Happy New Year. I hope it is a good one, and a happy one for you. Lamont.

I didn't put 2 and 2 together that the war for our attention was a war for our souls and that's so absolutely true. I'm definitely going to be more mindful of where I put my attention this coming year. Also, since this is a mostly language channel, I should say that I have struggled with the "grass is greener" mentality for as long as I can remember. I've always wanted to be somewhere else. I'm learning a language because I want to move somewhere else. I'm not giving up on that. My reasons for moving are still valid and I think I will have a better quality life when I move, BUT I'll be damned if I let that longing consume me and rob me of the happiness I can feel here and now. I've been postponing my life... not buying things I need or seeking and nurturing relationships because I plan to move. I have decided to be actively content this year where I am and actually live here until it's time for me to move. Imagine.

This video captures pretty well why you're one of my favorite language KZfaqrs. You're honest and you always say what needs to be said, but you never use that as an excuse to be condescending or rude like some do who call themselves "blunt". You are though, but in the correct sense, and it's very refreshing to witness someone kind, intelligent AND truthful. Thank you for sharing your wisdom with us, I truly wish for the best for you this year

This dawned on me the other night actually, except I then did a lot of self-blaming for wasting my time/life on those distractions -- forgetting that it's literally a feature of social media, not a bug. Thanks for this wonderful video and timely reminder. I'm gonna prioritize my mental health and fitness this year, and finally hit my goals in Russian -- but will still follow you, ha. Haven't been on here in a while, so glad to see you're still making great content. All the best to you and your family this year!

People post usually something happy and cheerful on the new year, but I'm glad you moved off that track. I'm glad you're speaking out such important note against your need for fame, views, subscribers. The war for our attention and opinions is precisely what I've observed during last year, and fought more and more against. My life is now a little more boring, a little slower, a little less exciting. I can't even differ Christmas, New year or birthday from any other day. But nevertheless, as one of my favourite book quotes goes: "What, that ain't good enough for you?"

I can notice how social media has influenced me. When I saw the title to this video I thought it was sarcastic and was worried something bad happened to you. I wish you a wonderful 2024. And everyone who had the same thought as me a good digital detoxification.

What beautiful words Lamont! Best wishes to you and your family for the new year!

Thank you, Lamont. Happy New Year and many blessings to you, your family and your followers.

Gott nytt år allihopa 🎉😊.

Wise words, at least my KZfaq addiction has me watching relatively worthwhile videos, I could be scrolling TikTok, luckily I’m too old for that

A rare sunny morning here in Melbourne. Calls for a cuppa. I know I will. And yes, thank you😊

Happy New Year Lamont and family. Have a good one. And same to you, here’s to it being a happy, healthy and fulfilling one.

This did help, thanks Lamont ❤

Happy New year. God bless!

You killed this one man! the message really hits home. there certainly is a war for our attention, but it's videos like these that help spark positive change 👍

Lamont siempre nos hace reflexionar ❤

Tack❤, och gott nytt år!🎉

I didn't expect to feel so emotional coming here... I'd love more of these sorts of videos! It was tugging on heartstrings and the thoughts we tend to have in the back of our mind. I don't usually comment on anything, but I just wanted to say thank you for this video you amazing human. It came at the right time for me as I had recently started thinking "Hey I am studying but...I don't feel like I am spending HOOOURS on it, what is eating my time???" I discovered it was collectively talking to others, scrolling through socials...doing anything really...other than sitting down and doing my language studies. I've been finding it hard to NOT be distracted, strange how I've thought about it for weeks, but this video lands on my lap and NOW I want to take action- I'll take it. Happy new year and keep being amazing, thank you!

Så fint sagt, samt ett intressant perspektiv, jag håller med fullständigt, gott nytt år ❤️

Thank you for this one.

