Joanna Gaines Had a Lot to Say About Moving Forward and the ‘Sport of Scroll and Click’
Fixer Upper star Joanna Gaines focuses on the theme of forward motion in this month’s Magnolia Journal column. She shares her thoughts on it has been for her and her husband, Chip, to adjust to the media spotlight. She also talks about continuing to move forward even when it seems like nothing is happening. Here’s a look at Gaines’ latest column.
Why Joanna Gaines chose ‘forward motion’ for the Magnolia Journal Fall 2021 issue
Gaines says when the theme of “forward motion” came up for the Magnolia Journal Fall 2021 issue, one of the things she thought about was how many of us have become “stuck” this year. There is still strife among different social, political, and racial groups. Also, the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic continues to drag on. Sometimes it feels like there will never be an end in sight. However, Gaines says it’s important for society to learn how to move forward together. According to her, this is how progress is achieved.
Joanna Gaines on the ‘scroll and click’ culture
Social media has made it all too easy to judge others with the click of a mouse, says Gaines. For her, one key ingredient for achieving progress is learning to think before we comment. It’s also important to learn to have more compassion for others. It’s easy to make quick judgments about other people and about their intentions when you’re sitting behind a screen in the comfort of your home.
Gaines says she sometimes wonders if social media has affected the way people relate to each other. She fears it has created an environment where people don’t think about how their actions impact others.
“Part of me wonders if social media, or the sport of scroll and click, has shifted the way we approach understanding one another,” says Gaines in her Magnolia Journal column. “If the quickness of it all and the immediacy that we’ve learned to live by—the ability to approve or dismiss with a tap of a button, to comment quickly and without a filter, to click and read only the catchy headline—have weakened our ability to see deeply and hear genuinely what others have to say.”
Joanna Gaines on the media spotlight
Gaines talks about how difficult it was at first when she and Chip became celebrities. They weren’t used to leading such public lives. It took time for her to adjust to the fact that they would regularly be in the news. Earlier in her column, she notes how “drama and division are offered up as a source of cheap entertainment.”
“When our show took off, we couldn’t have imagined all the beauty and blessings that would follow for us and for our family—all of which we’re continually grateful for,” says Gaines. “But it didn’t take us long to realize that being a part of this new reality also meant being a part of the news cycle.”
Gaines says she has learned to take it all in stride. She tries not to let things get to her. “Stories get written about us, about our family, our plans, our supposed beliefs and politics,” continues Gaines. “We’ve been through it enough now to know that it’s just part of the territory, and a lot of times it’s so unbelievable we can’t help but laugh.”
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