Let’s say you’re older than 40. Maybe you’re a little older, maybe you’re a lot older. It’s not the point. If you were a child in the days before the internet, you probably remember sitting in front of the TV. Maybe you only had a tiny handful of channels. And yet, you always had something to watch. Later, you got cable. There were more channels, which should mean more to watch. But, if you were like me, you spent some of your time scrolling endlessly from channel to channel. Or, you just watched the scrolling TV guide roll up trying to find something that sounded good.
Today, you have splayed out in front of you the most amazing selection of education and entertainment programming the world has ever known. It’s no exaggeration to say you have instant access to a million different programs at any given time. And yet, you stare at the screen, scrolling endlessly through app after app. Why? Because you can’t find something to watch.
It’s called “choice paralysis.”
There’s a term for it: choice paralysis. It turns out that as humans, we’re pretty good at making choices. Reasonable choices come easy to us. When you have a choice of three deer to hunt, you can pick the right one to take down easily. But we are not at all well equipped to handle choices of hundreds, thousands, or millions of items. The more things we have in front of us, the more likely it is that none of them will seem “just right.” It doesn’t make sense, but it’s how our brains work.
We all suffer from it to some degree. We just don’t know what to pick. Some people really really suffer from it, but I’m talking about just regular folks. Pretty much everyone suffers from choice paralysis, and it really comes into play while streaming.
The solution for choice paralysis
It may seem kind of odd, but the best way to avoid feeling anxious about having nothing to watch is just to watch something. Remember when you had 4 channels to choose from and there was always something on? That’s because you were willing to accept that your choice wouldn’t be perfect. If you find yourself doing the “endless scroll,” there’s a good way to get past it. Just stop scrolling. If you need to, set a timer. Choose a reasonable amount of time like 5 minutes. Whatever you’ve landed on in 5 minutes, that’s what you’re watching. Simple as that. Sit down with it and give it half an hour or so. If you’re still bored, move on. That’s what you used to do when you had four channels, and it worked.
Face facts, Gilligan’s Island wasn’t that good.
If you’re like me, you spent a lot of time watching reruns of shows like Gilligan’s Island. You watched them over and over again until you could predict what the Professor was going to make out of a coconut. But let’s be honest, that show wasn’t so good. It was silly slapstick, not too hard to digest, and it’s what you had. So you watched it. Over and over again. Chances are if you were to pick any recent program at random, literally any program, it would be better. Yet you routinely pass by some excellent programming.
On the other hand, there’s nothing wrong with going back to comfort food. Whether it’s The Office, Seinfeld, or the 967th rerun of The Big Bang Theory, there’s nothing wrong with just putting on something familiar. That’s ok too, and if it makes you feel comfortable it’s perfectly fine. In fact, that’s another option for you once that 5 minute timer is up. There’s nothing wrong with saying to yourself, “If I don’t find what I want in 5 minutes, I’m going to go to Pluto and watch whichever episode of The Love Boat is airing now.
The “library angel”
There’s an old theory out there called the “library angel.” You know it’s an old theory because it talks about libraries. (Libraries are cool places but they’re not the only places you find information anymore.) The theory goes, if you walk down any aisle in a library and spend time reading the titles of every book, you’ll find something you were looking for and didn’t even realize it. That’s because when you do that your mind is open to many possibilities. You’re not looking for “the most perfect” book. You’re open to a book that just might be surprisingly good.
You can apply this theory to streaming. If you start looking at one app, even in one category of one app, you could find something you weren’t expecting. You just need to be open to it. When you spend too much time looking for something perfect, you just might miss something you weren’t expecting.
Because remember, entertainment is supposed to be entertaining
If you find yourself stressing out when choosing something to stream, you’re probably not doing it right. Give yourself a break and you just might enjoy it.
