not helping you love yourself more.


i reference a post shared by the lovely, hayes in this episode. you can find her here. 

connect with julia on instagram @beautybyjulia + tik tok @juliasalvia

unlock more archive content on instagram @theselflovearchive + tik tok @theselflovearchives

sign up for the self-love archives newsletter: www.theselflovearchives.com

Transcript

Julia Salvia: 0:00

Pay attention to what you pay attention to. There is so much around us to consume. We have the access and the availability now, present day, to consume so much different content, information, knowledge than ever before. But have you stopped for a second and thought What you pay attention to most. Welcome back to the Self Love Archives podcast. I'm your host, Julia Salvia, your self love bestie, your self love guide, your self love best friend. I am all of the above and then some, and I'm so grateful that you are here today. Welcome to episode number 31, and we are going to be really getting into this whole topic of all of this information that we have the opportunity to consume, but how can that affect our self love journey? How can that affect our mindset? How can that affect us? Because it can affect us in so many different ways. It's kind of a double edged sword in a lot of ways because while it sounds like such a positive thing that we have the ability to Connect to so many different people, to consume all of this different creativity and information. It can also be a detriment to our own selves, our souls, our journey, our heart. There's so much to dive into. With this statement of paying attention to what we pay attention to. What we really pay attention to. What we give our energy to. Pay attention to what you pay attention to is a quote by John Green. I heard the quote from this amazing podcaster and she has an amazing advice column. Her name is Hayes and I've talked about her on my podcast before. She's so lovely. I would dream, I would die to have her here with us today to really chat about so many different things. She's incredibly insightful. But when she said this, it really connected to this theme of what I had been doing for myself, which is looking into and being a lot more aware of all of these things that I am giving my energy to. All of these things that I am paying attention to. I was having a conversation with one of you guys in DM, The gist of the conversation is something that I have heard multiple times from multiple different people. It's that I can't love myself because of this. I can't love myself because of that. I can't love myself because I'm trying to get to this point, or this part, or this goal, or I'm trying to reach this, I'm trying to lose that, I'm trying to do that. We talked a little bit more about this in the last episode, about loving yourself and why you can't love yourself, but I want to hone in, I want to focus in more on this topic of how the content and the books and the information that we are consuming can also be a detriment to helping us love ourselves more. But again, it's a double edged sword. It can also be a really positive thing as well if you're consuming the right content, the right information, or surrounding yourself with the right people. Have you ever taken a moment to look at really look at, not mindlessly scroll, not mindlessly have conversations, but to really look at the content that you consume, the content, wording, lessons that you pay attention to, the things that people say and how they affect you, the people that you surround yourself with. Have you ever stopped and really paid attention? to what they're saying, what someone is saying, the type of content that you're being fed online. There's two ways to look at it, right? You have the people and the environment that you actually are in and then you have the digital environment that you spend your time in. So you have the physical world and the digital world. Have you stopped? Taken a step back and just taken a look at what you're really paying attention to. What content you're consuming. What words are you holding onto from conversations? What places and environments are you spending a lot of your time in? And what do those environments look like? What does your digital environment look like and what does your physical environment look like? I'd almost consider your digital environment, the people that you follow and the content that you consume and the people that you watch is almost like the people that you surround yourself with in this physical world. While we can compare them in this very surface level way, of course, the physical world, we live where we live. We have family and friends and we surround ourselves with these people. And sometimes it's, of course we can make boundaries, create boundaries and what not. But we can't unfollow these people. Or we can't move our home to a different social media platform. We have a little bit more of a choice when it comes to our digital environments. Now you know when you're on social media and let's say that you saw a video of a puppy. And not just any puppy, but it is a chocolate lab with green eyes. And then all of a sudden, tomorrow, you're seeing a chocolate lab with green eyes again. And then all of a sudden you're going to your For You page and You're seeing more chocolate labs with green eyes. And then all of a sudden you're seeing more and more videos of those chocolate labs. The way that most social media platforms work is that it takes information from how you interact and engage with other pieces of content. So if you're looking at videos of Chocolate Labs with Green Eyes and you're consuming that content and you're watching it, your retention rate, which is how long you've watched the video for, is till the very end and then you're watching it again and again. they're going to feed you more videos. Those platforms are going to feed you more videos just like that. So while there's nothing inherently wrong about consuming content of a chocolate lab with green eyes, because that can bring you a sense of joy and a sense of happiness and a little bit of a relaxation in the middle of the day. Are there pieces of content that you're consuming or videos that you keep coming across that maybe don't have that positive effect on you? Maybe they have a negative effect on you. Maybe they leave you feeling not so good about yourself. And maybe it's not the piece of content. Maybe it's what this piece of content brings out in you. Let's say that you are feeling a bit insecure with how your body looks. You're seeing that your social media pages are feeding you a lot of content of women who are not the same body type as you. Women who don't dress the same as you. And women who seem to be extremely confident