netflix as practice for life
You’re done your work for the day. You want to relax, so you pour yourself something to drink, grab a snack, and fire up Netflix. *Ba-dannnggg*. You’ve been looking at screens all day, and here you are, looking at another one.
You sign in and immediately the screen fills with a trailer. You scramble to mute the volume as your ears get blasted with harsh, half-second cuts of music and voice. Apparently Netflix’s AI is predicting you’ll binge this show next. No thanks.
You scroll down and see a row of half-watched shows and movies, none of which you feel like continuing right now: You’re thirsty for something new. You keep scrolling, sifting through the options, but every time a title seems interesting, your mind fills with endless reasons not to watch it.
Wait, this show looks pretty good, but ah, horror movies are all the same, and you hated the last movie with that one actor, what’s his name again?
Oh! There’s that reality show your friend told you to watch. It’s a window into the everyday lives of rich, famous people. Looks interesting, but a little superficial. You want to find something a bit deeper.
A-ha, and here are the documentaries. Much deeper. Maybe a little too deep. Thought-provoking to be sure, but it’s been a long day. You’re trying to relax, not ruminate over the state of the world.
You keep scrolling and the next thing you know, it’s been half an hour. You could have actually watched most of these shows in the time you took to indecisively skim this ocean of rectangles.
It’s so easy to point out all the reasons not to watch something, so we keep looking, and looking, and looking… Sounds a lot like modern life, doesn’t it? We have the world at our fingertips and yet we remain unsatisfied with our options.
When I choose something to watch, I commit at least a few hours of my life, maybe a lot more. The same is true of most other choices I make. New paths present themselves all the time, and each leads to a different potential future. My choices in each moment have the potential to wield massive influence on my life.
When I get obsessed about making the perfect choice, I freeze up. It’s too much responsibility, and it totally sabotages my ability to commit to anything. And if we never commit to anything, we never find fulfillment. This is why perfectionism is the enemy of a satisfying life.
I can break this spell by remembering that as human beings, we are predictably bad at predicting what will make us happy. Sounds like a problem, but at least it takes the burden off. I couldn’t make a perfect choice even if I tried, so might as well give up and just pick something. Economists call this ‘satisficing’, and Netflix is a great place to practice.
Next time you’re in the mood to watch something, try intentionally diving into the unknown. Set yourself up for serendipity. The very moment any title looks even remotely interesting to you, immediately hit ‘play’. Don’t give yourself time to overthink it. Skip through the opening credits if you have to. Hell, skip to a random point in the middle and see what happens. Who knows what you might find?
Likely something with flaws, yet new (to you, at least). Definitely something unexpected. Maybe something mysterious or eye-opening. If you’re lucky, you may even witness the dawning of a whole new taste bud. You might find magic. Or maybe you’ll lose interest pretty quick. That’s fine, too. You can always hit stop. No regrets.
My wife and I have been experimenting with this approach and, long story short, I watched a whole season of Indian Matchmaking; probably the last thing I would have ever chosen to watch. But it was entertaining, heartwarming, and even gave me some insight into my family’s culture.
Sometimes saying ‘yes’ when I’m thinking ‘no’ opens things up for me. It reminds me not to always trust what I think I want. It teaches me that, with a little spontaneity, my only options may not in fact be my only options.
It’s as true for Netflix as it is for life. You’ll never find fulfillment if you only ever skim the surface of the infinite, potential futures which lie before you. Sometimes you need to break through your paralyzing thoughts and just dive in. Maybe the perfect choice is simply whichever one you make.