I compartmentalize. Focus on things at a smaller scale, and work through them one by one. Try not to distract yourself too much on the things that are out of your control. Prioritize the ones that you can actually control. Then identify the short term and long term ones and further prioritize based on that.
Keep in mind that American news is not really news. It’s strictly entertainment and you should treat it as such. FOX, MSNBC, CNN are all for profit enterprises and they are completely focused on that and nothing else. That asshole fuck face that owns FOX even admitted it in court under oath.
So instead of informing the public, these entities present “news” in a way that is designed to make you emotionally react, give you a dopamine hit, instead of actually informing you of anything. Are some worse than others? Yes, but all of them do it to some degree or another. I personally believe that the down fall of this country will eventually be tracked to the elimination of equal time laws and the limits of entities owning media outlets. It used to be a single entity could not own more than 11 broadcast stations. Those laws need to come back and it’s an absolute emergency that they do.
To sum up the above: You are constantly being manipulated by the media you watch to make you feel that things are a lot worse than they really are, so some asshole somewhere can make more money. Yes, your feeling of things being out of control is only because some fuck face is making money from you feeling that way.
My suggestion is do not watch TV for your news. Read. If you want to learn about American politics, read a foreign newspaper that comes from a country that really doesn’t have a lot of skin in American Politics. Better yet, get involved in your local political scene and make yourself a part of the news cycle.
Unlike most, I don’t believe its possible (or even a very good idea) to ignore the news. What I do is limit my news source to two places a day, BBC and The Guardian which I know are not perfect but I believe they can be largely trusted. Other than that, I read the odd link on here but I won’t doom scroll.
I also do things that have a tangible effect for people who have it worse than me. Hands on in my immediate locality, and via donation nationally and/or internationally. I have a list of charities that I support and donate to two for 6 months then switch to another two and repeat. Doing this means that most importantly, people are helped in some small way and less importantly it offsets the shitness of life a bit. If I can feel a bit happy that I’m doing something, that’s a good thing.
I have a small circle of focus on my own life. It’s working, and my life is getting better.
In my work, I focus on doing the best possible job. If I succeed at my job, then my customers’ lives are better. That’s how I make the world a better place. It gives me a reason to do my best every day.
What I do is design kitchens. I also bridge the gap between the plan and the execution of the plan. There are lots of little details to pay attention to. When I get everything right, people get new kitchens.
With kitchens the way they want them, they eat well. They have peace in their house. They have social space to invite people over. Everything works smoothly, and they have a solid building block to build their own lives on.
If I try to do more, I might fuck it up. This task of making kitchen rebuild projects go well is the perfect balance between my own competence and the needs of the world. It takes everything I’ve got.
Having the match between my mission and my skills, having the mission be just hard enough to take everything I’ve got, is my own personal recipe for not falling into despair at the state of the world. The thing that bothers me the most is if one of my customers has a problem. I worry more about that than I do about Gaza.
Good news, just a benign growth. Vet isn’t concerned. Said some fancy medical terms and said it’s nothing to worry about in the short term, just keep an eye on it monthly to see if it’s growing.
Should he? Probably not. Would he do a better job in office than the idealogicaly brain dead choices being ‘weekend at bernies’ed’ by the highest paying lobbyists we’ve had since Citizens United? Absolutely.
For me, personally: Shit’s always been out of control, and even though it may seem like human rights are going backwards, we’re better off now than we’ve ever been. Interacting with my own kids and the college students I work with gives me a lot of hope. We really just need the boomers to stop getting nostalgic for the “good old days” when you were allowed to bully anyone who was different from you.
The kids are progress. Support them! Let them turn the world into what they what it to be, and not what we think they need.
asklemmy
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