in their bodies, how they look, And what they wear. And every time you view this piece of content, you finish watching these videos, and you just feel worse about yourself. You feel as though your body, your style, and who you are isn't good enough. Because you've now just been paying attention to all of this content that provides the assumption that this person loves their bodies, isn't insecure about their body. But the reality of it is that you don't actually know if that person is insecure or not. You're consuming content that is making you feel more insecure about yourself because you're making the assumption that this is what you're supposed to look like. That this is the norm, this is the goal, this is the person that your, that your brain has decided you're supposed to be. That the only people that exist out there, because that's all your social media is feeding you, is that type of woman. When that's not true. And I know you know that it's not true. That's why we need to pay attention to the content that we consume. Because we have control over the content that we consume, right? If we are paying attention to videos on food, or videos on puppies, we're gonna get fed more of those types of videos. Social media is smart. But I don't think that social media works against us. It actually works for us, which can be a double edged sword because it can put us in this circle, this world of thinking that only these certain people, only these certain things exist. Our physical environments can do the same for us. When I grew up, I did not know the half of it, the quarter of it. I didn't know, I didn't know anything about the world that existed beyond the town that I grew up in. Because we didn't travel too much. We didn't really get to experience. this life outside of this little town in the middle of New Jersey that I grew up in, and this little beach town that I grew up in. I didn't have the access to explore, and I didn't really grow up, so to speak, with social media to the extent that we have today. So there's this double edged sword of being in control of the content that you want to consume. The content that you're aware of and pushing social media to feed to you. And also being in this place of it only feeding you the things that you want it to, the things that you enjoy. That it could could create this bubble if we're not aware of what we're being fed. Now that we have this opportunity, this giant world of information, we have more societal norms. There are so many more Things for others to see, for others to judge, and for others to question. Especially if we're putting out content into the world. We're giving, we're giving the opportunity. Doesn't mean it's right, but we're giving the opportunity to everyone across the globe to have a say, or to make judgment, or have an opinion on us. So what type of content should you be consuming? What content should you be paying attention to? I believe that if you can recognize that everything you're seeing, while it may be true, you're not seeing everything. But there is a way to kind of, Cheat the system in this digital environment. And that's by choosing what you consume. So what content, what information, what platforms, what should you actually be consuming? I think this answer is up to you. But if I were to answer this, if I were to tell you the types of content that I consume, I consume content from people that make me feel inspired. I consume content from people that make me feel creative. From people that bring me joy. from Content that brings me joy We do have that choice on our platforms to choose who we follow And who we don't follow or who we mute or who we don't mute on our platforms Take into consideration and don't feel bad about it who you deliberately click follow for or subscribe for Because at the end of the day that is the content that you're going to be Consuming. That's the content that you are going to be learning from. That you are going to be seeing day in and day out because you chose to follow this person. Because you chose to watch this entire video. If a piece of content or a video doesn't make you feel good about yourself, ask the question, why? Why doesn't that piece of content make you feel good about yourself? Is it because the content doesn't align with your values as a person? Is it because of maybe an insecurity that you have with yourself? Is it because you don't agree with what the person has to say? Is it because it just doesn't leave you feeling comfortable? creative, or inspired, or kind. Maybe the piece of content is mean. If that's the case, stop watching that type of content. Unfollow that person. And please don't feel bad about it. Because this is your environment. Just like we create our environments In the physical world, we create our environment in the digital world. You have the opportunity to follow like minded people, to follow and consume content from people that make you feel creative, happy, inspired, positive, that make you think. You have the opportunity to choose the type of experience that you want to have in your own digital environment, on your digital platforms. And you can say the same for the physical world as well. You have the opportunity to choose who you want to spend your time with. To choose where you want to go, how you want to live your life. At the end of the day, Of course, there are so many little, little things to consider, but at the end of the day, you do have that choice. I want to share with you my private DMs with one of my lovely viewers. She asked such a wonderful question to me and I loved, not to pat myself on the back, but I loved my response to her because it really brought full circle. One of the biggest questions that a lot of people asked. Talk to me about or ask me about and it has to do with social media and the content that we consume and How that has an adverse effect on us and loving ourselves more Hi honey, how are you? The wind chimes in the background sound so cute. Congrats to you on losing 35 pounds. That's definitely something that is so amazing, if that was your goal. Social media is, social media, whether social media existed or not, I think that we just have so much more things to consume and more people that we have access to. that it's overwhelming to see so many things happening. I think all of us, men included, um, we are shamed into thinking that there are certain parts of ourselves that are negative, that are bad, that aren't good enough, that need to be changed, that are shameful. And because of that, there, when you're looking at social media or you're just like, you know, conversing or seeing the people around you. You have no idea what is going on behind the closed doors, right? You don't know what