Episode #90
Everyone was watching the fire on the hill. They missed the concert they paid for.
We paid to watch a Beach Boys cover band. And the whole crowd turned their backs on it to stare at a fire on a distant hillside. I was at a county fair, standing in the middle of a concert, when a brush fire broke out miles away. Within minutes, every head in the crowd — including mine — was watching helicopters drop water on a hill instead of the band we'd all paid to see. That's the exact moment this episode is about. Our brains are wired for survival. We're built to lock onto the biggest threat, the loudest danger, the most outrageous thing in view — because 10,000 years ago, ignoring it could get you killed. But here's the problem: that ancient wiring is now a product. News, social media, and entertainment have all figured out that outrage and negativity capture attention faster than anything else. And attention is money. So the "fire on the hill" never stops. It's in your pocket, refreshing every thirty seconds, telling you the world is on fire while the good things in your actual life play on behind you, unnoticed.
