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I had my beloved book club earlier this week, and the selected book was Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg. Usually at our book clubs there are at least a few girls that haven’t finished the book (or sometimes even started), so I was pleasantly surprised to find out that every single one of us had read it completely.

While I definitely didn’t agree with all of Sheryl’s views (to be honest, there was quite a bit that rubbed me the wrong way), I was still left with some major takeaways about women in the workforce. There are so many invisible systems in place that make it easier for men to succeed than women, and while we have made a lot of progress, sexism is alive and well. This wasn’t a surprise to me as most of my professional experiences have taken place in very male-dominated environments, but seeing the facts laid out so clearly is always jarring.

But perhaps more importantly, a huge takeaway for me was that we (as in women) frequently hold ourselves back. We often don’t go after our dream jobs out of fear. Fear that we’re not ready. Fear that we won’t be able to spend time with our families. Fear of judgement. And in comparison to women, men don’t really have these fears. They go for things regardless if they’re qualified or not, while women often don’t. So as women we have to stop holding ourselves back. To not let fear stop us from reaching for our goals or achieving our dreams.

One of the recurring themes of the book was the question “what would you do if you weren’t afraid,” so my friend Shannon asked all of us what it was that we would do if we weren’t afraid.

What would you do if you weren’t afraid?

And here’s the thing… as ridiculous as it might sound, at first, some of us were afraid of even answering that question. Publicly declaring what our real hopes and dreams were, out loud, to a group of people (even when the group was full of awesome supportive girlfriends), well, it was kind of scary.

But as we talked about this, the question started to morph from “what would you do if you weren’t afraid” to “what would you do if money weren’t an issue,” because for a lot of us, it’s our fear of not having the money we need to support ourselves that is holding us back. Once the question was asked like that, the conversation seemed to flow easier.

Almost everyone said that they would quit their job and pursue things that they were truly passionate about, things like design, cooking, writing, art. We would travel more. Start our own businesses. Find an organization that we are passionate about and work with it. You know, all those things that “everyone wants to do” and that only a few are actually able to make a successful living at.

But over the past few days I’ve been thinking, is it really money that is holding me back? Because if I’m being honest with myself, really honest, I’m not necessarily sure it is. Yes, money does pose a huge obstacle, and that fear is a very real and valid fear for sure, but what I’m afraid of more than that is the fear of failure. Of trying something I think I’m going to love, and then failing at it. Or, and I’m not sure which is worse, trying something that I’m so sure I’m going to love and then realizing… I just don’t. Where would I be then?

While I can’t speak for others, I know that I definitely downplayed some of my own dreams out of fear, though even now I’m not sure what exactly it was that I was afraid of. Fear that my friends would think my dreams were stupid? That they were unrealistic? That I wasn’t smart/strong/talented/[insert insecurity here!] enough to actually achieve them? I suppose a little of all of that.

The little/vague things are easy to talk about. It was easy for me to say that I wanted to be my own boss, to work with people who inspire me, and to find a way to combine my love of writing with my passion for travel and international education, while still making enough money to live a good life in San Francisco and travel often. The totally outrageous things are easy to talk about, too. Things like “I want someone to pay me to travel the world while I eat and drink and write about it!” because really, who doesn’t want that?

But the big things? Those are a lot scarier to admit. Things like “I want to be a published author!” Things like “I want to create a more cohesive blogger network for bloggers in the bay area!” Things like “I want to find a way to encourage college students to step outside their comfort zone and study abroad in programs and places that will make them more socially responsible and globally conscious people!” Because those things are all so different and HUGE and daunting and OMG what if I suck at all of them and where do I even start?

Also? All of those things would require me to be serious about changing my life.

And that is scary.

So what would I do if I wasn’t afraid? A lot of things.

I want to do something purposeful with my life, and though I might not know what exactly that is right now, I’m certainly not going to figure it out by sitting on the sidelines.

So the first thing I’m going to stop doing is being afraid to even try.

