
Ask HN: How are you staying positive? - gmemstr
With everything going on during the first few months of 2020, it might start to feel like a struggle to keep a positive mindset.
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he11ow
I think that if someone told me that there's a 99.8% chance I've won $5
million, I would have pretty much assumed I just became rich. And the stakes
here are not money, but actually life. That cheers me up.

I am worried for the elderly, and for the poor. But this also revived my
astonishment and appreciation of how magical our bodies are, in having a
mechanism to fight previously unseen attacks and develop antibodies. It's
really humbling.

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BrizzleKicks
I've found that the easiest way to stay positive is daily aerobic exercise and
eating healthily, and limiting alcohol intake.

If you are finding that doesn't make too much of a difference, keep a
gratitude diary, take St John's Wort and limit the news you are consuming.

It's amazing how little it takes to pull you out of even the darkest places.

Look after yourself :)

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kleer001
I try to keep a long view. Not just weeks and months and years. But centuries
and millennia. Watching paleontology pop sci vids help.

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austincheney
As a military guy who has deployed 4 times, including 2 years in Afghanistan,
things could be worse. Everything is peachy so long as you have food security
and basic utilities.

The real way to get through this isn't by trying to be happy. That is a
shallow goal destined to fail. I remember reading about how that actually
killed people in the story of Hanoi Hilton from the book Good To Great.

Instead be productive. Build something, write something, or help someone. Stay
active. Go jogging or exercise. Set realistic goals, crush them, and then set
more goals.

Things could be far worse. The whole world could be crumbling around you. You
could be isolated in a holocaust death camp. You could one day lose
everything. Bad things happen to good people. As bad as things could get
people still find a way to make the best of it. What's important is that you
accept the reality that is and how you move forward and stay focused.

