What’s the Good News?

I don’t pay attention to the news much.

Sure, I have subscriptions to a few national newspapers and I occasionally check out the latest headlines on the internet, but I don’t spend much time on it at all.

Part of the reason I don’t choose to take in much news is that I believe the news media is as much a business as a service. Many of the people and organizations responsible for publishing information have a vested interest in getting and retaining your attention. With your attention comes subscriptions and revenue from advertising and other sources. Nothing wrong with that as long as you are aware of it.

But, the biggest reason I don’t read as much as I used to is it’s easy to get caught up in all the drama in the world. With Covid, the Ukraine crisis, the political situation in the U.S. and other countries, and of course the changing climate it’s easy to convince yourself that it’s all bad news.

Behind the headlines, people are living their lives. Many of us are living happy lives with challenges and opportunities. There is a lot of good in the world and it doesn’t get much attention.

One source of “news” that I do enjoy reading is a weekly newsletter called “reasons to be cheerful“.

This is a publication founded by David Byrne (from Talking Heads fame) that writes about good things happening all around us. Each week there are a handful of articles highlighting places in the world that are doing things from a place of love.

Someone told me that our brains are wired to latch onto “bad news” like velcro and skip past “good news” like Teflon. If that’s the case, it requires a little extra work to find and embrace the good and do our best to breeze past the onslaught of publicized drama.

How do you view the news? Do you consume it, or does it consume you? 

If you are looking for a bid dose of reasons to be cheerful, here are 192 reasons the world became a better place in 2021!!