There have been more times than I would like to admit that I’ve stopped myself from going after something solely for fear of the possible rejection. Or times where I’ve made excuse after excuse about why it wasn’t right for me, when really, I was just afraid. Afraid of being rejected, yes, but also of the work that I would have to do if I wasn’t rejected. Or, like I mentioned above, the fear that I wouldn’t love it as much as I had hoped, and admit failure and have to start all over again when I’m even older than I am now.

But no one said living a life with intention and pursuing a life you are passionate about was easy!

Right?

Now it’s your turn. What would YOU do if you weren’t afraid? Please let me know in the comments below!

(And if, like me, even writing those things down is kind of scary, feel free to use a fake email and comment anonymously.)

Cheers to Friday and to not being afraid!

P.S. The What Would You Do If You Weren’t Afraid website has a constant upload of awesome, inspiring, and often hilarious things people would do if they weren’t afraid. And from the looks of it, the world would be a much happier place if we were all just a little less scared of everything!

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THE SUMMER DAY

by Mary Oliver

I am currently reading Wild by Cheryl Stayed and last night I came across the quote pictured above. I’ve loved this quote for a long time, but I realized I had never read the poem in which the quote resides, so I did.

It’s a wonderful poem, and gets you thinking about life and what you want out of it.

I still don’t have the answer to that question, but I’m doing my best to figure it out.

There are so many things I want to do, so many things I hope to do in the future, but in the meantime I’m trying to be as present as possible in the here and now. Because plans and somedays are great, and dreams are a necessary part of a happy life, but I don’t want to take for granted how wonderful life is now, right this very second.

Because my San Francisco life is pretty damn great. Living in this city I adore, married to the man I love, making friendships and spending time with some of the most incredible people I know, well… it’s exactly what I always wanted.

That’s not to say I’m not planning on doing all sorts of other exciting things with my one wild and precious life, not at all.

I’m still making plans for my future, exciting plans!, but right now what I plan on doing with my one wild and precious life is enjoying it, and being thankful for where I am today. I waste far too much time stressing about the when and the ifs, and it’s really pointless. It does nothing but distract me from the good things in the present.

And there are a lot of good things.

So your turn…

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Happy hump day, friends!

Yesterday I came across this wonderful little video and it got me thinking.

Thinking about happiness.

It’s a little animated film called “The Pig of Happiness,” which is based on a book of the same title by Edward Monkton.

(and if you’ve never heard of Edward Monkton you are missing out. He writes adorable short stories that always end with a moral that puts a smile on your face, my favorite of which being A Lovely Love Story.)

The video is about a pig who is just oh so sick of his fellow pigs whining all the day long and being miserable, and he decides that instead of being miserable, he is going to be happy. He makes a decision to be happy. He changes his attitude and eventually he becomes SO HAPPY that the happiness explodes from him and the other pigs start becoming happy, too.

The moral of the story being that happiness is infectious.

So like I said, it got me thinking about happiness. My own happiness.

This quest for happiness so many of us are on.

Lately I feel like happiness, the search for happiness, has become almost… trendy.

From the bestselling book “The happiness Project” to the sequel to that book, to a new award-winning documentary on happiness, it’s kind of everywhere. Everyday I come across tons of articles on the subject, and because finding ways to be happier appeals to me, I generally read them.

They usually say the same stuff (meditate! be more compassionate! love! smile! laugh!) but sometimes i read something that sticks with me.

This article describes one of the biggest obstacles of happiness, something called The When and The If syndrome.

You know what I’m talking about.

“I’ll be happy when“ or “I would be happier if,” etc., etc., etc.

Oh, how many times have I rained on my own parade because of a when or an if!

(too many times)

The article makes a good point: “Happiness isn’t like the rainforest. You don’t have to worry that you’ll use too much and the planet will perish. Actually, the reverse is true. If you’re happy before you get the raise (get married, lose weight, get divorced, etc.) you’ll be more experienced in happiness and more likely to respond with joy when even better stuff comes your way. Happiness is like any other habit: The more you practice it, the more natural it becomes.“

Which kind of goes back to the whole “happiness is infectious” moral of the pig story, no?

