How to Clean Up The Virus You’ve Installed In Your Mind

Recently, the family and I were in the iStore looking for an iPad for the little guy as he prepared to begin at his new school.

While we were waiting for the assistant to check stock, I found myself admiring the new MacBooks and all the beautiful engineering that went into them.

Another assistant obviously picked up on my fascination and came over to ask if I needed some assistance.

I explained to her that I already had one but was just looking and that it was the best purchase I’d ever made. My MacBook was my most “precious possession”.

Oh boy…

I immediately caught myself as the stoic minimalist in me laughed at the fact that a material thing could be my most precious possession.

Then, with a little mental course correction, reminded myself that if I had a most precious possession, it would really be my mind.

But here’s where this gets a little interesting…

Continuing this dialogue in my head, I couldn’t help but notice how we go to such extreme lengths to make sure our computers never get infected with a virus, yet we so freely allow our minds to be infected with messages from the things we consume.

Put another way: if you wouldn’t willingly install a virus on your laptop, why would you do so to your mind? 

Yet this is exactly what we do on a daily basis: we feed our minds with things that are making it operate at a reduced capacity.

Call them what you will, but watching the news on repeat, mindlessly scrolling through your feed, and comparing yourself to everyone on Instagram is no better than a virus for your mind.

Instead, let’s get into the habit of regularly running a scan of the things we’re consuming and cleaning up any dodgy-looking items that are slowing us down before it’s too late to avoid the crash.