I didn’t start this detox because I was virtuous. I started it because I had relapsed.
My journey with “political detox” actually began years ago, back in Nepal during the COVID lockdown. I realised then how toxic the cycle was, and for a long time, I managed a “soft detox.” I avoided the fights. I focused on my life.But recently, the dam broke.|It started simmering with the rising intensity of the Pro-King protests and the Durga Prasai movement. Then came the Gen Z revolution. And when the news broke of 14 people dead, my resistance shattered.I didn’t go back to fighting in comment sections—I’m too old for that. Instead, I channelled it into writing long blog posts. I thought I was being “constructive.” But after a month of obsessing over every development, I realised the old addiction was back. I wasn’t an informed citizen. I was emotionally exhausted.I wasn’t reading the news to learn; I was reading to feel something. Or, more accurately, to numb something.
So, I pulled the plug again. This time, I went harder. I performed digital surgery. I wiped my YouTube history. I aggressively unfollowed political accounts. And for everyone posting political drama on my Facebook feed, I hit “Snooze for 30 Days.” I silenced the noise completely.
I thought the hard part would be missing the news. I was wrong. The hard part was meeting myself.
The Withdrawal (The Ugly Truth)
On Day 4, I crashed.
I wasn’t looking at my phone, so I should have been present and happy, right? Wrong. I was irritable. I snapped at my wife over a small misunderstanding. I got annoyed with my mom for no reason. My nerves felt raw.
That evening, guilt-ridden and stressed, I realised something profound: Even though I wasn’t fighting online, I was still using political obsession as a vent for my daily stress.
Don’t get me wrong—the politicians give us plenty of legitimate reasons to be angry. But I realised I was taking the pressure of my life in London—the hard days at work, the heavy responsibilities—and dumping it into this political fixation.
Writing the blogs felt productive, but the internal fire was the same. Without that release valve of constant political thinking, the stress stayed inside me, and unfortunately, it leaked out on the people I love most.
The Void (The Magic Moment)
The strangest thing happened on Days 2 and 3.
I opened YouTube, and because I had wiped my history, the algorithm didn’t know who I was. It offered me nothing.
I stared at the blank screen. Usually, this is where I would consume content for an hour. But without the algorithm spoon-feeding me, I realised I had no actual intent to watch anything.
So, I turned it off. And then... I felt it. The Void.
It was an itch. Boredom. A restless energy with nowhere to go.
Instead of fighting it, I remembered a lesson from Eckhart Tolle about the “power of now.” Just be. I looked around my room in Harlington. Really looked at it. I saw the scattered papers. I saw the disorganised cupboard.
For months, I had been too busy trying to mentally “fix” Nepal to physically fix my own room.
I stood up. I didn’t tweet. I cleaned. I organised that cupboard. I made a dedicated space for my laptop and documents. It sounds small, but trading a dopamine hit for a clean shelf felt like a massive victory.
And in that silence, my brain started doing something it hadn’t done in years. It shifted from anger to imagination.
One night, unable to sleep, instead of reading about political deadlock, I watched a video about Tesla’s humanoid robots. My brain started racing—not with complaints, but with ideas. I imagined a robot on a farm in Nepal, cleaning cow sheds and cutting grass, revitalising a village emptied by migration.
I wasn’t worrying about the past; I was designing the future.
The Test (The Brake Pedal)
By Day 5, I felt stable. Then came the first boss fight: The Social Visit.
My uncle came over. Inevitably, the conversation turned to “politics back home.” In the past, I would have jumped in, raised my voice, and let the “flow” of passion take over the room. I felt that flow rising. The arguments were on the tip of my tongue.
But this time, I found the brake pedal. “I’m actually on a political detox right now,” I said. I kept 70% of the thoughts inside.
Then, (Day 7), came the second test. My younger brother visited. He started talking about Nepali politics—the usual frustrations. Again, I felt the urge rising right up to my throat. I wanted to dive in. But I stopped. I gave a non-reactive opinion and let the conversation fade out.
It was the first time in years I controlled the conversation, rather than letting the conversation control me.
The Conclusion: The New Reality
Throughout the week, I found the ultimate anchor.
I was playing with my 11-month-old daughter. She is learning new things every day. She babbles constantly. She has been clapping her hands for a while, but that day, for the first time, she folded her tiny hands into a “Namaste” when I asked her to.
It hit me: This is real.
Even watching her cry in the evening felt like a beautiful, honest moment because I was truly there to witness it.
The political world I obsess over is abstract; it happens on a screen. This world happens in my arms. When I stepped away from the screen, I didn’t miss a single important event. But if I had stayed on the screen, I would have missed that Namaste.
I’m not quitting the world. I will always care about Nepal. But I am done being a passive passenger on the outrage bus.
I have reclaimed my brain, my cupboard, and my time. And I’m not giving them back.
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