Anyway, research on happiness has found that there are three factors that contribute to daily happiness.

Drum roll please….

1. Being part of something that offers a sense of meaning and purpose.

2. Spending time with family and friends.

3. Being kind and helping others.

Simple but fantastic tips, in my humble opinion!

So today, as cheesy as this might sound, I urge you to go and practice some happiness. In whatever form that may come in, go and do something that adds a little more happiness to your day.

(And if you have a few minutes I highly suggest you watch the pig video. It’s four minutes of your day that is pretty much guaranteed to put a smile on your face.)

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Yesterday I read this article on regret, titled “What Would You Erase From Your Life?” In it, the author asks the question, “If you could go back and Etch-a-Sketch away some part of your life, what would it be?”

Reading it made me think about my life and the choices I’ve made along the way, and I was relieved to realize that for the most part, I’m happy with decisions I’ve made. After all, even the bad decisions have led me to where I am today, to who I am today, and without them I might not be the person I am.

Granted, there are definitely things in my life I wish would have done differently. Decisions and choices that I wish I could do over. We all know hindsight is 20-20, after all.

But to “etch-a-sketch away” something from your life is more permanent than that. The author describes it as a way “to capture those aspects of our past that we’d truly like to eliminate so that even the vestiges of their imprint don’t remain.”

So that even the vestiges of their imprint don’t remain. 

In my opinion, to want to remove something so deeply that “even the vestiges of their imprint don’t remain,” the experience or memory would have to be truly horrific, and well, I don’t know if there is any experience in my life that was so terrible I would want to erase it completely.

But memories are a different thing. Especially those of the haunting sort, and I do have a few memories of things I’ve seen or done that I wish I could remove completely. Do an eternal sunshine of the spotless mind procedure, if you will. Even now just thinking about them fills me with complete misery and unease. One involves seeing my dog get hit by a car, a memory so horrendous and vivid that I still have nightmares about it almost 20 years later. Another involves something I did, something I wrote, about my high school boyfriend (who was and is a wonderful person). Had he never found this ominous letter in which I wrote undeservedly mean things, who knows what would have happened, but of course, life is never that simple, and if I could take back that action I would. Since that is not possible, I certainly wouldn’t mind having the memory of it erased completely, as thinking about it still makes me cringe with self-hatred.

I also have quite a few memories from my childhood that I wouldn’t mind etch-a-sketching away, but I’m not going to write about those here.

In general, I do believe that bad choices and shitty situations can lead to incredible solutions and great future changes, but I’m sure that most people have at least one memory they wouldn’t mind erasing.

What about you? Is there anything in your life that you would like to etch-a-sketch away completely?

I recently came across this post about things you should never give up on, and I thought it was worth sharing. It’s nothing new, but so completely true.

You can read the whole thing here, but here are the key giveaways:

Six Things You Shouldn’t Give Up On

1. Having a job you enjoy, which, please keep in mind, doesn’t necessarily mean career: “We live under this collective delusion that we are defined entirely by the job we do, which is an absurd notion. If you are happy doing a job that leaves you a lot of time and no stress for the rest of your endeavors, you should feel no shame in doing it.”
2. Being Loved. Well, of course you shouldn’t give up on that! Love makes the world go round.
3. Maintaining a nice environment. This is something I’m working on, and despite falling on the messy side of the spectrum, I do feel much better when things around me are clean and  pretty.
4. Keeping good friends. Truly one of the most important things in life, in my opinion: “A good friend is a precious thing, and must be taken care of on both sides.”
5. Your body. As I’m nearing the big 30 I’ve realized just how important this is. What you eat and do matters. A lot. Being healthy is a big deal:  “And though we are all struggling with how we look and feel, everyday, and no one (no matter what they’re trying to sell), has the secrets to perfection, it doesn’t mean it’s something we can’t always be working on. We can always eat a bit healthier, be a bit more active, take a bit better care of our skin, and love ourselves a little more. “
6. Personal Change.  This one was my favorite. “Whatever the goal is, no matter how far-fetched or inconveniently located it may seem, if it is something that makes us feel alive, we should be following it.“   Amen to that!     “We often forget that our big moments and successes are achieved in small increments — little steps that can seem almost unrelated to the bigger picture — and that is such a shame… There is never a point at which we can no longer change, improve, or shape ourselves into what we desire. And the day you decide that your dreams are something that you’ll actively work on every day, you’ll know that every foot you’re placing is, at the very least, in the right direction.”

