Right Rev. Jake Owensby, Episcopal Bishop of Western Louisiana on hate ascending in Trump's wake * * *
Leadership consultant Marcel Schwantes relays Shawn Achor's 23-minute daily positivity regimen
1. (2m) Write down three acts of gratitude (ideally for 21 days) - trains the mind to scan for positives instead of negatives. This activity is the fastest way to teach optimism. "will significantly improve your optimism even six months later"; "raises success rates significantly"
2. (2m) Journal one positive experience - from the past 24 hours, for at least 21 days. Bullet point each detail you can remember. Prompts the mind to relive it, which reinforces the sense that the positive behavior matters. Anchor says it works because the brain can't differentiate between visualization and primary experience. In essence, you've just doubled the most meaningful experience in your brain. Reprograms the mind with "this trajectory of meaning running throughout your life". Chronic pain patients who did this for six weeks had reduced their pain medication by 50 percent six months later. (Question the cause/effect and control group implications though.)
3. (15m) Exercise - "a short burst of fun cardio activity (think hula hoops, working in the garden, dancing, or a brisk walk with the dog)" - trains the mind to believe "my behavior matters," which transfers/generalizes to other daily activities.
4. (2m) Meditation - focus on the rhythm of your breath. Trains mental focus and presence in the moment. Achor says it will "raise accuracy rates, improve levels of happiness, and drop stress levels." He did this with Google employees with great success.
5. (2m) Express kindness through a text or email - * * *
Reflecting on Amazon's wide range of "sexual wellness" accessories and subculture fashions, I got to wondering about right-wing religious organization boycotts. Just a few years back, Target and Best Buy came under fire from the liberal side of the spectrum for contributing to a PAC (MN Forward, touting "job creation" and "economic expansion") that in turn supported Republican Tom Emmer's run for Minnesota governor. Emmer was a particularly vile opponent of same-sex marriage, reciting sick, tired slippery-slope fallacious rhetoric that equates homosexuality with pedophilia and bestiality.
Happy ending, Emmer lost to Dem Mark Dayton; but in the meantime, HRC (Human Rights Campaign, not Killary) called for boycotts of Target and Best Buy. Target apologized and committed to more strategic consideration of its political spending AND internal policy development to strengthen LGBT equality.
So fast forward to 2015, when Target said "hey customers, use whatever restroom matches your gender identity" in contrast to NC's transphobic HB2 "bathroom law", far-right heads exploded and called for boycott. Needless to say, letting transwomen use the ladies room is not at all tantamount to letting male aggressors prey on women, and right-wing claims otherwise are ridiculous and patently disingenuous. In 2016 Target said their trans-inclusive policy didn't hurt sales at all.
But this was only one battlefield of the reactionary war to impose artificial heteronormativity. For example, it was only in 2010 that Florida stopped defending the 1977 Anita-Bryant-driven ban on homosexuals adopting. All the way back in 1977-80, Bryant's crusade to repeal Dade County's anti-discrimination statute prompted gay rights groups to call for boycott of Florida orange juice. Maybe this was not a terribly effective boycott in itself, but in the long run the fallout pretty much scuttled Bryant's career in entertainment, AND galvanized the queer-and-allied community to organize and resist on other fronts.
Boycott (or threats thereof) have been a weapon of both sides in the sexual revolution, albeit ineffective when wielded by tiny fringes like AFA's auxiliary "One Million Moms" (actually only a few thousand moms). The Campus Pride boycott against Chick-Fil-A looked counterproductive at the time, as heartland anti-gay partisans turned out in droves to parade their approval of exclusion - but in the midst of all that, CFA CEO Dan Cathy reached out to Campus Pride founder Shane Windmeyer. To hear Shane tell it, in the ensuing dialogue Cathy pledged closer scrutiny and ongoing conversation about the hate groups CFA had been supporting, such as AFA, Focus on the Family, and National Organization for Marriage. Snopes observes CFA's publicity statement a while later was not so clear about whether or which organizations with anti-gay elements they might continue supporting.
(paywalled, don't expect more than one free read per browser)
"The most important of the five: Write a positive email or text every morning praising or thanking someone you know. And do it for a different person each day. Achor says people who do this become known as positive leaders with strong social connections--the greatest predictor of long-term happiness."
Left the house at a normal time but arrived at my desk ~8:37, thanks to schools being closed and probably lots of other people taking the day off to cook, clean, shop etc.