Let It Linger

It is amazing to me how much stress we put on ourselves over the immediacy of information. Between social networks, newspapers, blogs, television, and many other sources, we constantly consume information. What was breaking news 6 hours ago is now old news.

Use my blog as an example. I have now posted this on Thursday, making what I wrote on Tuesday (though much better than what I’m writing today) mostly irrelevant. On Twitter it is common knowledge that a tweet remains relevant no longer than an hour in most cases.

The inevitable outcome from consuming too much information is a lack of depth. In fact the more information we consume the more depth we lack rather than gain as it would seem. By consuming more (or too much, some people can handle more than others) we become knowledgeable in many areas, but we lack the depth that comes from processing the information over the course of many days.

I’ve been slowly paring back the number of people I follow on Twitter, the number of people I’m friends with on Facebook, and the number of blogs I read. I’m slowly learning…better than going an inch deep with lots of sources, is to truly go deep with a few people and sources. It gives me the time needed to process and let everything linger.

Don’t just process and consume information, let it linger.

Let it stir something in you. God works in the lingering process.