Read the full post here.

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Sometimes I think about all the things I want to do in my life, all the things I want do with my life, and I get so very overwhelmed. My goals can seem so far away, so lofty,  so out of reach, that I find myself drifting into complacency.

But then I have a moment of clarity where I can take a step back and realize that this is just a part of the process, part of the journey of life, and that the little things that can add up to huge life altering change. It’s a step by step and day by day process, and at the end of it, small acts really can transform the world.

Anytime you feel like what you’re doing isn’t enough, just keep that in mind.

I need less Un.

So what to do? I’m not so sure. I feel like I’ve been looking so hard for inspiration that I’m trying too hard. Interesting articles and artwork used to just jump out at me, but lately I feel like I spend hours scouring the internet and still can’t find anything to get excited enough to write about. It doesn’t feel as organic as it did a few months ago. I need a project or something.

I’m trying to learn illustrator which is a lot harder than I thought it would be. I had falsely assumed that because I am fairly computer savvy, I would pick it up easily, and within a couple days I would be creating the most amazing prints and invitations and cool graphics. I envisioned my friends asking me to help make their wedding invitations because I was just that good.

HAHAHAHA. If only. In my most recent attempt I tried to make my text more scripty and curly and instead it looked like a 1 year old scribble. I’ve got a long way to go.

I started reading Martha Becks’ Finding Your Own North Star and there are all sorts of exercises to help you come closer to your “essential self,” what Martha likes to refer to as “your north star.” And so far the book and exercises are great! But reading it has also made me realize just how far I have fallen from my north star. Outside of spending time with the people I love, eating good food, reading (be it books. blogs, etc), and, well, watching TV… I’m not sure what else I really enjoy doing. And that makes me feel more than a little bit pathetic. I have to have more interests than eating and drinking and reading, right?

Clearly I’m in a creative rut, and I need to break out of it.

So that’s where I am right now. Lacking creativity and not sure how to find it.

And with that, I will leave you with the following infographic “How to Break Out of a Creative Rut.” I hope it’s helpful!

Do you have tips when you are lacking creativity?

Infographic from: http://visual.ly/how-break-out-creative-rut

Yesterday I came across this post over on the Oprah blog (and yeah, I know, okay, you caught me… I read the Oprah blog. My cool factor may have just plummeted, but I’m a fan. I can’t help it) and it made me smile.

It’s a list of rules and regulations to incorporate into your life in order to help you be blissfully, senselessly, ecstatically happy everyday, and really, who doesn’t want that?

A few of my favorites:

• After all clumsy, embarrassing moments, you must curtsy.
• Make up a lovable name for your least favorite body part. Like Irene. Nobody hates a thigh named Irene.
• While you’re driving behind a school bus with kids at the windows waving to everyone in cars, you must wave back—and honk three times.
• You may not leave the house without smelling the top of the head of your child, partner or pet. Inhale their scent (even if it’s unwashed) for at least two breaths.
• Once a year, take yourself out for a mandatory lunch at a restaurant with fancy waiters. Sit at a table for four. Order three courses, including wine and a dish that must be set on fire.
• Each time you pass a street musician playing the instrument that you quit as a child, place one crisp, full dollar in the cup and wait until the absolute end of the song to applaud.
• Never go to bed without looking up at the ceiling and thanking it for keeping out the rain.

