What you pay attention to influences your thoughts, which impacts your actions, which determines the outcome of your life.

你的注意力决定了你的思维方式，进而影响你的行为，最终决定你的人生。

The following quote is 2000 years old. But it seems like it’s about today’s world: “Most of what passes for legitimate entertainment is inferior or foolish and only caters to or exploits people’s weakness.”

以下这句话虽然有 2000 年的历史，却让人感觉像是在描述今天的世界：“大部分所谓的合法娱乐要么低俗、要么愚蠢，只不过是在迎合和利用人性的弱点。”

That’s from the Stoic philosopher Epictetus. It couldn’t be more telling about our attention and the things we focus on. We allow other people to control us because we’re pretty much defenseless when the media exploits our weaknesses.

这句话出自斯多葛派哲学家 Epictetus，他一语道破了我们对注意力和关注事物的脆弱。面对媒体对我们弱点的利用，我们几乎没有抵抗能力，任由他人控制。

Now, I’m not against all media. But I do think there’s a lot of manipulation going on. Just look at every single social media platform, news website, streaming site, and every app on your smartphone and you’ll notice that you and I are being exploited.

我并不是反对所有的媒体，但我确实认为现在有很多操纵行为存在。举例来说，只要你浏览一下各大社交媒体平台、新闻网站、流媒体平台以及手机里的各种应用程序，就会发现我们都在被这些平台所左右。

You just have to look at the signs. What do you think I will do when I see a notification from Netflix, saying there’s a new season available for my favorite show? I’m going to pause everything else in my life and watch the WHOLE season in a few days.

你只需注意这些迹象。你觉得我会怎么做，当我看到 Netflix 有通知说我喜欢的剧有新一季上线？我会把其他所有事情都放下，用几天时间把整季看完。

And when I’m done, I’ll probably go on to the next thing on Prime Video or maybe watch some clips on YouTube. But I don’t do that because I shut myself off from those things.

做完之后，我本来可能会去 Prime Video 上看下一个节目，或者在 YouTube 上看些短片。但实际上我没有，因为我强制自己不看这些。

I want to control my attention as much as I can. Why? Because If I don’t, millions of people and organizations are eager to control it for me. And what happens when others control your attention? You become a mindless drone.

我希望尽可能地掌控自己的注意力。为什么？因为如果不这样做，就会有成千上万的人和组织想要替我操控它。而一旦注意力被他人掌控，你就会变得如同一个没有思想的傀儡。