“Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it.”

—Helen Keller

I was going to post something today about personal space, and how much my husband and I are enjoying having our offices separated—but it just seemed too frivolous in the wake of Superstorm Sandy. We’ve weathered a few hurricanes since we moved to Florida, but nothing like what the people in the northeast are experiencing with Sandy. More than 100 people have died, and more than one million homes are still without power, with a nor’easter bringing cold, snow and wind predicted for later this week. (Click here for a state-by-state summary of Sandy’s aftermath. Jason Good, who lives in New Jersey and still has no power, blogged about Sandy here.) 

I’ve been thinking about the people affected by Superstorm Sandy—wondering how I could help. I can’t volunteer up there, so I’m looking for ways to help right here. Cash donations may seem less personal, but they are highly useful to relief agencies. Cash doesn’t have to be sorted, packaged or transported, and agencies have more flexibility to provide for the true needs of survivors. Here are a few organizations that are taking donations for those affected by Sandy.

The Red Cross. Visit www.redcross.org, call 800-Red-Cross or text the word “Redcross” to 90999 to make a $10 donation. You can also give blood, since many blood drives had to be canceled because of Sandy.

In conjunction with the Red Cross, ABC is sponsoring a “Day of Giving” today.  All day long, ABC’s shows will offer viewers a chance to donate to those affected by the storm.

The Salvation Army provides food, clean-up kits, shelter and “emotional and spiritual care” to storm victims.

Feeding America operates food banks all over the US, and is distributing emergency food, water and supplies to the storm’s victims.

AmeriCares provides medicine, medical supplies and humanitarian aid.

Save the Children focuses on relief and support for children affected by Sandy. 

The Humane Society is working to help pets affected by the storm, especially those were not able to be evacuated with their families. 

In addition to the above organizations, you can visit the National Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster website for a list of volunteer organizations in your state.

I’ll get back to the personal space issue in a future post (and include some pictures of my husband’s new office). Today, I’m just grateful to have a roof over my head and electricity to power my household.

Do you get tired of being told to look on the bright side when you express a negative thought? Do you find yourself stifling your concerns out of a desire not to sound “negative”?

Turns out, there’s a place for negative, especially if it’s in the form of defensive pessimism.

I just finished reading The Positive Power of Negative Thinking, by Julie K. Norem, Ph.D.  In this book, Norem introduced me to the concepts of defensive pessimism and strategic optimism. People who use strategic optimism seek to avoid stirring up anxious feelings, often by setting high expectations, then not thinking about what could go wrong.  Those who use defensive pessimism set low expectations and mentally rehearse how things could go wrong.

On the surface, defensive pessimism sounds pretty dismal. However, Norem explains, “Defensive pessimism involves learning to tolerate negative emotions in order to get things done. [Defensive pessimists’] tolerance isn’t passive wallowing in negative feelings; it embodies confronting those feelings and rejecting the premise that feeling good should always be our most immediate aim.” 

These two strategies are used by people who have differing psychic make-ups: those who typically feel anxious and those who do not. Those who feel anxious need to find a way to handle their anxiety so that they can act, and those who don’t feel anxious need to find ways to stay anxiety-free. As Norem demonstrates, the strategies that work for one don’t work for the other, and if you try to change someone’s strategy, their performance suffers. Norem writes, “Defensive pessimism and strategic optimism develop in response to different experiences, and their strengths lie in the ways they address different problems. Defensive pessimism works to manage anxiety and help people feel more in control, whereas strategic optimism works to keep anxiety away and to protect self-esteem. In both cases, these strategies motivate effective action and often lead to good outcomes for those who use them.” (Norem notes that these concepts are different from dispositional optimism or pessimism.)

As in most things, if taken to extremes, both of these strategies can be dysfunctional. Defensive pessimists can spend too much time preparing for disaster and become such perfectionists that they never complete anything. Strategic optimists may become overconfident, ignore real dangers, or keep working at impossible tasks they should abandon

Norem doesn’t believe you should give up your natural tendencies. Whatever your strategy, be it defensive pessimism or strategic optimism, embrace it while making sure not to carry it too far. In addition, accept the strategies of others without trying to change them.

I think I fall more towards the defensive pessimist end of the spectrum, and this book clarified for me strategies to help get me through the anxious period and into the active period. (Truthfully, I often use “self-handicapper” strategies, discussed in chapter five—a tendency I need to overcome.)

Which do you use most often—defensive pessimism or strategic optimism?

I’m not alone in noticing how time accelerates as we grow older, and as the seasons grow ever more brief the holidays are gone in a wink.  This poem by Nancy Price about Halloween catches a little of that.  She’s an Iowan whose poems are so heartfelt, clear and useful that we could run them every week and none of you would complain. [Introduction by Ted Kooser.]

Trick or Treat

The ghost is a torn sheet,

the skeleton’s suit came from a rack in a store

the witch is flameproof, but who knows

what dark streets they have taken here?

Brother Death, here is a candy bar.

For the lady wearing the hat from Salem: gum.

And a penny for each eye, Lost Soul.

They fade away with their heavy sacks.

Thanks!  I yell just in time.

                                                 Thanks for another year!

I just had my last roll of film developed, and it made me kind of sad. I entered the digital photo age kicking and screaming. I loved my 35mm camera, loved the packets of shiny photos I had developed, loved the photo albums and scrapbooks I made with them. I feared my digital photos would never make it off my hard drive into prints. (I was mostly right about that, too. I don’t know which is worse: boxes of unsorted prints or computer files of unsorted images!)

I’m totally a digital convert now—I love the ability to take tons of photos and, even better, the simple software that allows me to crop and otherwise enhance them so I have images I think are beautiful. I’m looking into websites that allow you to make photo books to replace the scrapbooks and photo albums I used to make. The excitement of sending my film away and seeing if the photos I took are as good as I think they will be has been replaced by immediately checking the images, then popping a memory card into my laptop. Now that I’m converted to digital, I’m going to sell my 35mm SLR camera. It makes me a little sad, but I don’t need it or use it anymore.

So what was on that roll of film? Before-and-after photos of our kitchen when we changed the countertops from Formica to granite and added a new backsplash. (We made this home improvement right before Christmas—that’s when we do all our home improvements. It adds that perfect touch of panic to the festivities.) My husband and I were thinner. Nick was shorter. And Crusher was still with us. (Sniffle.)

Sometimes technology makes life better—it certainly has made photography more fun and easier for me, even though I still have a lot more to learn. My husband says I’ll soon exchange my paper books for an e-reader, but I’m not so sure about that. There’s more to reading a book than seeing words on a page.

How has technology made your life better? Is there anything you said you’d never do/try/use that you now find indispensable, like my digital camera?