I wish I hadn't looked

A barrel of rotten apples?

Happy Friday…

I read a human-behavior/philosophy article that stuck with me like an ear worm. Like when you hear “We are the Champions” and can’t get it out of your head.

Sorry. lol :)

It said because of our negativity bias or some such foible of human nature, we’re more likely to read articles that have a negative spin than a positive one.

You know. Like, instead of saying “tips to improve your writing” a more effective title would be “mistakes only amateur writers make” or “biggest writing mistakes” or maybe “dumbest writing mistakes I’ve ever seen”

Stuff like that.

Just focus on the negative. Push insecurity buttons or imply doom.

Honestly, even though it rung true and made sense, it kind of ticked me off. Because really, isn’t there enough negativity in the world?

That’s the crap advertisers and the media are made of.

It’s how they sell everything from cosmetics to diet products. By pushing our buttons. Telling us we smell bad, have bad breath, we’re not pretty enough, thin enough, our thighs are too big, our eyes are too small. Etc. And since clicks are cash, the media does the same.

But you know. Tick tock, time passes.
And I kept thinking about it.

So I looked at my email stats. And now?

I wish I hadn’t looked.

Know what my top emails are? Know which have highest open rates?

1) Another one down
2) Why Medium is hard for authors
3) When it rains, it pours. Bigotry on Medium.

I could go on. Because, there’s more. It kind of runs from negative to positive, in terms of open rates and response rates. The ones where I bash someone for doing a crappy thing —like rich people not paying their staff during the pandemic— those have the most opens and most comments, too.

We all do it. I’m just as guilty. It’s like we can’t help ourselves.

Problem is, it’s not cake…

When my daughter was little, she had a book called “Too Much Birthday.” It was a Berenstain Bears book. Remember those?

Little bear enjoyed a birthday and wistfully said wouldn’t it be nice if we could have birthdays every day? Mama Bear said no, she didn’t think so. But little bear did.

So Mama said they’d have a birthday every day. Cake, every day. And they’d see.

After a while, little bear was tired of cake.
Mama, please. No more cake.

It’s one thing to have too much of a good thing, but negativity, button pushing and doom and gloom were never good things.

What happens when we have too much of a bad thing?

Not much we can do about how the human brain is wired, I suppose.
But even less chance of changing anything if we don’t even see it.

I’m going to try watch for that.
Hope you will, too.

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“There is little choice in a barrel of rotten apples”

― William Shakespeare

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Hope you’ll follow along…

I’ve created a new publication to collect my own writing because the profile pages are a gong show and I’m planning to chase fewer publications. You’ll find it here;

https://medium.com/linda-caroll

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What I wrote this week:

I don’t come bearing sales pitches and affiliate links. Only words. Hoping something I write might resonate. It feeds my heart when you read. So thank you.

• Don’t Confuse Listicles and Numbered Posts. They’re not the same.

• The Hardest Part of Good Writing Isn’t Skill. It’s Being Interesting.

• No One Got Sick Because Donald Trump Lied

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If you enjoyed this, please click the heart. Substack hearts are like claps on Medium, they don’t pay, but are a nice gesture to say you enjoyed my writing. :)

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:)
Linda