The French priest Pierre Teilhard de Chardin famously said that “We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience”. In other words, our minds and souls are having a material experience here on Earth. You would imagine that a healthy society would therefore cherish both sides of this duality - the non-physical and the physical. The strange thing about our modern culture though is that we have rejected almost all concept of spirituality and, according to Watts, we have also forgotten the value of the material world, leaving us with nothing that we truly value.

I just finished bringing 12 full boxes of baby clothes outside for donation.

Twelve boxes of mostly mediocre fabrics stitched together to be worn, what, ten times at the most? And in some cases, never worn at all.

Twelve boxes that contained thousands of dollars worth of labor to purchase them initially, not to mention the thousands of hours of labor to stitch them together in the first place.

And while placing every single item inside those twelve boxes, I hardly felt nostalgic or wasted any time lamenting the loss of anything I was discarding.

I kept thinking of a quote that says, “Look around you. All that stuff used to be money. All that money used to be time.”

And it made me think about my anxiety surrounding my job search. Needing to get myself back into the work force, just so I can keep consuming more stuff?

I think a lot of my anxiety stems from moments where I’m unable to make sense of a given situation (or, at the very least, make peace with it).

This is the system we’re in. There’s only so much I can change about it.

My kids got so much stuff for Christmas this year. Thousands of dollars of toys, books, clothes, games.

And yet, they don’t really care about any of it.

Their Barbie dream house? It’s in shambles, with stickers peeling off the walls and various marker doodles covering the floors.

Their PAW Patrol Lookout? Shoved in the corner along with two complete sets of each of the 7 (wait, 8? wait, no, they added a few more?) characters with vehicles in various states of destruction.

The best I can hope for is that they get a few hours of enjoyment from these toys.

Because someday soon, probably within the next two years, I’ll have to grab twelve more cardboard boxes out of the garage and start placing all of those toys into them.

And there is very little about this situation that makes sense to me.

Darby Saxbe, a clinical psychologist at the University of Southern California and a mother to a high schooler, told me she has come to think that, for many young people, claiming an anxiety crisis or post-traumatic stress disorder has become like a status symbol. “I worry that for some people, it’s become an identity marker that makes people feel special and unique,” Saxbe said. “That’s a big problem because this modern idea that anxiety is an identity gives people a fixed mindset, telling them this is who they are and will be in the future.” On the contrary, she said, therapy works best when patients come into sessions believing that they can get better. That means believing that anxiety is treatable, modifiable, and malleable—all the things a fixed identity is not.

It’s hard enough to come to the realization that you are not your anxiety or depression. Wearing it on your shirt and proudly broadcasting it to everyone doesn’t do you any favors.

Saxbe said the best thing we can do for ourselves when we’re anxious or depressed is to fight our instinct to avoid and ruminate, rather than get sucked into algorithmic wormholes of avoidance and rumination. The best thing one can do when they’re depressed is to reject the instinct to stay in bed basking in the glow of a phone, and to instead step outside, engage with a friend, or do something else that provides more opportunities for validation and reward. “I would tell people to do what’s uncomfortable, to run toward danger,” Saxbe said. “You are not your anxiety. You’re so much more.”

As I mentioned in a link from earlier today, I’ve been dealing with a rolling anxiety attack that’s lasted the better part of a full week.

I spent an afternoon in the ER because I was actually seeing changes on my Apple Watch’s ECG report when stressful thoughts would cross my mind. I could feel this deep pain in my chest, and as I write this down, I am still feeling that pain.

These pains are part of the anxiety attacks I’ve dealt with off and on for at least a decade, but unlike the other attacks, the problem with this one is that I couldn’t put my finger on why it was happening.

Besides journaling late at night with a nice, chill album playing in the background, the only thing that’s helped so far is stepping outside and engaging with friends.

It’s incredible that we live in a time where we can open up about our feelings and process difficult emotions with the help of others.

As Pete Holmes says, it helps to get into the headspace of observing your thoughts. When you notice a thought that says, “I am depressed”, you can instead say, “There is depression.”

Even if you’re not struggling with your mental health right now, it’s worth checking out that Pete Holmes video so you can have another tool at your disposal in the off chance you find yourself in depressionland.

Reports of Baby Boomers worried that younger generations lack the motivation and morals of their parents were met with pictures of a 1974 hippie commune and a plea from 28-year-old Travis Garner who said, “Look, every generation eventually figures it out and finds their own way. We’ll be fine.”

In California, 18-year-old Sarah Thompson began her freshman biology class at UC Davis where she’ll learn stuff we didn’t know when her parents went to college, while she won’t be taught stuff that’s since been proven false. “That’s how progress works,” her professor said. “A slow grind higher over the generations.”

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 48 points on Tuesday. Greg Jones, an analyst at Merrill Lynch, expected that no one would care about that useless, vapid, fact by tomorrow.

See, this is the kind of article that makes my five-day-long anxiety attack start to subside.

Slow and steady progress wins the race. Relax. Take your time. Be just a tiny bit better every day.

So, rather than living in ‘the never-ending then’, you have to learn to avert your focus elsewhere. You have to enjoy the present a bit more and stop trying to plan your idealized path through life. You won’t get that path either way. Something always comes up and sends you on a detour.

Accepting this is hard and something I still struggle with regularly. However, once you do, you will realize that the ideal life is not one that exists solely in the past, present, or future, but one that moves seamlessly between the three. If you can appreciate the past, live in the present, and plan for the future, then what more can you ask for?

Today, I went with my wife and kids up to the recently remodeled playground at my daughter’s school.

Right before we left, my son started playing a game he was making up on the spot.

I got so into it. It was totally engrossing, and my attention was solely on being in character, climbing across obstacles, having fun.

