Tag Archives: positive thinking

The Worst Foods For Your Brain

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Not bacon, cream, or the usual suspects. I’m talking about a steady diet of negative influences that makes us feel lousy to the core. Such as:

  1. Fake news in all its mean, snarky iterations
  2. By extension, only getting news from one point of view. It’s important to hear what the other side is thinking, too — but not so much that we start hurling things at the TV
  3. Following the minutiae of celebrities’ pretend-perfect lives
  4. Inactivity
  5. Living in the past, whether you have good memories (those glory days as a high school athlete) or bad (your dysfunctional family)
  6. Envy
  7. Social media that makes us feel our lives aren’t as glamorous, exciting, happy, or satifying as other people we know
  8. Obsessing. Make a plan, take action, move on
  9. Seeing the glass half-empty
  10. Tunnel vision
  11. Influencer unboxings. Hey, many times they didn’t even PAY for the stuff!
  12. Holding on to anger
  13. Not cutting ourselves enough slack : our finances, weight, wrinkles, job, house, parenting skills etc.
  14. Forgetting that you are good enough just as you are
Photo by Andre Furtado on Pexels.com

Good News Monday: Oryx and Eagles and Bears, Oh My!

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Happy Labor Day, US friends!

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Today’s heartening item is that several animal populations are finally on the upswing, including

  • Bald Eagle
  • Arabian Oryx
  • Gray Wolf
  • Northern Elephant Seal
  • Brown Bear
  • Giant Panda
  • Humpback Whale

Unfortunately, no politicians have been added to the endangered species list.

 

Good News Monday: Climate Change

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We’ve still got a long way to go, but trees are adapting to offset carbon emissions.  They’ve begun to use water more efficiently, which allows them to grow in size and thereby remove more CO2 from the air.

Keep reducing your own carbon footprint, though.  Trees can’t do it all by themselves!

 

Shopping As an Act of Optimism

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It’s sale season, and that means each time I sit down at my computer I’m bombarded by urgent messages to take advantage of every markdown.

Buy now! Going fast! Last chance!

As I was feeling vaguely annoyed by all the hysteria, it occurred to me that shopping is a profound act of faith. One that has nothing to do with the economy.

Please bear with me.

We buy last season’s markdowns in the belief that we’ll be around to wear them next year.

We buy for the person or size we aspire to be.

We buy for the happy occasion in our future that we plan to attend.

We buy maternity clothes much too early; shoes that await a dinner invitation; the house where we hope to grow old.

Whether we’re shopping for something big or small – the car we plan to keep until it hits 50,000 miles or the coat we buy in October when it won’t be cold until January – it’s with an unspoken confidence that we’ll remain in good health long enough to enjoy it.

Call it our bargain with the universe.

On a rational level, we know we can’t always control our future. But isn’t there something wonderfully hopeful about acting as though we can?

I’ve been thinking a lot about a friend of a friend who was recently diagnosed with cancer. I don’t really know her or what she’s going through but I imagine she’s a lot more focused on actual therapy than on retail therapy.

Still, along with doctor visits, chemo, radiation and all the serious things she has to worry about, I wish she’d do a little shopping.

Not because she necessarily needs a new dress or sexy sandals right this minute. But because I’m optimistic that she’ll be wearing those summer splurges next year, and the summer after that.

And I hope she is, too.

That’s what “shoptimism” is all about.