I’m rather fond of “the name your body part idea” and I do believe I am going to name my muffin top Margo and my inner thigh Eleanor. I can see it now…

Trying to zip up jeans just after they’ve been washed and dried: “God damn you Margo!”

Planning for a trip: “I’m sorry Eleanor but I’m not taking you with me to Mexico this time around, though I’m sure we will meet again soon.”

Eating so much cake you think you might explode: “Goodness Margo get a hold of yourself! This is not flattering.”

Well see if I start feeling the love, because right now, Margo and Eleanor are kind of on my shit list.

Do you have any small tips or rules that you do randomly to make you happy?

A few days ago I learned about a new anti-racist campaign, Un-Fair, the mission of which is to raise awareness about white privilege in hopes of creating systemic and structural change for racial justice. The tagline of the campaign, if that’s what you would call it, is “It’s hard to see racism when you’re white.”

I’m not sure how I’m just now learning about this campaign, as it’s been around since last year, but I hadn’t even heard of it until I read this article titled “Fellow White People: I assure You This Anti-Racist Campaign Video is Not Trying to Make You Feel Guilty.” I immediately watched the video, read the article avidly, and then clicked over to learn more about the actual Un-Fair campaign.

Though the campaign is largely supported by many communities of color and anti-racist groups, there is a lot of hype surrounding this that focuses less on ending racism and more on how this is just another attempt by liberals to make white people feel bad and guilty, because, hey, it’s not our fault that we are white! I happen to agree with the title of the aforementioned article, and I don’t believe that campaigns such as these are trying to make white people feel guilty.

The topics of race and racism are very taboo and touchy subjects in our culture. People do not like to talk about them. When white people hear the term “racist” they tend to get defensive and take it very personally. Talking about race can be very uncomfortable, and I think think this is a big part of the problem. As stated in the Un-Fair campaign video, “our silence keeps it in place.” So I’m going to take a risk and talk about race and racism, and the role my own white privilege has in perpetuating it.

I’m going to be honest and admit that up until a few years ago, I had no idea what white privilege really was. I had heard the term thrown around before, but I never really understood it. I didn’t understand how being white gave me an “unfair advantage” over other people. I didn’t consider myself racist, and like most people in the world, I had a whole boatload of issues and problems that I felt made me far from privileged. My childhood was less than idyllic and I had to work hard to succeed. I suppose I subscribed somewhat to the “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” mentality.

What I didn’t realize is that a lot of people don’t even have bootstraps to pull up. It’s not that simple. And it’s a hell of a lot easier to get bootstraps if you are white.

When I read the essay “Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack” by Peggy McIntosh a few years ago, my world was kind of rocked. My whole perspective on race and racism and my own whiteness changed completely. The best way for me to describe what happened is like looking at one of those optical illusions, where once you see the hidden image, you can’t unsee it. And you can’t understand how you were oblivious to it for so long. Becoming aware of my own white privilege, and the role I played in perpetuating racism and oppressing others, albeit unknowingly, made me feel so awful. So Stupid. So naive.

I couldn’t believe that I had been so unconscious of it for so long. And this new knowledge made me feel terrible.

For those of you that were like me and unfamiliar with white privilege, according to Ms. McIntosh, “white privilege is the unquestioned and unearned set of advantages, entitlements benefits and choices bestowed on people solely because they are white. Generally white people who experience such privilege do so without being conscious of it.”

For example:

• I can be sure that if I need legal or medical help my race will not work against me.
• I can be pretty sure that if I ask to talk to “the person in charge,” I will be facing a person of my race.
• If a traffic cop pulls me over or if the IRS audits my tax return, I can be sure I haven’t been singled out because of my race.
• I can remain oblivious of the language and customs of persons of color who constitute the world’s majority without feeling in my culture any penalty for such oblivion.
• When I am told about our national heritage or about “civilization,” I am shown that people of my color made it what it is.
•  I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and see people of my race widely represented.
  
• I can be sure that my children will be given curricular materials that testify to the existence of their race.

