What Everyone Else is Doing

What Everyone Else is Doing

I’ve been reading a bit about Google Trends this morning. It is an interesting tool that charts out for you how often things have been searched for in Google. It kind of gives you a read on what everyone on the internet is interested in.

Since I consider my blog here to be mostly about practical life philosophy, I thought I’d look run “blog, life, philosophy” through and see what came out. The results actually surprised me with life having a much higher consistent search than blog and philosophy in the gutter. It is also interesting to note that blog seems to be on a steady upward trend. Of course there is no scale shown on the graph so all we get is relative comparisons.

But the most interesting part of it to me is when I clicked on the “Regions” tab of the lower graph. There we see that Peru is far more interested in blog than life. Singapore is looking for life just about as often as for a blog. And the US & Canada both appear to be desperately searching for life while hardly caring about the blog.

I have no idea what the take-away from that is.

After I poked around with Google Trends, I went looking at my propaganda sites like Drudge and Fox News and it appears that folks are all up in arms over the government data basing masses of phone records. Although by the time you read this they may have moved on.

It does make me think when I see that many of the same companies that are involved with shady goings-on regarding phone records are among the same companies that are spending millions to lobby Congress for changes to the laws that would pretty much give them control over what you can and cannot access over the internet.

If that gives you pause, check out my post that explains why Your Internet is in Danger. Then go spend some time looking at SaveTheInternet.com.

You can make a difference in the future of communication by contacting Congress.

But all this talk about trends and headlines got me thinking. Does it really matter what everyone else is doing or worried about? I suppose to some degree it does. We are all part of the same human race so there is a certain level of interconnectedness and other people will probably always influence us to some degree.

But if we try to plot our life’s course based strictly on the opinions and actions of others, we will never really be fulfilled. Leaders who have the biggest impact follow a specific vision, even when it is unpopular. For example Lincoln comes to mind as a leader who was lambasted by public opinion while he led, but whom history and hindsight has shown to be perhaps our nation’s greatest leader.

In the Bible, Paul said it this way:

But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. (Phil. 3:13-14)

Each of us has our own path to walk. Those who make the most of it, march to their own unique drummer. Don’t be so concerned about what everyone else is doing. Life is too short.

Enjoy!

Tags: Google Trends, Life, Save the Internet, Your own Path, CREEations, Chris Cree