Balancing The Noise

Welcome to Balancing the Noise! Isn’t it nice to stop by a place without clicks, comments, likes, love, sad face… all that noise?

Read on if you’d like… or just skip to the videos. I tend to ramble.

This site is dedicated to finding balance. Not complete peace, but it doesn’t have to be all chaos either. 

It is loud!  Politics, moronic things people do, what’s right in history, what’s wrong. The latest health trends and then, how not to listen to that ‘influencer’ because this is correct… and it’s the only way. The voices in your head, the voices outside your head.  The algorithms. The keywords.  Which keyword is having a moment now???!! Does it really have to be quality protein?

If only I knew.  

About me:  In a nutshell, I was working with Voice of America as a television journalist for 20 years.  And got DOGE’d. 

So now, in conjunction with job searching, freelancing and pro bono, I figured… why not start my own digital platform. I’m already doing what I have to do to stay balanced between good sleep, workouts, therapy and pocking fun at society. :)  

 So here it is: a vertical media platform built around stories about people, what they are doing, health, and calling things what they are.  I really don’t believe in being any type of ‘influencer.’ I actually think that term is the opposite of journalism. To me, influence, by definition, means you have to bank on people not having a brain of their own and then, through your influence, perpetuate that and rewire your audience’s neuropathways on an accelerated ramp to cognitive decline, far, far away from neuroplasticity.

In journalism, you give credible information so the audience can make up their own minds and opinions (which is my goal). 

As a television journalist (oh, and someone who got DOGE’d), I feel extra passionate about it. Social has mushed our collective brains (there’s good too), which… wait for it… is a balance! I don’t have social media on my phone, but I do have it on my laptop. I post, but not over-post.  But the main rule: no phone after 8 p.m. and no phone until about 8 a.m. 

As a journalist, I want to give you information for you to take, form, and integrate into your life, if it seems fitting. Or at least get enough info to start doing your own research. Research of self is wonderful. Knowing yourself is wonderful. Try that.

Jokes aside, I think you have a brain and my goal is to foster it. 

All videos for this are linked to mostly Instagram since job prospects basically require me to have these accounts. Once I signed up, the scroll wouldn’t stop.  Video after video of a girl weeding, a guy eating peanuts, a group of kids jumping till 100, a puppy...wait, I like puppies.  

That’s why I’m approaching this differently. I’m playing along with the algorithm, giving people what they want so my videos get seen, but also sneaking in what we need: kinda like kale inside your smoothie, like your mom did.  So seems natural to call myself the DEfluencer.  Using the same social pathways that pull people in, but redirecting them toward balance. The idea is to give people their “fix” of engaging content, without it replacing real habits or their ability to think for themselves. It’s about rewiring how we use these platforms so they work for us, not the other way around. 

Enjoy my videos (but really, no more than 20 minutes a day 🙂).