11 Reasons to Have a YP Love Affair With Your TV

We haven’t been huge television fans throughout our young professional (YP) life to date. Call us restless, but we have always felt it was synonymous with laziness and that we should really do something more productive with our time than sit still in front of what our great aunt would call the idiot box. With the inhumanely freezing weather that has plagued the country lately, however, we have rediscovered the value of watching TV – and we just may remain planted on the couch until spring. Here’s why we’re fine with that

1. It can make you feel better about yourself
If you thought that you were a little out of whack emotionally, all it takes is 15 minutes of The Bachelor to make you (or your girlfriend) seem like the most sane, rational human on the planet. Guys, the comparison for you would be the meathead dudes on the Jersey Shore reruns.

2. It can make you look better
Whether on a cardio machine at the gym or while doing Pilates in your living room, TV makes exercising so much more enticing and enjoyable. You may even end up working out longer than you planned to make it to the end of a TV show. Now that’s multitasking.

3. It can make you smarter
All television isn’t mindless fluff, and primetime TV seems to be smarter, more engaging and wittier than ever. With increased competition for coveted time slots, there is no room for the alternative. Then, of course, there are the educational channels like The History Channel, HGTV, Discovery and TLC. You can even gain historical insight and references offered by shows like Mad Men and Downton Abbey

4. It can make you feel again
Shows like hospital dramas, Grey’s Anatomy and Saving Hope tug on the heartstrings and the massive lump in your throat, and accompanying tears provide assurance that you still indeed have a heart and soul… as much as your job may be sucking it from you.

5. It can brighten your mood
Whether it is an old rerun of Seinfeld or Saturday Night Live, or an episode of How I Met Your Mother, TV may offer the only thing that makes you actually laugh of loud (as opposed to LOL) in the course of a stressful workday… and if laughing isn’t good for you, we don’t know what is.

6. It can improve your work relationships
Watching popular shows makes for conversation among coworkers who may not otherwise have anything in common. Shows like Game of ThronesBreaking Bad and American Idol, among others, are universally appealing among males and females and varying age groups, filling awkward moments at the water cooler with a unifying banter.

7. It can improve your actual relationship
The couple who watches TV together, stays together. Well, maybe not. But if you’re into the same shows, what’s better than watching them together curled up on the couch?

8. It offers a temporary escape  
The simple pleasures offered by a favourite TV show provide something to look forward to at the end of a freezing, dark and dreary day. It marks a rare time in the day where your mind won’t wander to work or other stress. Most of the time, a few hours of solid TV offers a better escape than a night on the town in the dead of winter.

9. It inspires commitment
Whether you tune in religiously each week to catch the drama at the same time as other viewers (social media ruins many unwatched episodes, after all) or commit to watching all three seasons of a particular show in a weekend, some YPs have an easier time committing themselves to a TV show than a potential significant other (SO). Now that’s dedication.

10. It won’t take all your money
As opposed to a night on the town with your SO or a date (complete with dinner, drinks and cabs), a night in with the TV makes a much more affordable – and often more entertaining – option. And it won’t ask for anything in return.

11. You can turn it off
Unlike a nagging SO, annoying coworker or drunken friend at a party, you can simply turn your TV off when you’ve seen or heard enough of it. 

Of course, we believe in everything in moderation, and there is such thing as too much television, especially if it involves back-to-back episodes of Keeping Up with the Kardashians. But if you want to commit some of your spare time to your couch in the dead of winter, there’s nothing wrong with that.

 

Cover image from: RogerWilkerson

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