What I've learned since moving to D.C. (some of which should be obvious): 0178

8851.  Accepting responsibility for our problems is the first step to solving them;

8852.  A lot of people hesitate to take responsibility for their problems because they believe that to be responsible for your problems is to also be at fault for your problems;

8853.  There are problems that we aren’t at fault for yet we are still responsible for them;

8854.  Fault results from choices that have already been made.  Responsibility results from the choices you’re currently making every second of every day;

8855.  There’s a difference between blaming someone else for your situation and that person actually being responsible for your situation.  Nobody else is ever responsible for your situation, but you.  Many people may be to blame for your unhappiness, but nobody is ever responsible for your unhappiness, but you.  This is because you always get to choose how you see things, how you react to things, how you value things.  You always get to choose the metric by which to measure your experiences;

8856.  Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new beginning;

8857.  Crying after sex . . . check;

8858.  “Pesci” means “fishes” in Italian . . . so Joe Pesci is really “Joe Fishes;”

8859.  Apparently, restaurants don’t like it when you’re drinking your cocktails to-go on a bench in front of their building;

8860.  Action isn’t everything, but without it nothing will ever change/improve;

8861.  We all get dealt cards.  Some of us get better cards than others.  And while it’s easy to get hung up on our cards and feel we got screwed over, the real game lies in the choices we make with those cards, the risks we decide to take and the consequences we choose to live with.  People who consistently make the best choices in the situations they’re given are the ones who eventually come out ahead in poker just as in life.  And it’s not necessarily the people with the best cards;

8862.  Sometimes what we see when looking at others depends on the window through which we are looking;

8863.  You don’t really need someone to complete you.  You only need someone to accept you completely;

8864.  (The original) Merriweather Post Pavilion was designed by Frank Gehry;

8865.  Rice and hoisin sauce is (pretty) tasty;

8866.  Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt;

8867.  Putting pears in oatmeal is a good combination;

8868.  Because of the amygdala, we pay 10 times more attention to negative news than to positive news.  And, for that reason, every news source is putting out 10 times more negative stories than positive ones.  It’s purely a matter of marketing to capture our attentions for more advertising revenue;

8869.  The average American adult spends nearly 6 hours each day watching TV – about 30% of our waking hours.  Yet few pause to consider how this massive input impacts our outlook;

8870.  A study of 180 undergraduate students found that anxiety and total mood disturbance increased after watching a 15-minute news segment.  Those levels remained elevated unless students explicitly engaged in relaxation exercises following the viewing period;

8871.  A 2017 study by the American Psychological Association found that over half of Americans feel news consumption causes them stress that leads to sleep deprivation and increased anxiety;

8872.  What you let into your mind influences your thoughts, conversations and feelings, which can drive fear and anxiety for many.  These emotional states are associated with increased levels of cortisol also commonly known as the “stress hormone,” which often causes inflammation and reduces the immune system’s efficacy;

8873.  A woman can get a hickey on her breast. . . . Who knew?

8874.  Breast hickey . . . check;

8875.  If money is your hope for independence you will never have it.  The only real security that a person can have in this world is a reserve of knowledge, experience and ability;

8876.  You are already choosing in every moment of every day what you care about so change is as simple as choosing to care about something else;

8877.  People think happiness is a destination and not a choice.  People think love is something that just happens and not something that you work for.  People think being “cool” has to be practiced and learned from others rather than be invented for yourself;

8878.  Each individual gets to decide what is “enough” and that love can be whatever you let it be;

8879.  What goes on when you sleep: 1.  Your brain recharges; 2.  Your body releases important hormones; and 3.  Your cells repair themselves;

8880.  You need different amounts of sleep depending on your age: 1.  Newborns (0-3 months): 14-17 hours; 2.  Infants (4-11 months): 12-15 hours; 3.  Toddlers (1-2 years): 11-14 hours; 4.  Preschoolers (3-5): 10-13 hours; 5.  School-age children (6-13): 9-11 hours; 6.  Teenagers (14-17): 8-10 hours; 7.  Younger adults (18-25): 7-9 hours; 8.  Adults (26-64): 7-9 hours; and 9.  Older adults (65+): Sleep range is 7-8 hours;

8881.  Men have dreams about other men 70% of the time, but women dream about women and men equally;

8882.  We can only dream about faces we’ve already seen whether we actively remember them or not;

8883.  Parasomnia is a type of sleep disorder that makes you do unnatural movements despite being asleep such as sleep driving, writing bad checks, murder, child molestation and rape;

8884.  12% of people dream only in black and white a number that used to be higher prior to the advent of color televisions;