I’ve spent the past two years after getting a job on fixing my mental health. A huge part of that involved deleting the vast majority of my social media accounts. If it was giving me stress I got rid of it. I think that doing this and getting a new hobby really helped me. I feel like I finally have control of my mind back.

What a creator! Wishing the best to all your family 😊

Deep, insightful. Thanks for posting. Let's take the best from it. Best to everyone

Nicely said, thank you.

Thank you brother

So beautifully said. Thank you.

I wish you a great year 2024. So true it is difficult to focus on something nowadays.

Thank you.

Thank you! Let's do our best 2024!

Happy New Year!

Best way to be happy is to become a basketballer! Jokes aside, I literally told a family member this past Christmas that I was really happy when I lived in an area with no electricity and hardly any cell phone signal. It sounds depressing, but I loved how I didn't get constant notifications for emails, messages, etc. It was peaceful.

This is a very good point. As someone with moderate attention deficit disorder (ADD) and moderate anxiety disorder, I definitely noticed myself repeatedly being distracted by the internet from making a focused and intentional language learning self-study routine in a way that I would like. The internet like TV or something can also distract from some aspects of life in general. Different groups of people would like to manipulate people's natural instincts, and neurotransmitters such as dopamine, to redirect our attention and influence us. People have always done this but the internet just makes this process more efficient.

Спасибо за тёплые слова 🙏

have a great one Lamont (and family) :D

There really is a war for our attention. It is one of my goals to reduce my time on social media this coming year. I wish you and your family a happy new year!

I'm happy 🙂

Its true... Its heavy. Ahh. Thanks for the vid. Something to reflect on.

Thank you Lamont. God love you

Lamont, tak fordi du har delt denne besked! It’s important to have a varied perspective on the incoming year and this was useful! ❤ hope you have had a good 2023 and hope 2024 is also good!

off topic but the way you use lighting is just amazing

This just became my favorite language learning video

"Almost a quarter through this century" Damn that hit way harder than it should've...

Good man, nice one really🙂

Man your video quality has gotten so good

After a really long wordy message written and then deleted, I'll just leave you with a thank you for the content you make. I'm taking the JLPT N2 this December and after watching this video I closed the 7 other tabs of useless junk and will be going back to my Japanese audio book while I work. I hope you find happiness in this crazy world with the rest of us!

Good stuff Lamont. I read Dopamine Nation by Anna Lembke and am re reading in Spanish at the minute. Would definitely recommend! I think a lot about attention and focus. For the kids growing up who don't remember a time without the internet, I do wonder whether there will be a backlash one day as people seek to assert control on their attention. Happy New Year mate

You make at least a part of the social media world something good (I'm trying not to hype this up, and could've found a less general, less mild word than that). That's the other side. We get to choose, and we're having to learn to get better at choosing than we used to be. If you make good choices (provided one of them is to stay connected with meatspace, and not go and hide away in the parts of your own imagination inhabited by others) there needn't be anything wrong with it. I hope you have a great 2024.

Thanks, buddy. Never met you or seen a video of yours, but I have been losing the fight for my attention almost every day for over a decade. Thank you for the reminder. I'm gonna log off and win for as long as I can.

Awesome, Hello everybody. I'm new in the channel. My name's Gabriel and I'm from Perú and speak Spanish. Currently, I'm in Melbourne and trying to understand the Aussie accent. 😅 thank you for your videos. 🤘

I have nearly given up on my goals to learn portuguese, but I vow I will give it another go. I hope to visit Brazil again this year and I don't know if I'll be any better equipped to deal with the language barrier than I was last time, but I owe it to myself to at least give it a shot.

