On Noticing What's Good

Shining your attention where it belongs

Hello friends.

It’s one of those weeks when life seems to be happening faster than I can write it down.

I saw the movie Civil War Sunday night, which follows four reporters covering an American near-future civil war. Judging by reviews, the movie seems to be a bit of a Rorschach blot; for me, it instantly transported me back to my time covering Ukraine for NPR.

War correspondents, and journalists in general, suffer moral injury as we witness human suffering that we are powerless to stop. And it gets worse. We’re profiting from that suffering. We’re excited, professionally and personally, to be so up close to it.

Conflict, violence and danger are what humans are hardwired to pay attention to. The movie is mostly a string of scenes that knowingly and effectively exploit that hard wiring. In that way, director Alex Garland makes the viewer complicit in the moral injury of war.

But there’s one interlude that feels very different. Our travelers stop at some kind of civilian aid camp in a broken-down stadium. It’s orderly and peaceful; they’re greeted by unarmed, young, women aid workers. There are children everywhere, running, laughing and playing. I wanted to stop there for awhile, and get to know the families who had taken shelter. What were their stories? How did they maintain this oasis in the middle of social breakdown? How were they providing for everyone’s needs?

While I was in Ukraine, partly because I didn’t have the experience or the risk tolerance to go to the front lines, I very much focused on these kinds of stories. I visited a family shelter that a woman in Lviv started inside her fancy private preschool, a makeshift orphanage, refugee and aid workers and volunteers. I met this kids’ therapy dog.

Therapy dog in Zaporizhzhia

Pollyannaish? No. This, too, is the reality of war. It’s the reality of life. It’s what makes life possible, it’s what makes life better: people trying to help. People caring for others. And it’s worth our curiosity. (Related: This paper arguing for the newsworthiness of joy, via TriplePundit. )

We held our first meeting of our We Are The Great Turning podcast club this week! It was really moving to be in community with people and unpack some of the ideas that Jess Serrante and I have been working deeply with for the past nine months. If you’re interested in joining a future meeting, let me know by replying to this newsletter; I’m also doing some matchmaking with folks who want to start their own.

The second episode of the podcast introduces the Work That Reconnects concept of “The Three Stories.” And it turns out to be so, so useful for this moment.

In a nutshell: There are three stories, three deep ways of looking at what’s happening in our world.

Business as Usual: US stocks are rising. Job growth outstrips forecasts. Money is the bottom line. I may like my work but I also need to get paid. Corporate capitalism is forever. Let’s be realistic: Infinite growth is the only way to continue. Also, things are…sort of fine, day to day? I live in America, I scroll through Instagram, I shop on Amazon, I watch Netflix.

The Unraveling: Coming off the hottest year on record, another record summer of heatwaves and storms is predicted. Ocean heat is shattering records and the world’s fourth major global coral bleaching is under way. Humanitarian crises in Sudan and Eastern Congo and the armed gangs taking over Haiti are hardly in the news because of the focus on children starving in Gaza and the third year of war in Ukraine. Here in the US, one of the two presidential candidates is charged with 91 felony counts, and the Handmaid’s Tale is looking less fictional all the time. There is an infinite scroll on all your feeds of hate, dehumanization and polarization, including chaos on campuses nationwide, with cops showering tear gas and rubber bullets on anti-Semitic protestors who call for meeting violence with violence.

The Great Turning: U.S. solar power generation will grow 75% from 163 billion kilowatthours (kWh) in 2023 to 286 billion kWh in 2025. Electric car sales in 2023 were 3.5 million higher than in 2022, a 35% year-on-year increase. Amazon deforestation has fallen 53% compared to last year, with the help of indigenous guardianship. Grassroots activists and peacebuilding movements that bring Jews, Israelis and Palestinians together for peace, justice and coexistence have a higher profile than at any time in the past 20 years. Some students are dancing while they protest peacefully for peace:

@hellokaramvir🪯❤️🖤💚 The caption js placed over their faces for anonymity. This was not only requested by the students but is also the right thing to do. #columbiauniversity #nyc #encampment #fyp

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Here’s the key: all of these stories are true. All of them are happening. Yet it’s so easy to get caught up arguing about which one is happening, or which one is winning. You know: conflict.

I do care about facts. I care about discernment. Unsustainable things can’t continue. Calling out injustice, speaking up about what’s wrong has its place. And part of me gets seduced by engaging in predictions and spotting trends.

But there’s a competing strategy I learned interviewing parenting experts and skilled educators for many years. It’s to intentionally praise and shine a light on the behavior you want to see, instead of spending your energy condemning what you don’t like. You say “more of this,” and “let’s do this!”

If you want The Great Turning—and I do, oh I do! —you have to be the great turning. We have to overcome our innate negativity bias and propensity to concentrate on threats. Or, retreat and be lulled by a sense of false normalcy. We have to grow our moral ambition and spend as much time idolizing and studying and enacting goodness and caring as we currently obsess over conventional success (BAU) and the many, many things out there to fear (U).

“You’re doing it wrong!” can’t be the only message we bring. If we have capacity, it’s also important to pay attention so we can say, “You’re doing it right!”

What have you seen lately that’s going right?

The Climate Emotions Wheel has a new design and a dedicated page! Here’s the emoji version:

Here’s a poem about spring.