Ok this isn't quite the same brain rot as what the kids are saying today, im more today talking about something I have been observing more lately.
When I need to sleep but I can't, I put a show on, or something (screen off) just loud enough it drowns out my inner monologue.
Over time I have come to realize that if I'm trying to drown out my inner monologue to sleep with this noise....what is it doing when I do it while I'm awake?
This might not seem like a big deal, people do it all the time, however, I'm an engineer, I like to see problems and to to solve them with software or if I'm able in hardware
But the problem is that I can't do that if my brain is turned off.
This is similar to the problem people are complaining about with using LLMs, and how we will cause brain stagnation. (As an aside, while I can see that being a problem, I don't personally see the issue for myself there, as I am using the LLM as an assistant, I usually already know what I need to or want to do, but I'm letting it be my hands a bit).
Here's the thing, stuff like this is (IMHO) kinda like a drug, it's harder and harder to get off of it, and I think it's probably doing literal damage to me in various ways. we used to have idle cycles for our brain to think about things.
1. Probably not good for my hearing
2. I fall asleep watching movies now.
3. I'm not thinking about problems I want to be thinking about.
4. I'm not even having time to discover and think about new problems.
Going forward I'm going to be thinking more deeply about how I'm consuming media, and if I'm using it as a 'brain off' mode, or if I'm using it to actually aid (like I treat LLMs).
Before I forget tho, there is one benefit to using this to help sleep, it does help me sleep, I used to sleep less, but if I think about it, that never bothered me, I liked sleeping less cause I could work on my projects for an extra hour or 2 every week anyways....and I don't think I felt 'bad' when I slept that amount, in fact I feel more tired now than back then.
Let's see how it goes, I'm going to stop using media to shut my brain off.
I said it...let's see if I can stick with it!