8885.  Dreaming is normal.  People who do not dream generally have personality disorders;

8886.  Sleep positions may determine your personality: 1.  Fetal (41%) – Gruff initially, but have warm and open hearts; 2.  Log (15%) – Social butterflies; 3.  The Yearner (13%) – Perceived as open, but truly suspicious; 4.  Soldier/Corpse (8%) – Reserved; 5.  Freefall (7%) – Fun and fantastic at parties; and 6.  Starfish (5%) – Excellent listeners;

8887.  1 in 4 married couples sleep in separate beds;

8888.  British soldiers were the first to develop a method of staying up 36 hours without sleep.  When fatigued, they put on special visors that emulated the brightness of a sunrise and it woke them up;

8889.  Koalas are the longest-sleeping mammals (at 22 hours/day) while giraffes which sleep only 1.9 hours a day (in 5- to 10-minute increments) are the shortest-sleeping;

8890.  When dolphins sleep, only half of their brains shut down.  The other halves stay awake to help with breathing cycles;

8891.  You’ll die from sleep deprivation before starvation.  It takes 2 weeks to starve, but 10 days without sleep can kill you;

8892.  Blind people can still see images in dreams;

8893.  Within 5 minutes of waking, 50% of your dream is forgotten, and, within 10 minutes, 90% is gone;

8894.  1 out of 50 teenagers still wet their beds;

8895.  You cannot change your destination overnight, but you can change your direction overnight;

8896.  Forgiveness isn’t something you do for the other person, it’s a gift you give to yourself;

8897.  Forgiveness has its own pace and its own grace.  It’s a process and that process may look different for everyone, but it doesn’t start until you’re willing;

8898.  No matter how materially wealthy or otherwise lucky you may be a blackened heart taints everything;

8899.  Proactively deal with emotions.  We should never become victims of our emotions.  That’s not to say that we should suppress them.  We just need to be consciously aware of them and avoid reacting emotionally;

8900.  Don’t waste time with self-pity.  We can be our own worst enemies especially when we drown ourselves in the negative light of the worst-case scenario we tend to paint for ourselves.  Although it can be tempting to exaggerate our circumstances, face reality, take action, practice gratitude, serve others and get outside of yourself;

What I've learned since moving to D.C. (some of which should be obvious): 0177

8801.  Being “average” has become the new standard of failure;

8802.  When a culture’s standard of success is to “be extraordinary,” it then becomes better to be at the extreme low end of the bell curve than to be in the middle because at least there you’re still special and deserve attention;

8803.  A lot of people are afraid to accept mediocrity because they believe that if they accept it, they’ll never achieve anything, never improve and that their life won’t matter;

8804.  The rare people who do become truly exceptional at something do so not because they believe they’re exceptional.  They become amazing because they’re obsessed with improvement.  And that obsession with improvement stems from an unerring belief that they are in fact not that great at all.  It’s anti-entitlement;

8805.  People who become great at something become great because they understand that they’re not already great.  They are mediocre.  They are average.  And that they could be so much better;

8806.  Your actions actually don’t matter that much in the grand scheme of things;

8807.  The vast majority of your life will be boring and not noteworthy and that’s okay;

8808.  Owning your mundane existence will actually free you to accomplish what you truly wish to accomplish without judgment or lofty expectations;

8809.  Limitations, failings, losses and setbacks are temporary.  Pain and uncertainty pass.  Time heals, but don’t watch time fly by;

8810.  Our values determine the nature of our problems and the nature of our problems determines the quality of our lives;

8811.  If what we value is unhelpful, if what we consider success/failure is poorly chosen then everything based upon those values, the thoughts, the emotions, the day-to-day feelings, will all be out of whack.  Everything we think and feel about a situation ultimately comes back to how valuable we perceive it to be;

8812.  What is objectively true about your situation is not as important as how you come to see the situation, how you choose to measure it and value it;

8813.  Problems may be inevitable, but the meaning of each problem is not;

8814.  We get to control what our problems mean based on how we choose to think about them the standard by which we choose to measure them;

8815.  The question is not whether we evaluate ourselves against others; rather the question is by what standard do we measure ourselves;

8816.  Our values determine the metrics by which we measure ourselves and everyone else;

8817.  If you want to change how you see your problems, you have to change what you value and/or how you measure failure/success;

8818.  Pleasure is great, but it’s a horrible value to prioritize your life around;

8819.  Pleasure is a false god.  Research shows that people who focus their energy on superficial pleasures end up more anxious, more emotionally unstable and more depressed.  Pleasure is the most superficial form of life satisfaction and, therefore, the easiest to obtain and the easiest to lose;

