One of the most common things about our age, increasingly so as everything becomes digitized, is the impatience among people in regards to seeking information and knowledge. I understand this sentiment, the internet has made it too easy to seek out whatever you're looking for that one expects to get the newest and freshest material with the click of a button. This is wonderful yet it's something I've personally and I'm sure many others have been challenged by.
A fundamental problem with the ubiquitous amount of information is what's referred to as analysis paralysis; the struggle in dealing with the vast amount of data and then trying to make relevant decisions or judgments. The case of going into the infamous rabbit hole of knowledge provides the optimal environment where this phenomenon peaks and many time leads people astray. What often happens is ether one continues down the hole opening up numerous other side paths making it even more complicated or one immediately gets out and plugs the hole likely to not pay it mind ever again. I believe it takes experience and and some control to filter out what is important, because at the end of the day, things only matter to the extent they can help you with your main task of figuring out how to live.
Let's take the example of vegans, including those looking to learn more about the lifestyle, detractors, as well as those just curious to what it's all about; I've noticed many get of them become confounded with contemporary trends and the notable leaders "in the movement". Something triggers the curiosity to gather further information, usually a friend or family member who has made the decision to sustain from animal products, and then you first find yourself searching for the right information on YouTube or typical google search. Perhaps this is well intended and you can't really blame someone for using todays common means as a starting point, though you can save a lot more of your time and effort by going back to the classics and checking out where these ideas were first laid out and stemmed from. Ancient traditions from East to West, have the longest record of what humans have been busy about for thousands of years and this is before the immense diffusion of ideas in modernity.
When Hippocrates made the remark of how we should let food be thy medicine, he wasn't only saying food can be used as medicine, but also that food is integral to the whole goal of what medicine supposedly preaches—health. This was 2,500 years ago where health and food was synonymous in Western Civilization before the fad diets of the present age. In regards to vegan lifestyle, Amos Bronson Alcott nearly 200 years ago, experimented with fruit based lifestyle in his Fruitlands. These ideas are nothing new, and it can apply to all other aspects of life; if one just uses this heuristic of surveying the classics or ancient traditions, apart from their dogmas of course, you'll find some valuable common sense saving you an immense struggle in the present.
