Peace

Anxiety

The mind is divine. It gives us superpowers, and the dots we electrochemically connect make us human. Such capacity allows us to achieve extraordinary things. At the same time, this mysterious grey matter can also hold us back and even cause havoc.

Anxiety is assuming failure in advance. As a mental cousin to fear, anticipation, worrying, and perhaps even desire, anxiety is like an unspoken agreement you make with yourself to be unhappy until you get what you want.This exhausting emotion is all in your head, yet the way anxiety affects your body is absolutely real.

For those who pursue greatness, the more we try to achieve, the tighter we wind the strings of life. When harnessed, this fuels strength, creativity, grit, and persistence. As the tension tightens, however, something is bound to break. Healthy habits and being mindful of your personal bandwidth reduces the frequency and severity of such breakdowns, but with the relentless pressure from never-ending progress, it seems impossible to completely avoid disquiet.

The most common way we attempt to manage such angst is to stop the pain by seeking reassurance. The nourishment of overthinking every scenario in an unknown future may satisfy the moment, but scratching this itch usually makes things worse. Even if we answer every possible question, the willingness to indulge the worry sets a precedent that keeps you coming back to what can become an endless loop.

An alternate approach is to acknowledge the suffering. Don’t run from it. Appreciate the relentless internal narrative you’re dealing with. Breathe. Be thankful for having something you care this much about. Find peace in knowing you’ve done your best to tip odds in your favor, but invite doubt and welcome an opportunity to be wrong. The anxiety is here and it’s dramatic, but it’s also normal. Let thoughts float by, focus your attention on what’s good, and allow time to heal the pain. Yes, this is like letting a forest fire burn without soothing it with water. It will get wild at first, but it eventually burns itself out. The scorched land is then ripe for renewal and less likely to burn again.

Extra Shot

Accepting that anxiety is inevitable may be a secret to finding equanimity.

By acknowledging anxiety, clarifying awareness helps us understand, even appreciate, the energy. This breaks the cycle and reduces the frequency of such misery. Courage over fear also adds an eagerness to lean on support systems, confirms confidence in how the pain will pass, and allows the mind to stay centered with less climactic swings.

Brewed From Within
#96 📖 Life & Happiness

By Ben McDougal, ago

Endowment

Leaving a legacy seems to motivate those who change the world. This leads to prolific focus and lasting ambition, but the psychological undertones are real.

Subconsciously needing to be loved, trying to counter death anxiety, and equating our legacy to symbolic immortality can slip toward self-centered intentions. A decorated life is legendary to the person living it, but a dilated ego becomes burdensome. This mental weight holds us back from living in the moment. It belittles simple pleasures. It fuels a fear of failure and disguises invigorating initiative by equating movement to risk. When the idea of leaving a legacy starts to echo a desire to be famous, impossible expectations harbor misery and unavoidable disappointment.

The entrepreneurial lifestyle is guided by leaders who create more than we consume, but there is freedom for those who are not engrossed with the hope of being remembered.

This may feel like an assault on the impacts we make or a wicked invitation to be complacent, but it’s neither. It’s forgiveness and a liberating release to keep building.

Brewed From Within
#124 📖 Life & Happiness

By Ben McDougal, ago

Creation vs. Consumption

Before the music, before the crowd, there’s one voice asking a simple question: Can you hear me? Creation starts here. Not with a perfect line or the finished song. But with the smallest test of presence.

EXTRA SHOT
This contribution was written by Corey Dion Lewis. Corey is a leader in healthcare who creates impact networks where care is equitable and shared far beyond the clinic.

Creation over consumption sounds like a slogan, but for most of us it’s a balancing act. Consumption is how we learn from the world around us. It’s also a comforting remedy that helps us reset. This supplement for the soul keeps us tranquil, but in excess consumption mutates into a drug devoured by a subconscious addiction.

We are all imaginative, and being creative makes us happier, but we live in a world where algorithms reward spectators. This has us scrolling, watching, and absorbing everybody else’s thoughts, pain, and opinions before we check in with our own. This does something to our mind, and it’s not neutral. Consumption without creation leads to overload. The American Psychological Association reports that heavy, unfiltered exposure to news and digital content is associated with higher stress, anxiety, and burnout. There’s just too much coming in. This feeds unfair comparisons. Suddenly, everyone else’s life is your own measuring stick. We start to feel like our voice, our story, and our unique angles do not matter as much as the polished content we continuously consume.

As the emcee of your own life, there’s no time to hope someone hands you the mic. We must choose ourselves, make sacrifices to unite an audience, step into the light, and even when our voice is untested, speak to add energy into the room. Whether we succeed or learn, such personal progression brings us to life as we feel the thrill of creation.

That is mental health in action. When we create, we regulate. When we speak, we release. When we name what we feel, it loses some of its power over us. Pressure turns into expression. More thoughts, often the hard and heavy ones, become art. The sounds, images, pages, and other multidimensional content become part of our creative practice. Creation is the path to descriptively understand systems, parts, processes, and how we make things better.

