It has everything to do with reality — as a comparator.

It has everything to do with reality — as a comparator.

The mind has very real power. One of the things I’ve learned as someone with a chronic illness is the danger of acclimation. If you’re in a bad spot and you don’t have an aim (an ideal), it’s hard to gauge progress. If you are not careful, bad circumstances can very easily define you. I’ve seen this before with people with chronic migraine & depression.

Some people start out with 28 migraine days per month, they take positive steps, and they are satisfied with a reduction to 16. Going 3 days without a nauseating icepick headache is cause for celebration. They don’t take further steps because 16 migraines/month is better than 28. “Chronic” is the new norm. They’ve “acclimated.”

I’ve seen the same thing happen with clinically depressed people. The mind and body acclimate to ubiquitous fatigue and despair. Soon, they cannot even recall old hopes and dreams — and they don’t seek treatment.

There are a lot of articles out there about what led to our situation. (I’ve even written a few.) The value of a forward-thinking paradigm — an ideal outcome — is to help people realize what we might have to gain.

To build something better than what we have, each of us needs to take personal responsibility for what’s going on around us. It’s very important that we don’t acclimate. We can do so much better than this.

Vote.