How to Survive Another 4 Years (+) of Trump News

I know a little something about getting overwhelmed by the pile of dread. Here's my advice.

I’m sure you get the reference.

Before I start, I would suggest bookmarking this post. I think it’ll remain helpful in the coming months and years as we devolve as a nation and the news media fails to evolve (as they always do). Profits will always trump our quality of life.

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One thing that we learned for certain in the last Trump administration, was that his greatest and most effective tactic is wearing down citizens who try to stay informed by constantly doing and saying something messed up. If this past week of nominations and appointments haven’t reminded you already, try to remember that Trump is essentially the dying smoke detector battery chirp of politicians. Every time you’re just about to take a deep breath and focus your energy somewhere productive, *BEEP* you get traumatized by his idiotic actions in a new and surprising way.

Over the course of nearly 400 daily news episodes of What a Day, I learned firsthand what an overcommitment to being informed can do. In addition to the very kind messages I receive about my time on that show to this day, I often hear “I had to stop listening because it was ramping up my anxiety.”

It’s true, too much news is a problem, and it is also a tactic. So what do I suggest?

1. Be intentional with your media diet. I moved on from Twitter to BlueSky this week. I follow a few people who update on news, and (and who knows if this will remain the case) in no way is the app designed to be as endlessly reactionary to everything happening in the shitshow forming in DC as the old place is. I do not hate the daily news podcast format at all (and I may have something up my sleeves coming soon!!!), but I think you have to decide when you’re getting your news and turn off those damn push notifications. I imagine you have at least one person in your life who will hit you up if you really need to know what’s happening in that very moment. But what has really helped me is checking in once in the morning, and once in the evening (but well before bed so I’m not stuck doom-scrolling til sunrise).

2. Choose what you care about. I think one crisis of cable news and the ivy league pundit class is that they expect us to all care about everything all the time. Well, much to their chagrin, we have lives, and it feels more important to be living them now than ever before since the Trump admin appears hellbent to make every part of our lives less comfortable. So what does that look like? For me it’s less about who they are appointing (though trust, it’s not looking great) and more about what we stand to lose. My focus is going to be on human rights and education. If you’re more a scientifically-minded person I’d look toward changes at HHS and our climate agreements/the promise to decimate our national parks for unviable oil. If immigration issues are close to your heart, focus your energy there. I’m not suggesting you avoid caring about those things, I’m just telling you that if you don’t focus your energy they will wear you down much more quickly. Divide and conquer applies to your attention as well.

3. To that end, find the influencers (complimentary) who can synthesize details in specific news buckets. The major downside to algorithmic hangouts like Threads, Facebook, TikTok, and Twitter, is that scrolling becomes doomscrolling completely mindlessly. If you pick and choose who you are following, and make sure you’re toggled to your “following” timeline rather than the For You page, you’re less likely to lose your mind, and you can let the contagious anxiety of others pass you entirely. Unless you’re getting paid, you do not need to be an expert! You don’t even have to argue with people, frankly. Now is the time to protect yourself and search for credible sources who will provide intel as a service.

4. Don’t give in to simple “vibes.” More on this in an upcoming post, but I think our brains have evolved to respond quicker to emotion than logic or facts, and with that in mind, it’s easy to say “well what this person is saying ‘feels good’ and is therefore what I will tune into.” The main way to combat this is to have other stuff going on in your life. I encourage you to find hobbies in-person and otherwise. I play Fortnite with my buds and sometimes the news comes up, but the human connection definitely feels more rewarding now, and I find myself less compelled to engage with people who hate me online after those hangouts. Just yesterday I had coffee with a friend and we did talk about politics for the entire 2 hours, but it served to relax me more than enrage me. Truly it can be anything. Community gardening, a bowling league, a book club—when I lived in New York I came up with a fun “field trip club” (real ones remember) where we planned weekly hangs at movies in the park, trips to the zoo, block parties. I just think one major problem currently happening across the US is this pervasive isolation that makes doom-scrolling and rage-bait enticing for the simple chemical reaction is produces. Let’s retrain our brains. Joy may have lost this election, but it doesn’t have to be absent from our real and precious lives.

5. Remember your power here. I immediately felt powerless when the election results came in and as all of these hairbrained and deeply unqualified morons were announced across Trump’s cabinet. My brain is an olympic-level catastrophizing force. Worst-case scenarios are entertaining but tedious. I obviously am not perfect, I certainly struggle with this. But mental health is a muscle we have to work out. So prioritize it. If you’re blue in the face defending your position to someone who isn’t listening, consider how it is making you feel. Consider how your feelings impact your day-to-day life. I had so much anger from 2016-2020. And I’m not beyond anger now or anything, but when I look back, I do generally remember happy times with people, in public, doing things I enjoy. I don’t remember every asshat who said something offensive in Trump 1.0. And that’s because not everything actually has to matter if we don’t let it. He’s almost certainly going to have his boneheaded toilet posts blasted in front of us by cable news and pundits who make their money by scaring you shitless, so avoid news that feels the need to tell you every little thought this small man has. We all hate making boundaries, but set boundaries with yourself first and then with other people. How much energy are you willing to dedicate to feeling bad in the pursuit of being informed? Seriously map out 24 hours in a typical day. Do you think your chest should hurt from 8am til midnight, or will one hour be more than enough? We are all somewhere on the timeline between the beginning and end of our lives, let’s make the rest of the race bearable for ourselves.

Thank you so much for subscribing and reading. I will continue posting on a regular basis because frankly there’s a lot to unpack and I like doing so with you.

Be good to yourself,

A