Bah!! KZfaq ate my comment!!! Anyway, what I was trying to say.... Happy 2024! By the time I managed to find time to sit down and watch this video, it was already 2024 for you, so let me know how it looks, eh? I did sort of watch the member’s only video, but only with ½ or ¼ attention (because kids and holidays!), so the full import of the message didn’t register. From someone who stepped away from most social (and all) media nearly two years ago, it definitely does make a difference, especially for someone who is already struggling with their mental health. I will say, however, that disengaging from social media didn’t make me happier, but it did free up time in my day and space in my head. The extra time and space allowed me to focus on what I needed to do for me without feeling like I was “wasting time” on myself (I find it funny in retrospect that I initially felt like it was wasting time to NOT be on social media - rather supports your message, really.). Focusing on myself and what I needed helped me recognize so many simple joys in my life, and helped me find more contentment with the space I inhabit, physically and mentally. As I’ve identified the things that bring me joy and contentment, I’ve also identified the things that bring me sorrow, anger, or frustration, and I’ve been gradually making changes to reduce or eliminate those things. My New Year’s wish for you, and everyone, is that you find the year filled with simple joys, and the space to identify and appreciate those things in the moment and in reflection. Side note: Thank goodness for notifications, or I’d never know when you posted a new video! I’ve been learning to choose how and when, and with what, I do engage with on social and other media and I’m at the stage now where if nothing reminds me, I often forget to even check my social media.

Like the reflective attitude

This theme has been coming up a lot. Must be in the air, a critical mass of people are waking up and questioning the technodystopia. On that note, I tend to resist speaking my Spanish very much because I crave to have real conversations in real life, and not online. It's like this chore of adding yet another online have to. So I just end up with my biweekly italki lessons and talking to myself or my cat.

You do wonderful work but you're clearly an even more wonderful person. Thank you Lamont, wishing you joy and contentment as well ❤️

That's exactly true. While technology brings some equality for a handful of people, but It ruines most of people's lives and as you say happiness. Ai and robots and now superior to humans because creativity and thinking is no longer our only gift. Happy new year :)

Had an idea regarding the "watch movie 50 times" while editing the first harry potter movie to make it shorter, instead of sharing a movie you could share for example a saved project in windows movie maker. If it works, it would save people the time of editing it themselves, all they just need to do is open up windows movie maker (or any other popular video editing software) and then "find" the source movie. I wouldn't mind sharing my own saved project that I did in Camtasia, can't promise that it would work with future versions of the program (might not even work with other versions of the movie). Edit: I recently starting my own "watch movie 50 times" thing with the first Harry potter movie in Spanish. Decided to do the same with Russian, started watching the Russian Winnie the pooh (really digging the art style, pooh's personality also is quite different from the western version).

Cool

Well then Neat

I haven't watched your content in a while. Off pursuing other goals. This video was a good reminder of why that was a mistake. Thank you.

Touché! And Amen to that. However this freaks me out as well: I've never watched your channel before I hardly ever have been on KZfaq I don't follow social media, actually 95% of the time my WiFi is switched off 🤔How on earth did you end up on top of my Google news feed, getting my attention?? 😂

A work colleague recommended this book, I haven't read it myself but if you haven't, I thought it might be interesting.... "Stolen Focus" by Johann Hari. Awesome video by the way.

I think at some point you realize that you need to be comfortable with some degree of FOMO (fear of missing out) to reallx concentrate on what you want to do or learn. Because if you're constantly trying to keep up with what's up or what everyone else is doing or saying or latest things going on it zaps out almost all your mental capacities.

To be honest i hope that its my last new year...

This is the most useful warning I've ever received

Funny amongus

Curate the content you actually will use. Reflect more. And do more individual things, less multitasking. Find purpose behind what you do to drive you. And stop listening to ads or “99% of people” thumbnails. Be cynical. Make and maintain those friends. Live life. Be something that you want to be rather than what your phone tells you to be. Connect with as many people as you can. Live. LIVE. LIVE.

damn....

uninstall social medias

Lamont, thank you for the awesome content. Any advice you can give to make video content for teaching languages for this channel: uzqalam. Explanation of grammar is structured in parallel and color with English and Uzbek. Thanks a lot.

Thank you.

Thank you brother