Financial wealth is surely important, but true wealth is being able to shut off the monkey brain for as long as possible.

The reason why a still lake is the archetype for a still mind is because it flows without any intention. The currents softly rise without breaking, and in the instances where it does, it happens without aggression. There’s nothing it’s trying to do; it’s simply going where it needs to go.

But drop a stone into the lake, and the ripples flow out in a way that goes against the state of nature. Even a harsh gust of wind won’t create ripples in the way that a small stone does. That’s what it means to desire more than what you have; to become somebody or to further your place in a community. Your presence may be known, but it may do so at the expense of the stillness around you.

Rest is to take those moments to understand that you’re not defined by what you produce, and to be okay with whatever you are. It’s to allow that emptiness of mind to prolong whenever you see something beautiful, and to understand that this is not an anomaly, but a glimpse into the reality of what truly is.

I’d like to offer a tool to put in your emergency kit for shifting self-sabotage to self-care and going from overcommitted to well-resourced. And that is managing for whole capacity—rather than simply time or money. In other words, don’t ask, “Can I squeeze this in?” when presented with an opportunity. Ask, “Do I have what I need to do this well?”

Seidel went to Eugene in late June, during the U.S. Outdoor Track and Field Championships, for what is known as team processing, an administrative session to prepare athletes for international competition. They fill out paperwork and get sized for uniforms. And, new in 2021, athletes undergo a mental health screening.

Seidel answered the questions on the screener honestly—and her responses raised red flags. The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC) doctors, who administer the screening, referred her for treatment.

A USOPC spokesperson wrote in an email to Runner’s World that the test screens for anxiety, depression, eating disorders, drug and alcohol abuse, and sleep disorders, among other things. The results athletes provide are then flagged for follow up by a USOPC licensed mental health provider. From there, the athletes are connected to mental health resources.

“The screenings are not intended to screen athletes out of competition or off Team USA, but are a part of a broad approach to intervene and provide support to athletes who struggle with mental health, so they are able to achieve their goals,” the spokesperson wrote.

Seidel said she was connected with a new team of specialists, many in Salt Lake City. “USOPC set up everything for me and they’re continuing treatment for me,” she said. “Honestly it was so much easier being able to have them take the reins on it. And feel very much like, ‘Okay, they’re going to help me out on this.’”

I recall sitting with my therapist for the first time during my big depressive episode in 2021. I hadn’t said a word yet, and I started welling up almost immediately.

“I have no idea why I’m crying,” I said to her. I hadn’t even explained why I was there.

“It’s probably because you are feeling relief,” she said.

She was completely right. I hadn’t really appreciated the need to unload your trauma and to allow someone to help you unpack and sort through your anxieties.

I’d still say that 99% of the tears I’ve shed in the past three years came after being vulnerable and letting others help me.

I felt those same tears well up when reading this piece about Molly Siedel, particularly the section in the pull quote above.

Say what you will about our Olympic committee: this policy is a walk off home run. Kudos to them for offering help, and mega kudos to Molly for being strong enough to take it.

I’ve had the fortune of getting to hang around several Olympians, and hearing them share stories of the pressures they face is incredible. I’m glad they have an opportunity to get relief when they need it.

Moving your body, even a bit, has enormous benefits – again to almost all people towards reducing the probability and severity of almost all diseases. So can you imagine the benefit of moving your body for several hours per day in a natural environment, and including heavy load bearing and bits of extreme exertion?

These things are not speculative pieces of alternative medicine. They are known, easily and reproducibly tested, and proven to be the most effective things we can possibly do with our time.

So why, the actual fuck, are people still sitting inside, watching Netflix, driving to work, and then driving to the doctor’s office to get deeper and deeper analysis of a neverending series of exotic and mysterious and unsolvable problems with their physical and mental health?

Okay, okay, this got me to put the book on hold at the library.

What I find is that those who lean too much into this logic of optimization are the ones that suffer from a (literal) maddening degree of alienation.

It’s an easy trap to fall into as it is so very sensible: Why would you spend six hours cleaning (doing a chore you hate and doing it badly) if you could just work an additional hour and outsource that? So you hire a cleaner. And a cook, a personal shopper, an interior designer and a nanny. But if you don’t watch out, all your little self worth eggs, so to speak, are kept in the same work basket – and, step by step, you start to live the life of a stranger. You eat the food of someone else, wear the clothes of not-you, in an apartment that might as well be a hotel room, with kids that are more attached to their nanny than to you. Your vacations are glamorous, but there’s little connection to anyone or anything in them.

At this point you might start to feel a little unease. You might start to wonder why you’re unfulfilled and try to treat yourself better – so you double down. You get a PA because dealing with a schedule is annoying, you get a personal trainer because mens sana in corpore sano and while you’re at it, you also start therapy, where you learn techniques that help somewhat and where you analyze childhood events. But what somehow is kept at bay, in a fish-not-having-a-word-for-water-way, is that you identify with your job of optimizing processes to maximum efficiency to a degree that you treat yourself like any work project.

Boy, this pull quote within the bigger article here really struck a nerve.

Fortunately, I’ve been trying hard to not always make the optimaly decision lately. It’s tough to break the habit, but “good enough” often is just that.

"You become more resilient, and your body learns that the anxiety and stress isn't needed because there is no threat to losing anything when there's always more ways to gain what you want or need," says Papetti. "The only thing that's certain in life is uncertainty, so embodying an abundance mindset that trusts you'll be safe in the uncertainty is the secret to living a life of greater gratitude, ease, and satisfaction." 

Great advice in here for helping you to adjust your mindset. The journaling tip and the celebrating the wins of others tip are resonating with me as of late.