Rewiring the brain to be positive! :)

I just wanted to make a short post this evening. Today we had a work lunch (catered by Jack Stack!), and the focus was about how having a positive outlook increases the quality of your work. (Watch the TED talk here. )

One of the suggestions at the end for rewiring the brain to be positive was to participate in one or more of the following activities for a month. I don't think I will actually be able to, but I'd love to try it at least for a few days!

1. List three things you are grateful for. I'll try not to have repeats! I'm grateful for a husband who makes me laugh, I'm grateful for the random photos and other art that makes my apartment a happy place to live in, and I am grateful that I get in-state tuition at the school I go to. 
2. Journal. This one seems pretty similar to the "gratitude" action, but you are supposed to write about something good that happened in the last 24 hours. I'm going with Eric and I decided to binge-watch Stranger Things from start to finish last night, the first time we have done that with a show. It was kind of fun and impulsive, especially since I start school this week! :) We were tired this morning but I was all like, "worth it! zzzz".
3. Exercise.  I take the stairs at work, I walked around the block during lunch and Eric and I went on an evening walk.
4. Meditation. I don't really know how to do that. I'll probably look up some videos on how to. The guy in the TED talk basically said that we need to train our brains to focus on the task at hand, one task at a time, instead of the ADD multi-tasking that we've all become accustomed to. Eric said he read something sort of similar today, about how we should all read long-form writing (like books and stuff, not just headlines). He said our brain changes if we get too used to the internet/social media style content, and that if we try to switch from that to reading a book, our brain has trouble focusing. I can attest to that for sure. I will say that starting my Intellectual Property textbook (and focusing on it intently) was my form of meditation today :) 
5. Random acts of kindness. Eh. I feel weird sharing these because it almost takes away from the niceness because it seems like bragging. I don't even know if this counts, but I gave a really good review of a primary care doctor I saw recently. She deserved it though, she was way more attentive than most doctors I've seen in my life! 

And I'll add one more category for the blog: Random photo that makes me happy.

-Sannah