Practice Thinking (and Acting) Little

The helplessness and potential despair I feel and observe around me continue apace. The cause(s)? Take your pick: the rapid advance of AI (look up P(doom)), a potential debt default, recent court decisions and legislative enactments . . . Or maybe just the recognition that sometimes I ache in the places where I used to play.

There's not a whole lot an individual can do to manage those risks, solve those potential problems, or influence public policy outcomes. Existential dread and fear are quite powerful and potentially overwhelming. And everyday financial and other worries can take on seemingly gigantic significance when evaluated by our Paleolithic emotions.

At the same time, there are scores of little things I can do every day to ease those real and imagined fears. Sure, walks and pictures and videos of dogs and cats and sunrises and pretty flowers and expressions of gratitude and kind words and reconnecting with friends are hardly "gamechangers" or "disruptors".

But aren't they?

These acts bring me joy, connect me to the natural world, and remind me of the magic that's all around us if we're willing to look for it. And by doing them, I create some amount of energy and capacity for optimism and the sense that wicked problems can be faced and tackled (if not solved).

But they don't happen by default. Nobody else is going to demand I do them. It's just me and my own agency...

Think Little By Wendell Berry As you've figured out, very little if anything I do is based on original thought. Few if any of us are as committed as Berry to our ideals, but consider the potential of living some of the things about which you express so much passion. Take some ownership in showing your faith or being that change you'd like to see in the world. (Clearly this newsletter has been hijacked by a ChatGPT cliché generator).

You can listen to this essay on the Conspirituality Podcast, too.

?A man who understands the weather only in terms of golf is participating in a chronic public insanity that either he or his descendants will be bound to realize as suffering.

Berry says it best, though, in his poetry:

Why Birds and Their Songs are Good for Our Health (Washington Post). Birds are very strong in my family. I fully subscribe to the idea that cardinals are messengers from departed loved ones. Seeing and hearing them is always therapeutic.

One hypothesis on nature’s salubrious effects, known as the attention restoration theory, posits that being in nature is good for improving concentration and decreasing the mental fatigue associated with living in stressful urban environments. Natural stimuli, such as birdsong, may allow us to engage in “soft fascination,” which holds our attention but also allows it to replenish.

If you want to some good technology tools to help with exploring birds, consider the Audubon Bird Guide App or Merlin. I identified this Brown Thrasher (Toxostoma rufum) with the former, and exchanged calls using the latter.

The Puzzling Gap Between How Old You Are and How Old You Think You Are (Atlantic). How do I feel? To quote Billy Martin, I feel very strongly both ways.

What underpins them both is an enduring sense of agency: If you mentally view yourself as younger—if you believe you have a few pivots left—you still see yourself as useful; if you believe that aging itself is valuable, an added good, then you also see yourself as useful.

Graduates, My Generation Wrecked So Much That’s Precious. How Can I Offer You Advice? (NYT). The world is beautiful, and people are good. What are the things you can do to feel that every now and then.

When you are restless or lonely or afraid, go for a walk in the park or a hike in the woods. Plant a little garden, if only in pots on the sidewalk. Being in the wild world will make you feel better. Get your hands dirty. I promise you will feel better.

I can hear the flowers a-growin' in the rubble of the towers.