Justin Powell

“When facts are treated as if they were opinions, when there is no universal standard by which to determine truth in law, in science, in scholarship, or in the reporting of events of the day, the world becomes a place where lies become true, where people can believe what they want to believe, where there is no possibility of reaching any conclusion not predetermined by those who interpret the official, divinely inspired text.”
― Chris Hedges, American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America

“Heart disease is the Jeffrey Dahmer of modern ailments. It kills more than 25 percent of us. That’s one person in the United States dying of it every 37 seconds. Expanding fitness just a bit—the equivalent of a person improving their max running speed from five to six miles an hour—reduces the risk of heart disease by 30 percent, according to the American Heart Association. Next is cancer. It kills 22.8 percent of us. The most fit people face a 45 percent lower risk of dying from the disease, according to a study in the Annals of Oncology. Then we have accidents. They take 6.8 percent of us. If a person is in a serious car accident, being in shape drops their chances of dying by 80 percent, according to a study in the Emergency Medical Journal. If the docs have to operate—regardless of whether it’s an emergency or a planned surgery—fitter people also face fewer surgical complications and recover faster than unfit people, say scientists in Brazil.”
― Michael Easter, The Comfort Crisis: Embrace Discomfort to Reclaim Your Wild, Happy, Healthy Self

“But there are a lot of great pleasures you can get out of the experience of being alone with yourself,” said Bowker. In solitude you can find the unfiltered version of you. People often have breakthroughs where they tap into how they truly feel about a topic and come to some new understanding about themselves, said Bowker. Then you can take your realizations out into the social world, he added: “Building the capacity to be alone probably makes your interactions with others richer. Because you’re bringing to the relationship a person who’s actually got stuff going on in the inside and isn’t just a connector circuit that only thrives off of others.” Research backs solitude’s healthy properties. It’s been shown to improve productivity, creativity, empathy, and happiness, and decrease self-consciousness.”
― Michael Easter, The Comfort Crisis: Embrace Discomfort to Reclaim Your Wild, Happy, Healthy Self

“Research backs solitude’s healthy properties. It’s been shown to improve productivity, creativity, empathy, and happiness, and decrease self-consciousness.”
― Michael Easter, The Comfort Crisis: Embrace Discomfort to Reclaim Your Wild, Happy, Healthy Self