You are careful, right? Careful with what you eat and drink, which one might think of as your nutritional diet or guidelines. You care about how your body feels and functions, and you know that what you put into it matters. So, you pay attention. Most of the time, anyway, the occasional weekend lapses don’t count. After all, you’re human.

But what about your information diet*? What are the guidelines you follow to make sure that the information you process is beneficial to your mind? Your heart? Your very being? Diving headlong into social media, consuming anything and everything that pops up on your screen isn’t necessarily (or even ever) a wise choice.

You know what I’m talking about. You’re innocently scrolling through Facebook and the next thing you know, you are both fascinated and horrified by the weird things people do to their bodies, mates, pets, which gets you sucked into yet another terrifying story, and then another--you get the idea. It’s curiosity gone wild, which leaves you frozen in fear or frantic with anxiety. Not a pretty sight.

Not that Facebook or any other feed is a bad thing, far from it. You’ve just abdicated your power of choice to the algorithms that run the internet: “You interested in this? Here’s more!” When all you probably wanted to do was alleviate your temporary boredom.

Reinstate your power of choice. Be the one who determines which feeds you’re interested in, how much of each provides entertainment, useful information or relief, even when you want to indulge. Not some algorithm. It’s not always easy, however.

Deciding that you’re going to eat so many grams of protein a day, a certain amount of veggies and carbs, doesn’t mean it’s easy to follow through on your plan. It takes self-discipline, true, but aren’t the results worth it? When you step on that scale and realize 5 pounds magically (yeah, right) disappeared?

You get it. Just as with a nutritional diet, your information diet takes fortitude and willpower. Reinforce what you want in your feeds and what you want to consume. Don’t just chomp away at whatever, whenever. Remember, it’s up to you to choose.

*A term a dear friend, Steve Cooper, shared with me recently.