Hey you! Yes, you right there. Come here. Wait…not too close. Come close enough to hear the words coming out of my mouth. Can you hear me? Can you hear me now?

Ahem. Let me clear my throat. Please. Please don’t share another article you haven’t read. And PAUSE before you share it. Consider why you want to share it in the first place. And if it’s to only bash, degrade, judge, or to belittle others…consider not sharing it at all. Do us that favor and keep it to yourself. Yep. I said what I said.

Here is what I’ve noticed in the past few weeks. We see an article with an overall appealing (often misleading) title, and we read another person’s synopsis and we immediately tag on our feelings (anger and sadness mostly) and we hit the share button often times without even reading it. We have to be careful y’all. This is why anxieties are so high right now. When we spread those articles with our emotional captions without reading or proper investigating (researching the source, date, etc), it puts us in the position of gossiping. And without knowing it, we are engaging in none other than the spread of fear.

The next person then does the very same thing. Now there is a whole group of us operating off of misinformation or unwarranted heightened emotions. Hell, if you ask me, that’s the real contagion that everyone (most people) are falling victim to. And I’m sorry but it has to stop. I’ve caught myself doing this very same thing so I’m talking to ALL of us to include myself. We have to think before we share.

And I’ve been on the other side of that wrong information with my own anxieties out of whack. Up at night because everyone is spewing a host of thoughts and feelings (mostly negative) and sharing stuff; and so I end up feeling like we are all doomed. Only to get up the next day to find out the truth. The results of that article wasn’t THAT bad after all. Sigh

Here is an example…there was an article shared that spoke to my state (Alabama) having the 4th largest Covid fatalities. Wait what. How does Alabama, at that time having less than 20 deaths, turn into having close to 6,000 fatalities by 4 August? This would put us just behind Michigan and California. After reading this article that consisted of 3 paragraphs only, my heart rate was beyond elevated. I was close to having a panic attack. Remind you all, I’ve only felt like this way twice before and here comes a third time. My mind couldn’t wrap around just how this was to happen and how. Did the writers know something that was about to happen in my state that wasn’t being shared?

After some research, I realized this was the ONLY article reflecting such gloomed predictions. So I asked the person who posted it about its validity. The response to my question was, “my friend is a medical professional and she posts info daily.” Well, I get her wanting to trust her medical friend but how does that answer my question. I asked if she knew of the data set that was used. Another response to me (from someone else) was, “why does that matter?” To me, as a financial/data/number/accounting professional; data means the world to me. It tells the story better than words.

Well apparently the article had a link within it with the source data. It was a state by state forecasting tool based off of population, number of hospital beds needed, current number of beds, etc. I quickly realized the importance of the number of beds each state needed and had in conjunction with the fatalities predicted. It jumped off the page that California had 17,000 beds, but needed 20,000. It showed that Alabama had 3,000 beds but needed 27,000. How? Alabama’s population is no comparison to that of California. Something about this was strange and I planned to keep searching to figure it out.

Well a week later, the data was updated. Alabama’s number of beds needed changed to reflect just under the number of beds we had. Therefore, eliminating the appearance of having a tremendous bed shortage. As a result, the number of fatalities changed from 5700 to under 700. And now the forecast is under 300 by 4 Aug. Here is the link. Check it out for yourself.

https://covid19.healthdata.org/united-states-of-america/alabama

Information is changing fast. Information is powerful. Info can liberate us. Yet information can be damaging and stressful if wrongly displayed or shared. My advise to us all is to step back from the news and social media from time to time. Information is good when it’s received correctly. Too much info (especially flawed) is not good for any of us. Check on some of your social media friends that you have noticed has stepped away from social media recently. Many of them will tell you that it was getting to be unbearable with all of what was/is being shared.

If we are not careful, we will allow it to put us in a seat of a judge. Think about it. Our horror really began on 13 March (Friday the 13th) with a press conference from our POTUS. At that time, many didn’t think much of what was being stated. We thought it all to be a joke at first. We kept on with our lives. It took some time before many of us became believers. Once we did, many of us started to throw shame at the unbelievers. Does that sound familiar at all? “They aren’t social distancing…they aren’t wearing masks…their kids aren’t wearing masks (as to suggest they don’t care about their kids). Careful…

Took time for many of us to become believers and then we begin to look down our noses at the unbelievers. This happens so often with something like church/religion/spirituality; and now it’s happening with Covid. My prayer is that we begin to grant grace with the sharing of information instead of antagonism. Sometimes it takes some of us longer before we become believers. Just pray for them that it’s not discovered too late.

Thanks for your attention. Remember you are your own competition.

Competition of 1