#firstworldproblems

Twitter is a mechanism that I use predominantly for my own professional learning, but I do have a few guilty pleasures that I indulge in occasionally while on Twitter.  One of these is to explore the hashtag 'firstworldproblems.'  This hashtag is a lighthearted look at the things we all find ourselves complaining about from time to time.  The hashtag is based on the idea that there are problems that only people who live in the "first world" find themselves worrying about.  Some of my favorites are: "I am so bummed that the remote car starter in my new car doesn't turn on my heated seats #firstworldproblems"  and "I'm going to try to improve my sleep cycle by not looking at a screen an hour before going to bed. #firstworldproblems"

I search this hashtag for a couple of reasons.  The primary reason is that when someone posts a well thought-out, snarky or sardonic tweet it brings a smile to my day.  However, a secondary reason for monitoring this hashtag is a reminder to myself to keep things in perspective.

As a building leader, I face challenges, roadblocks and problems each and every day.  Some of these are my own and some are those that I am helping my staff solve.  From time to time, I find myself stuck in the negative, only seeing the roadblocks; losing site of the road ahead for the challenges in front of me.

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Knowing that this can happen to me occasionally, I actively seek opportunities to help me reflect on the positive.  Whether it be reminders of the great things that are going on in my school, my district or in my personal life, it is important for me to take time each day to reflect on the positive, the
successes and the joy that came from that day.

I have always felt like this was a good way to approach things and thought that it made a lot of sense; however, it wasn't until beginning to read a book entitle The Happiness Advantage by Shawn Achor that I realized there is a lot of science to support the benefits.

Research on the brain has shown that the brain develops patterns for how it views the world, deciding what information to let in to be processed and what information to filter completely out as if it never happened.  Our brains do this automatically all the time.  A simple example of this is when you are in a room for a long time and no longer hear a certain background noise until someone points it out to you.  This happens because our brain determines which stimuli to focus on and which to ignore.  It is an important survival mechanism that is a part of our evolutionary history.  (No need for the brain to be focussing on the dripping noise from the back of the cave when the saber-toothed tiger is entering the cave opening.)

The most interesting part is that this phenomenon can actually shape our reality.  "Repeated studies have shown that two people can view the same situation and actually see different things, depending on what they are expecting to see." (Achor, p. 96).  If our brains are "looking" for negative things, bad luck, and people out to get us, it will cue in on every instance where it may be happening.  As a result, our "reality" is that these negative things are always happening to us.  However, if our brains are "looking" for the positives, good luck and people that are supporting us we see those things more often.

I found it promising to read that it is possible to change your brain patterns and therefore change your view of reality.  Achor discusses in his book that we are currently bombarded with a lot of stimuli that train our brains to see the negative.  News coverage, trolls on the internet, uncivil political discourse and a whole host of other actions constantly bombard us with negative images that train our brains to think this is the way of the world.  However we have the power to change this perception.  

I have begun to do a simple activity that I got from Achor's book.  At the end of each day, I take five minutes to write down three things from that day or my life in general that are good things.  Research has shown that this simple little activity will "train the brain to be more skilled at noticing and focussing on possibilities for personal and professional growth."  (Achor, p. 101).  He also stresses the importance of practicing joyful things, things that make you smile and laugh.  Our brain needs practice with these things to be primed to notice them in our environment.

So if you catch me thumbing through #firstworldproblems on my iPhone, know that I am not goofing off.  Rather I am practicing some intensive brain training to build a happier, more positive brain that is always on the look out for opportunity and as a result will be more productive.