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You could be happier
Yeah, no shit, John!
I’ll explain.
Monday’s show features Dr. Laurie Santos, professor of the most popular class in the 321 year history of Yale University (“the Harvard of universities”!), which is all about happiness. The class was so ridiculously popular that Yale began offering it free to anyone who wants to take it online.
In this course you will engage in a series of challenges designed to increase your own happiness and build more productive habits. As preparation for these tasks, Professor Laurie Santos reveals misconceptions about happiness, annoying features of the mind that lead us to think the way we do, and the research that can help us change. You will ultimately be prepared to successfully incorporate a specific wellness activity into your life.
She’s also the host of the excellent podcast The Happiness Lab.
This is my favorite song:
YOU GUYS! Today I interviewed Hrishikesh Hirway
The guy from so many podcasts, including Song Exploder. And from one tv show called Song Exploder:
One of my favorite episodes of the podcast is the one with Semisonic, where Dan Wilson (center in that illustration) talks about the double meaning of this huge hit. Yes, it’s about a bar closing. But it’s also about the birth of his daughter and the long hospitalization after it.
The guy on the right in that illustration is John Munson, whom I have worked with for a very long time. John is personable, funny, warm, and friend to all. The brooding image there just makes me laugh and laugh and laugh.
ONLY 1 in 4?
The CDC (“The Harvard of centers for disease control!”) says that during the pandemic 25% of young people sought out mental health care. I think some people might be surprised that the number is so high. Not me! I’m impressed that it’s so LOW! I am impressive and contrary!
It’s great that more people are seeking care and really great that they’re finding it. But the numbers also indicate that people in historically advantaged groups are getting more of the help.
Researchers found differences in who was most likely to receive mental health treatment by race among adults aged 18 to 44. Non-Hispanic white adults were the most likely, with 30.4 percent having done so in 2021.
Only 14.8 percent of non-Hispanic Black adults, 12.8 percent of Hispanic adults and 10.8 percent of non-Hispanic Asian adults reported receiving treatment in 2021.
Today in headlines I have to stare at for a while because I don’t understand them right away…
Putting Mental Health On The Table with Skull and Cakebones
Entrepreneur magazine, a magazine I should read because I’m a small business owner, BUT NEVER HAVE has a cool podcast episode about an enterprising chef.
Sascha Biesi, owner of Skull & Cakebones had been in various treatments for depression over the years, finally ending with ECT (electroconvulsive therapy). Biesi uses the outdated term “electric shock therapy” here, which is her business and her head.
"I started using cooking and baking as a way to start trying to remember more than one thing at a time, and that was how I got really, really good at the vegan stuff. It was after electric shock therapy that I just sort of woke up from that experience with this ability to be a vegan chef," Sascha said.
I think every culture, no matter how ancient or how modern, how advanced or primitive, has their own version of Adam & the Ants. That’s just common anthropology, idiots.
I’m screen shotting this before it gets taken down
Farewell, Queen Elizabeth and your oddly modular hand.