How do I cope with the avalanche of negative news? I try to focus on the things that are within my control.

If something is beyond my control, I train myself to ignore it.

There are also studies showing that children today are more anxious than children who were hospitalized (in Psychiatry) in the 1950s.

(via »)

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“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.” ― Richard P. Feynman

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There’s a technique some Facebook marketers use – they create apparently innocent Facebook groups, and they keep posting on them.

After the groups get some traction, they start one or more of the following:

• They invite people to even more groups;
• They start promoting businesses or political ideas very far from the original intention of the group;
• At some point, they change the name of the group to something very partisan; for example, “Supporters of X party”; since anyone can see who’s a member of a public group, this makes it look like each person in the group is a supporter of X party; even if Facebook sends a notification to group members that the group name has been changed, some people never notice this.

Quite annoying.

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I think praying is good for two main reasons:

1. It helps you forgive others; if you pray for your enemies (might be a strong word; those who harmed you?), you’ll tend to forgive them much more easily; “Love” is “willing the good of the other” (Bishop Robert Barron); if you pray for the other person, you wish them well;

2. It helps you become an actual friend with someone who did you harm; wait! There’s more than a simple forgiveness. You tend to become friends with other people.

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Sometimes, I surprise others by saying various things. I get this word a lot – “that’s weird”.

But if you stay a little and ponder on a situation, you discover things are not that wrong.

For example, I add an extra word in WhatsApp Contacts’ names, so I can search for them afterward. The name looks indeed strange, but it’s useful to search by tags.

Or I take the bus in the opposite direction if the one in my direction keeps being 100% full.

The things that appear strange at first sight might be the best solutions.

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I like looking at things with the full picture. Sometimes, there are positive aspects. At times, there might be some negative things. If you only see one side of a story, you’ll likely make errors due to too much pessimism or optimism.

Too much optimism makes you overconfident and makes mistakes of the sort – “I trust myself too much”. If you don’t see the bad side of things, you’ll likely do wrong things.

Too much negativity and critical thinking can affect your mind, but can also lead you to wrong decisions. For example, if you only read news via social media, you’re likely to have a negative opinion of the things around you.

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