8820.  Pleasure while necessary in life (in certain does) isn’t by itself sufficient;

8821.  Pleasure is not the cause of happiness; rather it is the effect.  If you get the other stuff right (the other values and metrics) then pleasure will naturally occur as a by-product;

8822.  Research shows that once one is able to provide for basic physical needs (food, shelter and so on), the correlation between happiness and worldly success quickly approaches zero;

8823.  The other issue with overvaluing material success is the danger of prioritizing it over other values such as honesty, nonviolence and compassion;

8824.  When people measure themselves not by their behavior, but by the status symbols they’re able to collect then not only are they shallow, but they’re probably assholes as well;

8825.  People who base their self-worth on being right about everything prevent themselves from learning from their mistakes.  They lack the ability to take on new perspectives and empathize with others.  They close themselves off to new and important information;

8826.  Denying negative emotions leads to experiencing deeper and more prolonged negative emotions and to emotional dysfunction;

8827.  Constant positivity is a form of avoidance and not a valid solution to life’s problems;

8828.  The trick with negative emotions is to: 1.  Express them in a socially acceptable and healthy manner; and 2.  Express them in a way that aligns with your values;

8829.  When we force ourselves to stay positive at all times we deny the existence of our life’s problems.  And, when we deny our problems, we rob ourselves of the chance to solve them and generate happiness.  Problems add a sense of meaning and importance to our life.  Thus, to duck our problems is to lead a meaningless (even if supposedly pleasant) existence;

8830.  Some of the greatest moments of one’s life are not pleasant, not successful, not known and not positive;

8831.  Nail down some good values and metrics and pleasure and success will naturally emerge as a result.  These things are side effects of good values.  By themselves, they are empty highs;

8832.  Good values are: 1.  Reality-based; 2.  Socially constructive; and 3.  Immediate and controllable;

8833.  Bad values are: 1.  Superstitious; 2.  Socially destructive; and 3.  Not immediate or controllable;

8834.  People who are terrified of what others think about them are actually terrified of all the shitty things they think about themselves being reflected back at them;

8835.  Some examples of good, healthy values: honesty, innovation, vulnerability, standing up for oneself, standing up for others, self-respect, curiosity, charity, humility and creativity;

8836.  Some examples of bad, unhealthy values: dominance through manipulation or violence, indiscriminate sex, feeling good all of the time, always being the center of attention, not being alone, being liked by everybody and being rich for the sake of being rich;

8837.  You’ll notice that good, healthy values are achieved internally;

8838.  Bad values are generally reliant on external events;

8839.  Values are about prioritization.  What are the values that you prioritize above everything else and that, therefore, influence your decision-making more than anything else?

8840.  When we have poor values, that is poor standards we set for ourselves and others, we are essentially caring about the things that don’t matter, things that in fact make our lives worse;

8841.  When we choose better values, we are able to divert our cares to something better, toward things that matter, things that improve the state of our well-being and that generate happiness, pleasure and success as side effects;

8842.  “Self-improvement” is really about prioritizing better values and choosing better things to care about.  Because when you care better, you get better problems.  And, when you get better problems, you get a better life;

8843.  Often the only difference between a problem being painful or being powerful is a sense that we chose it and that we are responsible for it;

8844.  If you’re miserable in your current situation chances are it’s because you feel like some part of it is outside your control and that there’s a problem you have no ability to solve a problem that was somehow thrust upon you without your choosing;

8845.  When we feel that we’re choosing our problems we feel empowered.  When we feel that our problems are being forced upon us against our will we feel victimized and miserable;

8846.  There is a simple realization from which all personal improvement and growth emerges.  This is the realization that we, individually, are responsible for everything in our lives no matter the external circumstances;

8847.  We don’t always control what happens to us, but we always control how we interpret what happens to us as well as how we respond;

8848.  Whether we consciously recognize it or not we are always responsible for our experiences.  Choosing not to consciously interpret events in our lives is still an interpretation of the events of our lives.  Choosing to not respond to the events in our lives is still a response to the events in our lives.  Whether we like it or not we are always taking an active role in what’s occurring to and within us.  We are always interpreting the meaning of every moment and every occurrence.  We are always choosing the values by which we live and the metrics by which we measure everything that happens to us.  Often the same event can be good or bad depending on the metric we choose to use.  We are always choosing whether we recognize it or not;

8849.  In reality, there is no such thing as not caring.  It’s impossible.  We must all care about something.  To not care about anything is still caring about something;

8850.  With great responsibility comes great power.  The more we choose to accept responsibility in our lives the more power we will exercise over our lives;