In recent years, especially since 2020, we as a collective have had this issue that we learn everything and anything through someone on Social Media talking about it because it’s their expertise or special interest. And to a degree there is nothing wrong with that because some of this stuff you would never learn otherwise. HOWEVER, we have become more lazy than ever about actually learning more about some of the things we come across. And I say we because even I as someone that uses search engines for random questions several times a day have noticed I go down fewer rabbit holes. And it’s also not rare to hear other people talk about themselves or their friends just keeping their knowledge oddly surface level.
It doesn’t shock me. We live in a time where a little bit of knowledge about everything feels like it is necessary to stay alive in a digital and online world. If that is true or not is not for me to judge because in my opinion most people could live without social media easily but if we all realized that then the economy would probably collapse because so many businesses depend on socials to drive customers. Anyway, I digress. We need to get into rabbit holes more often again and dig them deeper. I don’t mean the drama ones about some shady shit. While I do love a good gossip recap every now and then and can be amused by a conspiracy theory, that is not what I’m talking about.
What I’m talking about is things like learning about how different types of plastic are made, about what each of your local species of bird actually do for the ecosystem or getting disgustingly educated on how to keep your spine stable through the right exercises. I mean sure we all have some really niche interests, especially if we are neurodivergent (I’m a walking psychology research lexicon sometimes). Widening your horizon is what is important though. And not doing it out of a sense of competitiveness. Simply because you think it’s a neat thing to know more about. Maybe you wanna get really good at recognizing edible plants because that’s actually going to be useful for life or you wanna learn the coding used in Spreadsheets to be able to make the most mindboggling spreadsheets for tracking all kinds of stuff, simply because it seems like a fun skill to have.
Reading pieces on here, just like short form video content, is always going to be just an entrypoint into deeper knowledge. Many writers on Substack make incredibly astute observations about systems and uncharted sociological territory that I wanted to dive deeper into. Others have mentioned art forms I wasn’t even aware of existing. Same goes for Youtube videos in the educational realm. I love a good 15min video that teaches me something new, but what I love more are 1-3h videos of science communicators doing a deep dive.
In the past year I really enjoyed the shenanigans of Miniminuteman into different archeological topics I would never have been interested in otherwise. I mean damn, ancient roads in Ohio is certainly not something you come across otherwise. Dr. Fatima is another one of those science communicators that had me think about science itself in a different light through videos about the scientifiy method and our human-centric (and usually colonial) lens on science. I also learned how to write academic essays/papers last year, simply because I’m getting my first academic degree and am a child of non-academics that got her high school diploma not through going through the high school system but by prepping for the exams as an adult and then taking them (no essays involved…unfortunately). I’ve learned and written about how social workers can be the key to solving disparities in hospice and palliative care and I also wrote about how service-logic applies to lifelong education. Hell, I sent off a paper today about what social workers can do to make elder care more culturally inclusive.
As you can see, it’s a mix of things that’s actually useful to me and entertains me to know, but also things I just wanted an answer to without being keen on doing a deepdive on it (my social economics paper was only fun because of the studies I found, writing it felt like swimming upstream).
Having ADHD means I constantly give myself questions I could answer and learning through that lens has made me a person everyone compliments as smart. But it’s beneficial to actually sit down and determine what I actually want to learn. And you should honestly figure that out too, because while the aimless learning is fun, it’s not as useful as knowing a speciality and being able to exchange knowledge with someone else who has a specialty.
Maybe learning to code in Python isn’t something you have time for this year. I certainly want to learn that and don’t have time for it. But writing it down as something you want to add to your box of skills is important. I’ve had learning Arabic on my skills-to-learn list for years now and it simply has to wait because Spanish comes first.
This year I want to learn a lot about content creation. Which is ironic because I’ve made content in some form since I was 13 and that is now half of my life ago. I don’t wanna learn about this advice everyone differs on, but things like reading analytics correctly, analyzing similar content and applying a working structure onto my own content. I want to learn about the different ways people making content make money, because as much as I love social work, I’m neurodivergent enough to know I don’t want to be in the 9-5 world for an extended period of time and have way too much that I learned to share to not try to make money from that. Now, I also want to work on building hobbies I don’t want to make money from, because that’s important. I like writing stuff I cannot monetize for example (ahem, I’m talking about fanfic) but I’d love to become better at crocheting and sewing to fix a bunch of my stuff more often and more easily.
Miniminuteman - Science education about archeology, paleontology and spotting pseudoscience
Dr. Fatima - Astrophysics, critiques of the science community & anti-capitalist science conversations
People Make Games - Gaming-related mini documentaries that are essentially investigative journalism
Midwest Magic Cleaning - Has several videos about how to declutter, tidy and clean if your parents never taught you how (neurodivergent-friendly, since he’s autistic himself)
The Thought Spot - Deep dives into neurodivergent symptoms and problems that cover both science and lived experience
Benjamin Keep, PHD, JD - An entire channel on learning how to learn and study the best according to neuroscience
Climate Town - Funny man with a degree in environmental science unpacks climate related lies and solutions
Atlas Pro - This guy just really likes maps, geology and ecology and combines those loves with each other (ex: The Biogeography of the Dinosaurs)
Anna Howard / Wild Geese - Lifestyle pod diving deeper into topics like self-discovery, rethinking romantic relationships and reconnecting with whimsy
Lindsay Nicole - A zoologist diving into all types of evolution-related questions including a series about the freakiest looking animals
And these are just the ones I can think of that interested me the most. There are so many more.
Do more deep dives in 2026. Write down knowledge you want to gain in 2026 and beyond. Then actually chase than knowledge instead of doomscrolling for little bite-sized information about random stuff.
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