The beauty is, it doesn’t have to be dramatic or impressive. Drawing, even badly, reduces stress and eases anxiety. Gardening can do the same. Cooking with intention—chopping, seasoning, tasting—pulls you into the present. All forms of creativity ask your brain to be active, engaged, and creative. This produces positive emotions.

Creation builds a sense of mastery and progress. This strengthens self-esteem and resilience. It gives you a channel for self-expression, so emotions and experiences are being worked with, not just numbed by distractions. Over time, crafted creations become the highlights of your stories. These bookmarks add depth to future moments and drive toward a joyful side of our own mental health continuum.

While consumption can bump our spirits more toward a depressive state, the goal is not zero consumption. Some of what you consume is nourishing. It feeds your ideas, your learning, and your rest. The balancing act is spending more of your day making, expressing, and contributing than you do scrolling, binging, or buying.

We don’t have to change everything overnight. We don’t need a ten-step plan or a perfect morning routine. We need one small moment each day where we choose to create instead of consume—one page, one sketch, one idea voiced, one boundary set, one feeling named. Creation over consumption is not a rule; it’s a relationship we build with our own voice. Express one true thing in your own way, knowing we need you and await your creations.

Brewed From Within
#97 📖 Life & Happiness

By Ben McDougal, ago

Perpetuity

There are infinite ways in which perpetuity could be good or bad, but proficient happiness, trust, love, hard work, fun, generosity, learning, wonder, and action seem like safe bets.

As we traverse the entrepreneurial lifestyle, setbacks are inevitable, but each conquered setback makes us more resilient. As resiliency bonds with wisdom, focused determination makes setbacks less distracting. Eventually, setbacks become more like interesting obstacles for trained problem-solvers. This seasoned mindset welcomes suffering and unlocks the wild cards of consistency and persistence.

Passion is overused as a motivating factor, and enthusiastic storytelling is easier for extroverts to fake. The key to lasting success is more like an energizing obsession that makes us build when others don’t. We savor the quests we were called to pursue and push through the dips that make others quit. We don’t need a map and find comfort in the unknowns, as we all continue making a ruckus every step of the way. Ω

Brewed From Within
#125 📖 Life & Happiness

By Ben McDougal, ago

Conspicuous Kindness

Kindness enhances integrity and welcomes other good vibes. It’s empathetic but not without boundaries.

Consistency may be what people want in business, but the discipline to stay centered is challenged by constant change, and history makes it hard to imagine world peace. If war and the winds of outrage are human nature, conspicuous kindness can help de-escalate tension and heal the future.

Acts of kindness are seen every day, but what happens when conflict tests humanity? We long for a picturesque utopia where peace and progress co-exist, but reality is altered when humans play by their own personal and political truths. This unavoidable imbalance combined with complexity make global alignment close to impossible. Interplanetary travel may shift geopolitical stress, but when survival or perceived ownership is at stake, desperation sets in. This instinctive reaction devolves into animosity when anonymity lacks an interest in kindness and isolation fuels fear that apparently can justify begrudging rage.

Fortunately, life on Earth has long been resilient.
Unfortunately, any single planet has limitations.

With 8–10 billion humans consuming finite resources and our species altering the earth like never before, conflict may be inevitable. If we know conflict is coming, can we extend the kindness we teach children to our shared experience with friends and foes? What equilibrium must humans achieve to make everyone feel thankful, appreciated, motivated, and significant? Kindness cannot be the only answer, but it feels like part of an equation where we assume positive intent, welcome the opportunity to be wrong, appreciate healthy debates without regret, and let others lead.

If vulnerability is necessary, how can we lean into kindness without being taking advantage of? Start with boundaries and expectations. Be clear about what we are willing and not willing to do. With edges set, kindness does not have to mean weakness; we can be kind and firm at the same time.

Externally, consider the intentions of those you are interacting with and trust your instincts. If something feels off, take a step back to re-evaluate the situation. As you do, keep in mind that people’s life experiences impact innate responses. Was trust broken in the past? Has there been generational oppression that is destined to create tension? When evil is normalized, virtue feels unfathomable. Perhaps when kindness feels removed, kindness is needed the most.

Brewed From Within
#122 📖 Life & Happiness

BONUS CONTEXT

“I believe that leaning into conspicuous kindness without being taken advantage of starts with setting boundaries and expectations. It is important to be clear about what you are willing and not willing to do, and to communicate this to those around you. Additionally, it is important to be mindful of the intentions of those you are interacting with and to trust your instincts. If something feels off, it’s okay to take a step back and re-evaluate the situation. Finally, it is important to remember that kindness does not have to mean weakness; it is possible to be kind and firm at the same time.” –BEN BOT

By Ben McDougal, ago