The day I was born, I was given an unearned advantage over every other baby of color born on that same day. I didn’t do anything to earn this privilege, nor did I ask for it, but I had it. I did nothing to deserve to it, and yet it works in my favor daily. A person of color born into the exact same circumstances that I was would have had a harder time succeeding. This is not speculation; this is just how our society is set up.

As a white person, this is a hard pill to swallow.

I grew up under the impression that racism was how you personally treated people whose racial identity was different than that of your own, and not as an invisible structure created to benefit white people. We are not trained to think this way. As Ms. McIntosh writes, “my schooling gave me no training in seeing myself as an oppressor, as an unfairly advantaged person or as a participant in a damaged culture. I was taught to see myself as an individual whose moral state depended on her individual moral will. My schooling followed the pattern my colleague Elizabeth Minnich has pointed out: whites are taught to think of their lives as morally neutral, normative, and average, and also ideal, so that when we work to benefit others, this is seen as work which will allow “them“ to be more like “us.”

What so many people fail to realize, what I failed to realize for many years, is that racism is systemic. It goes so much deeper than our own personal thoughts and views and beliefs. It’s deeply engrained in our society, and will continue to be, until the oppressors (as in me and other white people) decide to stop participating in it and instead work to change the fundamental structures our society is based on.

And I think that’s why this topic can be so touchy and make people get defensive. No one likes to think of themselves as an oppressor. Realizing that you have been contributing to systemic racism, regardless of your personal, political or moral beliefs, is a terrible feeling. It makes you feel bad. It makes you feel guilty. In a video interview, Ms. McIntosh says that coming to terms with the advantages and daily effects of white privilege in her life was not easy, “because I didn’t want to know them, they were messing up my view of myself as a person who had earned everything I had.”

Our society has come to a place where we can openly talk about male privilege. For the most part, no one argues that males, in general, have an unearned advantage over females. People often talk about how their offices still function under a “boys club” mentality. Men still make more money than women for doing the exact same job. Men will often get a promotion over an equally qualified female counterpart. No one argues these facts. It’s a man world, after all. White privilege functions in the same way, but people have a much harder time admitting this. No one wants to acknowledge that “it’s a white’s world.” No one wants to admit being part of “white club.”

Despite what some may say, we do not live in a color blind society. I am not color blind. You are not color blind (unless, of course, you are literally color blind). We all look different and to say those differences don’t play a part of daily life is not reality. To say that Obama being black has nothing to do with some of the criticism surrounding him is just ridiculous. To say that me being white hasn’t been beneficial to me is just ridiculous. It’s just not true.

As the Un-Fair campaign states, “It is hard to see racism when we are white because the systems and institutions are set up to look like us and advantage us. It is hard to see racism when we are white because we live in a monoculture based on white northern European values, beliefs, practices and culture. We are ‘normal’. “

I’m not saying that we haven’t come a long way. The fact that we have a black President shows that we have come a long way. There are some places in the world that have made bigger strides than others, places where systemic racism is perhaps not as prevalent. But all one has to do is read the comments on any of the articles or videos I link to at the bottom of this post to see just how blatantly racist many people in our society still are. We still have a looooong way to go, and it’s a hard battle to fight.

I’ve heard people say they shouldn’t have to feel guilty just because they are white, and I get that, I really do. When I first learned about all of this, I felt horribly guilty. And no one wants to feel guilty, because feeling guilty sucks. However, I don’t think the overarching goal of anti-racist campaigns that happen to discuss white privilege is to make people feel guilty. Guilt is a useless emotion.

Yet there is a reason we feel guilt. It’s because we know there is something wrong with this picture.

And when you know there is something wrong, something to feel guilty about, and that you’ve done nothing to stop it, you feel bad. And sometimes when you feel bad, you start to get defensive, and eventually, you want to just avoid the issue all together. It’s a lot easier to avoid deeply rooted societal issues than to accept the privileges your color has given you and try to change them. Accepting this means acknowledging that the world is not a fair place, and that you have been benefiting from the disadvantages of others. And you have to be willing to give up that advantage, that power.

