Headlines that elevate
Headlines that elevate
Check out these two headlines:
Consortium acquires XYZ company, replaces CEO
Founder/CEO of XYZ hands over after company acquisition
Both talk about a similar reality but in completely different ways. The reality is that a consortium acquires a company, but the founder/ceo wants another person to lead the next phase of the company as chief executive.
So many headlines I have come across can tell the stories better, in ways that elevate the subject and the reader.1
We daily come across headlines that invite from us responses of scorn, or schadenfreude. We find headlines that try to celebrate success - but with backhanded compliments. The headlines we see can either connect with the most cynical version of ourselves or our most humane and best version.
We can either engage with our lower-level selves or our higher-level selves. The former leaves us acting below the line. With the latter, we function above the line - responding to life from a healthy state of mind.2
If our need to know what's happening in the world opens us up to headlines and news marred in cynicism, maybe it's time to consume news differently, or work with others to build better news platforms. Or stop reading the news altogether.
If it doesn't elevate us to be the best versions of ourselves as humans, it's not worth it.
For the sake of not giving those poor headlines attention, I refused to use them as examples here.
This simple concept of below and above the line was popularised by the Conscious Leadership Group. This video explains it.