this post was submitted on 20 Sep 2025
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Showerthoughts
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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.
Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:
- Both “200” and “160” are 2 minutes in microwave math
- When you’re a kid, you don’t realize you’re also watching your mom and dad grow up.
- More dreams have been destroyed by alarm clocks than anything else
Rules
- All posts must be showerthoughts
- The entire showerthought must be in the title
- No politics
- If your topic is in a grey area, please phrase it to emphasize the fascinating aspects, not the dramatic aspects. You can do this by avoiding overly politicized terms such as "capitalism" and "communism". If you must make comparisons, you can say something is different without saying something is better/worse.
- A good place for politics is c/politicaldiscussion
- Posts must be original/unique
- Adhere to Lemmy's Code of Conduct and the TOS
If you made it this far, showerthoughts is accepting new mods. This community is generally tame so its not a lot of work, but having a few more mods would help reports get addressed a little sooner.
Whats it like to be a mod? Reports just show up as messages in your Lemmy inbox, and if a different mod has already addressed the report, the message goes away and you never worry about it.
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So it's either be uninformed or miserable.
I've struggled with that dilemma before, but in the end I think it's not really an either/or. Sure, it's easy to 'stay informed' by reading about upsetting shit on social media but it's not the only or the best way.
Encountering upsetting and infuriating headlines and news stories at random among more 'fun' content adds to the background stress of modern life "don't relax, a horrible thing is just sound the corner!". And memes or posts about stuff often simplify complex events and emphasises the emotional horror of the events.
I don't always suceeed, but I've tried to keep away from communities and sites that share politics / world events, but then spend a specific time each week actually reading articles and deeper dives on these issues. When I read a real article, that adds nuance and historical context I'm not less horrified or angry, but it's in a calmer and more productive sense than just "aaaa the world is fire and everything is awful".
I found a good rhythm for myself. I'm still subscribed to many political communities but I don't get involved in every post. Might sound self-evident, but it's something about letting the first reaction subside and spend just one more second looking at the thing before I decide to click or not.
Also: headlines suck. These days, it seems 99% of media outlets - including the good ones - make clickbait/kneejerk headlines. Most cases, when I read the first paragraph of the article, I go: oooh, that is much less dramatic than I first thought!
Well, yeah. But that's a consequence of [gestures broadly at current events] IRL, not the Internet.
You won't be able to avoid being informed about the bad stuff, it's in your face every day.
Keep the feeds open that give you hope we'll survive it all, and the strength to do what you can. And the cute sweet stuff that gives you a joyful reason to go on.
You already know to avoid the fascist propaganda, and you can head on over to the factual sites or turn on NPR whenever you feel up to a dose of grim reality.
The world, and most of the things in it are not black and white.