If you care a lot about the world and the constant flood of bad news is wearing you down, this episode is for you. I talk about how a deeply cynical worldview fed into a year of severe depression in my mid-30s, how I got out of it, and the practical steps I took to unwind my doomer mindset. The good news is that the things that made me suffer less also made me more useful to the world. You don’t have to choose between seeing things clearly and being okay.
In this episode
- Feeding my mind on news, worry and doom works just as reliably as a pizza-only diet works on your body.
- Being depressed while “living the dream”: successful business, financially independent, location freedom, and still the worst I’d ever felt.
- The odd way out: counting my repeating thought loops on a tally app, which interrupted them, plus long, low-effort meditation.
- My first psilocybin experience, prepared as a careful therapeutic session, and the pure parent-to-child kind of love it let me feel for myself.
- Letting go of my “sharpen the axe or chop” obsession with performance, and letting myself enjoy life before the work is done.
- Why your feeds look worse than the world: negativity bias, hedonic adaptation and platforms that optimize for engagement.
- Pundits have terrible track records. If someone could really predict the future they’d be rich. Try putting money on your own worries.
- Pick one battle and leave the rest to others, the oxygen mask principle, and whether it’s cruel to bring children into this world.