We are inundated with news 24/7. Regardless of which side of the aisle you sit on, national and local issues juice our brain into ruminating, worrying, and contemplating the future of civilization.
Its been building for 30 years since Ted Turner started the all day news cycle with CNN and has now progressed to where we can watch TV shows, listen to news radio, and carry internet podcasts in our pocket. All this energy driven to our issues rile us up and have us cheering or jeering around our causes.
It’s a great way to ensure citizen engagement, but not so good in that it creates a high allostatic load which is the wear and tear that happens in our bodies when we are in a constant state of stress.
Some people would tell you that the best way to manage this kind of stress is to avoid it; stop reading your online paper, stop listening to NPR, or watching Fox or MSNBC. Unfortunately that strategy doesn’t work because of our concern about these issues.
In the Resilience Advantage, we talk about another option, which is to embrace the challenge and find the good in it. By looking for the “silver lining” we turn our negative energy into ideas that can help support and promote our ideals and values. It may be difficult to see the good in the bad but if you focus on your true north, you’ll find the star.
© Richard Citrin, All rights reserved, 2018
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