Watching more news when you are depressed or anxious sounds completely counterintuitive. But is it? You are feeling down. Your life is not the way you would want it to be. Your child got an F in one of his classes. Your best friend is moving. Your mate left. You are having a hard time paying the rent or your morgage. You are full of aches and pains. What else can go wrong? 

I too often focus on the negatives in my life. Too little money. My husband has COPD and is becoming more helpless and I am becoming the fulltime caregiver and all that goes with it. It is hard to watch him struggle for breath. My teenage granddaughter recently had a beautiful healthy baby but makes $8.00 an hour. So my mind is filled with worries about the future.

My friends ask me how I remain positive in the midst of all this.

 “I watch the news,” I say.

They stare at me in wonder. “The news is nothing but negatives,” they say. “Wouldn’t that make you more depressed?”

“I guess it could, but I only watch for a short time each day,” I say. “You see, I watch what is going on in the world, the wars, the famine, the disasters and I thank God for my life, the place I live, the house I live in, the food I have, two wonderful children, and the incredible, loving husband I have had in my life for 46 years. I cannot but count my blessings.”

When I was working as a psychotherapist I rarely became depressed. I listened to seven or eight stories every day much worse than mine. But now that I’m retired I watch the news (not too much of it or it becomes depressing) and I am triggered to count my many blessings.

WATCH THE NEWS AND COUNT YOUR BLESSINGS.