Like Ms. McIntosh says, “For me white privilege has turned out to be an elusive and fugitive subject. The pressure to avoid it is great, for in facing it I must give up the myth of meritocracy. If these things are true, this is not such a free country; one’s life is not what one makes it; many doors open for certain people through no virtues of their own.”

I have wanted to write about this topic for awhile, but I’ve been worried that I wouldn’t be able to get my thoughts across efficiently. That I wouldn’t be able to fully articulate my message. That I would sound too preachy and come off as just another one of those “guilty white liberals.” But I decided that is a risk I’m willing to take. It is a risk I need to take, because the first step towards changing these social systems is acknowledging that they exist. Staying silent is a huge part of the problem.

Giving up the myth of meritocracy is hard. No one wants to admit that our society is structured not around talent and ability but around class privilege. Trying to figure out what in the world you can do to stop being a part of it is even harder. There is no easy answer. At the end of her essay, Ms. McIntosh asks, “and so one question for me and others like me is whether we will be like them or whether we will get truly distressed, even outraged about unearned race advantage and conferred dominance and if so, what will we do to lessen them.”

What can we do to lessen them? What will you do to lessen them?

I sincerely hope that those of you that took the time to read this did so with an open heart and mind. I’m not trying to push any sort of agenda here, I’m just trying to bring awareness to something that people don’t like to discuss, and something that a lot of white people don’t even realize exists.

If you interested, below are some really great videos or articles that go deeper into this subject, and if you have a few minutes, they are well worth your time:

Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack:

Tim Wise: On White Privilege

What White Privilege Is

There is a wealth of great information available at the Un-Fair campaign website as well, and if you are  really interested in digging even deeper, below are links to some of the best literature I have read on this topic:

White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack

“Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?”: A Psychologist Explains the Development of Racial Identity

White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son

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A while ago I posted about how our brain has a negativity bias, which basically means that we are predisposed to focus on the bad as opposed to the good, and that because of that, negative  interactions and emotions are weighted far heavier than positive ones.

Ever since then I have been working rather diligently to fight against this negativity bias, so when I came across this article by Dr. Elisha Goldstein, titled “5 Steps to Balance the Brain’s Negativity Bias” I thought it was worth sharing.

We need to prime our mind to good, and to do that, the author suggests we do the following:

1. Think of a moment of receiving in the last day or week. You may have received something physical, or maybe a meal, the beauty of the sun, a smile, support from a coworker or the help from a stranger. It could be something that you may normally consider mundane.
2. Revisit the memory like a movie in your mind, picturing where you are, who you are with and pausing the reel in the moment of receiving.
3. As you’re recalling the memory, have awareness that you are receiving this, feeling into a sense of gratitude. Noticing how it feels in your body and allow it to get as big as it can get. As one client of mine said, “allow the glow to grow.”
4. In your mind, picture who or what is giving you this gift and intentionally express thanks.
5. Be on the lookout for moments of gratitude throughout today.

According Dr. Goldstein, if we make a habit of priming our minds to think about something good, something we are grateful for, we can really start to change the architecture of our mind and help balance out the negativity bias.

There has been much research espousing the practice of gratitude and the many benefits that can result from it, and this is something I’ve tried to incorporate into my daily thoughts and actions. The whole gratitude journal fad has been around for ages, and we all know how Oprah feels about it!

And hey, when Queen Oprah endorses something and says that keeping a gratitude journal will help us attract positive things into our lives, and become a “deliberate attractor of positive vibrations,” we know it’s gotta be good! It’s Oprah, after all. Her words are like Gospel to some.

I’m going to be honest… I always thought the concept of a gratitude journal sounded trite, but I think I’m changing my tune. How could taking a moment of your day to quickly think about and jot down something you are grateful be anything than positive?

I’m adding this to my list of passion pursuit resolutions.

My moment of gratitude for today?  Recalling last night’s four course foie gras meal. Oh. My. God. If I could choose my last meal on earth, it might be that.