Column: The real challenge in life can be just trying to see the good

“Train your mind to see the good in everything. Positivity is a choice. The happiness of your life depends on the quality of your thoughts.”

— Anonymous

I am so blessed right now. I am sitting by a pond surrounded by woods and cornfields. As far as my eye can see, nature is all around me.

Just now a larger bird glided above one of the fields. The sound of a truck could be heard off in the distance, but not enough to ruin the picturesque scene. Every time I come here, I get inspired. I told one of the owners I hijacked it as my office. I just got a chuckle out of them.

Unfortunately, too many of us don’t know what the good even looks like. We are consumed with bad outcomes, negative people, health concerns, and that is not even looking at what is on TV.

We can get tunnel vision and see the world as a bad place. Yet actually, the world is getting better, not worse. Overall, world hunger is decreasing. Look at how many people are surviving cancer. The FBI says the murder rate dropped by 14.9% in 2024. Violent crime is dropping as well, according to the Pew Research Center. These are all great things.

I am not telling us to simply ignore reality or pretend bad things don’t happen. It seems to me we have an imbalance toward the negative aspects of life. I feel like, in reality, the good outweighs the bad. We have what is called the negativity bias, where we tend to see all that is wrong with the world instead of all that is going right. Also, when focusing on only what is going wrong, we close ourselves off to seeing what is going right.

Stacey and I were on a drive, and she said, “Oh, babe, look how the trees are changing colors.” We get so wrapped up in the negative things going on around us that we sometimes forget to see how blessed we are. We get wrapped up in the complications of life, and we disqualify the simple things. However, it's the simple things that make up the majority of life.

Stop and literally smell the roses. Focus on being present, not the past or the future. Life is complicated enough without our help.

Kyle Snyder can be emailed at kylesnyder86@yahoo.com.