is inside of the book unless you read it. It's kind of like that whole saying, like, you know, don't judge a book by its cover. But it's so true because on social media we get to choose, like, the chapters and the pieces of these books. Like of our book we get to choose what parts of that we want to share even me You know, even as someone who is maybe a little bit more vulnerable and a little bit more vocal and a little bit more Um open on social media There are still so many things that people don't know because there are certain things that I choose to not share So it puts us in this really difficult place when Here we are And we're reaching these certain goals of ours, and we are trying to choose to love ourselves. And we are trying to just love ourselves. And all we see around us are these, are only these certain pieces of other people. And I think that's why it's so difficult to love ourselves. That's why social media can be You know, not the greatest place for everyone. That's why some people it's for some people It's a really great to take a break or to mute someone's profile or to unfollow or to not consume but we have One we have control over the content that we choose to consume as much as we think that TikTok Instagram is feeding it to us. We are actually the ones and I actually love this topic. I might even I might even like, if you don't mind, um, I might record, I'll like do a little screen recording and grab all of this for another podcast episode, because I love this conversation, because it just gives a different perspective, but We are at the end of the day in control of what we consume, and then Instagram and TikTok takes that information of what we consume and kind of feeds it back to us. So if we're consuming puppies all day and Those weird videos of that. I don't know if you've ever seen those weird videos of like this popcorny Like looking food that just gets thrown into this giant metal pan and pops up into like this Popcorn, I don't even know if you if you know what i'm talking about, you know what i'm talking about if you know, you know Um, then that's what the social media platforms are going to feed us It's kind of the same way You Just in a different facet that whoever we spend the most time with are the people who are going to kind of have influence on us, are going to be the type of conversations and lives that we are consuming. We get to choose what we consume. So what I wanted to say is that we're not seeing so many other chapters and parts of these books that people are creating for us. because they're only sharing parts and pieces of it. And we might never actually finish reading that whole book. We never, we might never get the chance to. Because that's, it's kind of like a private journal, private diary of each of these people that we're consuming content from. So I challenge you to look at the content you consume in a different way. So, I challenge you to look at the content you consume in a different way. Not everything you see, that everything you see may be true, but it's not, you're not seeing everything. And may I also add, because I had a, I hope, I hope this is, this is insightful by the way, because I actually had a call with my intuitive teacher earlier today. That was very lovely. And we were actually talking about, My challenge, which I will probably change the name of challenge to journey because I think challenge can be a little, a little too rough, and I don't want this challenge or this journey to be something that comes off so masculine. Discipline and motivation, those words sometimes can be really rooted in a lot of harshness. and a lot of criticalness of ourselves. I think having discipline is great and being motivated and creating motivation is such a wonderful thing because we need those things, right? We need that in order to push ourselves to get, we need that in order to push ourselves to get to the next level or to be the better version of ourselves, right? We need to have that, we need to create discipline in order to feel and create motivation. to help us be the best version of ourselves in whatever way that is. But there's also a kindness, a gratefulness that we need to have with ourselves, especially when we're in the process of like reaching a goal, right? You should be so fucking proud of yourself for getting to where you were. But the most important thing is that I hope you loved yourself through the journey of getting there. Because what I've found, especially in all of the, especially in regards to my body and all of the changes my body's gone through, the weight I've gained and the weight I've lost. Is that if I didn't give myself love in the journey of being a better version of myself, then I just end up back where I was. And I think that's the most important thing. Especially when it comes to social media too. Your journey is so completely different from everybody else's. And to be honest with you, what we consume and the things that we see Even the things that we hear from our family and our friends and the people that are close to us or co workers, whoever it may be, we're not even hearing the whole story or how much grit, how much work and how much determination and discipline and how much love and how much consistency and how much they had to love themselves to get to where they were, how much work they had to do to get to where they are. Something to consider. Love you! A big part of loving ourselves is consideration for the environments that we are a part of. The communities that we are a part of. That includes our digital environment, our digital communities, our physical environment, our physical communities. What we surround ourselves with is going to have A positive or negative, or both, effect on us. And if we can control it, which in most cases we have some extent of control to the environments that we partake in, the communities that we are a part of, if we can have some sort of control on whether or not we want to be a part of those environments, Why not make it an environment or a community that is going to positively affect us? When we recognize, listen, and see things, really see things, really listen to things, and understand how they affect us, we can love who we are a lot more. Because we can understand, because we can really get to the root of how something is affecting us. Whether it's causing us stress, pain, happiness, creativity. We'll start to learn ourselves. We'll start to learn more about ourselves. And in turn, hopefully, love ourselves more. Thank you so much for tuning in to today's podcast episode. I appreciate you to the moon and back. I will see you guys in the next podcast episode every other Sunday at 12 o'clock Eastern Time. I love you so much. Bye!