I have a confession to make and it may lead some of you think I am a little weird or naive. And that's ok - cause that's the thing about blogging isn't it, there is no point in pretending to be something I'm not. If I am going to invite you in to my world, I need to be honest about who I am.
Sometimes when I am tired and a perhaps a little overwhelmed by life, my deeper side surfaces, and it lingers, just for a little while. And it is times like these that I tend to open up a little more than I normally do and share some of the crazy stuff that goes on inside this head of mine.
Oh geez - reading back over that, it sounds like I am about to confess to a gruesome crime or some completely shocking. But nup - sorry to disapoint, nothing of that nature.
You see - I don't watch the news and I don't read the news.
Typically on any given day - I have no idea what is going on outside of my own little world.
I used to be a news addict. I had breaking news and Nine MSN up on my desktop all day. I devoured the news papers and I watched both the early news and the late news reports.
But about 8 months ago now, I watched my son have anxiety attacks over things he had seen on the news. I held him as he exhaustively bled his fears to me. He is 10 and shouldn't know what an anxiety attack feels like. Unfortunately anxiety runs in our family and my 6 year old also struggles with his own panic attacks.
It got me thinking though - when I was a kid of that age, the world seemed to be a much nicer place. It was safer and generally just more peaceful. I didn't worry about earthquakes or comets hitting the earth. I didn't think about gun men and terrorists and wars. I wasn't touched by the fear of rapists, home invasions and disease. No I lived in a perfectly peaceful if somewhat naive little world. But wow it was a beautiful place.
We weren't exposed to the news at all the levels we are today. It's on our radios, our TVs, news papers, our computers, our phones.
So much of my own anxiety stems from worrying. Worrying about things I hear about or read about, that could possibly happen, but most likely wont. Things I have no control over - horrible things lurking out there threatening to spoil my beautiful peaceful world.
Call me ignorant or just plain stupid if you please, but I decided I wanted to live in THAT world again and I wanted my kids to experience that world for themselves. They grow up so quickly and there is plenty of time for them to worry about what is really going on out there, when they are older and have the nicer world firmly imprinted in their memory to fall back on.
So I turned the news off!
I am well aware of the dangers that exist to us and our earth and I live my life respectfully doing what I can to protect our planet and protect my family and kids from as many of those dangers that I can. I abide by the laws, I vaccinate my kids and I do my bit for the community. I teach my children how to care for the earth and to show respect for diversity and different cultures and opinions. But I don't need to be reminded every day about the horrible things in this world that are fed to us so graphically through words and images that sting my soul.
I know there are good news reports out there and I have family who is in the media. My sister in law actually reads the news on TV and my brother is a news cameraman who has travelled the world reporting back stories from war torn countries - so I have a healthy respect for the news and the role it plays in society. But its just not for me anymore.
I am in business and I do unfortunately have to read about the financial news to stay on top of my job, but that's all the news I allow myself to be touched by.
My husband watches the news and reads the papers and he will relay anything to me I really need to know, but he edits things and censors them when he does tell me. Occasionally he pauses the news and plays something back to me that is of the feel good variety - you know the stories that restore your faith in man kind. But mostly he just keeps the news to himself.
So there you have it - Probably one of THE strangest things about me there is.
Like I said - That's just who I am, and at the risk of sounding completely ignorant, immature and incredibly naive, I make no apologies. I love my little world I live in. I don't know how long I get to be here in this life, but I do know that I don't want to spend what time I do have worrying about what could happen.
I want to be like Peter Pan and live in my very own Never Never land.
If you get a little laugh out of our Hiccups around here, that makes me mighty happy.
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Thankyou xxx
