Silver Lining Consulting,LLC

11/24/2024

You don’t have to become a Buddhist monk to realize the value of contemplating hard questions without clear answers, Arthur C. Brooks writes. https://theatln.tc/pjnscuJ9

In 2012, two psychologists asked a sample of young adults how often they considered questions such as “Do you ever reflect on your purpose in life?” and “Do you ever think about the human spirit or what happens to life after death?” They found that the people who spent more time on these questions tended to score higher than their peers on a variety of measures defined as spiritual intelligence, critical existential thinking, sense of life’s meaning, curiosity, and well-being, Brooks writes.

As a society, Brooks believes, “we have become spiritually flabby and psychically out of shape because we haven’t been getting in the reps on challenging existential questions.” To address this problem, he writes, “I’d like to see a revolution in existential thinking, a craze for pondering life’s mysteries … But short of its becoming a reality, I can suggest a routine you can follow.”

First, Brooks suggests, schedule your mental workout. Choose a period of time each day—say, 30 minutes—that you can dedicate to weighing tough questions of real importance. Ban all devices and allow no distractions, and then figure out in advance what existential or spiritual challenges you plan to consider. Secondly, go for a long walk, he suggests. And lastly, he writes, invite boredom, “which is crucial for abstract reasoning and insight, because it helps stimulate the brain’s default-mode network, the set of brain regions that becomes active when the outside world does not impinge on our mind’s attention. A good way to do this is to run errands and make short trips without taking your phone. At first, you will still feel the reflex to reach for it every few seconds. But fairly quickly, you will start to experience your default-mode network sparking up again, perhaps for the first time in a long time.”

Read more: https://theatln.tc/pjnscuJ9

🎨: Jan Buchczik

11/24/2024

11/24/2024

Silver Lining Consulting will be closed and unavailable 11/26/2024 to 12/05/2024.

If you are in immediate need of mental health support please contact 988, Bert Nash Treatment and Recovery Center or your local emergency services.

11/07/2024

It may seem hopeless right now, but it is not. There are those out there who care about you and support you. As always, we provide a safe space for those who need it. Do not be afraid to ask for help. We are here for you and we fight for you, no matter what.

11/07/2024

To kill the dining room is to design American loneliness, M. Nolan Gray wrote in June. https://theatln.tc/QcE44lJt

“The dining room is the closest thing the American home has to an appendix—a dispensable feature that served some more important function at an earlier stage of architectural evolution,” Gray writes. Classic, walled-off dining rooms now gather dust waiting for the next holiday. Americans have taken to eating in spaces “that double as kitchens or living rooms—a small price to pay for making the most of their square footage.”

But in many new apartments, “eating is relegated to couches and bedrooms, and hosting a meal has become virtually impossible,” Gray writes. “The apex predator of the dining room is the ‘great room’—a combined living room and kitchen, bridged by an open dining space.” And that’s what people want. Surveys from 2015 and 2016 show that “86 percent of households want a combined kitchen and dining room—a preference accommodated by only 75 percent of new homes,” Gray continues. “If anything, the classic dining room isn’t dying fast enough for most people’s taste.”

“The transition from the classic dining room to the great room mirrors the changes in gender norms and family formation that have occurred over the past 125 years,” Gray writes. Sectioned-off rooms “were designed around creating a separate sphere for ‘the help,’” or, when unaffordable, the women in the family.

But now, people are reallocating their limited square footage to maximize personal space—walk-in closets, or bigger bedrooms, especially for those living alone or with roommates. “As households and dining spaces have contracted, the number of people eating alone has grown,” Gray continues. “According to a 2015 report by the Food Marketing Institute, nearly half the time we spend eating is spent in isolation, a central factor in America’s loneliness epidemic and a correlate to a range of physical- and mental-health problems.”

“How many more dinners would be shared if we had the space to host guests?"

📸: Carolyn Drake / Magnum

10/09/2024

09/03/2024

September is Su***de Prevention Awareness Month. Not everyone shows the same signs that they’re thinking about su***de, but if you or a loved one are experiencing these behaviors or feelings, help is available. Learn more: https://at.apa.org/b9c
***deprevention

09/03/2024

09/03/2024

Good listening can be hard. Too often, we try do something else simultaneously, talk about ourselves, or offer advice. But the best listeners avoid all that and focus on the other person. Here's how.