The Optimist View
Our weekend edition long form journalism explores in-depth solutions to global issues.
The Optimism of Easter
"Spring is nature's way of saying 'Let's party!'" -Robin Williams BY Summers McKay For as long as I can remember, Easter has been my favorite celebration. Growing up Catholic, the holiday offered a meaningful and poignant ritual imbued with reflection, the excitement of rebirth, and a Read More...
Achieving quality along with quantity: an Optimist’s View on aging
“Aging is not lost youth but a new stage of opportunity and strength.” - Betty Friedan By Oliver Kammeyer I live on a bike path, and just a half-mile east of my place there’s a coffee shop that’s always packed. It seems every day the customers compete to see who can wake up earliest to Read More...
The New Symbiosis: Living with Wildlife
“We’re animals. We’re born like every other mammal and we live our whole lives around disguised animal thoughts.” - Barbara Kingsolver By Oliver Kammeyer Human society developed an idea over time that it is separate from nature, that we exist apart from it, or in spite of it. Perhaps it Read More...
Unbound and unbiased: Why international women’s day still matters
“I do not wish women to have power over men, but over themselves.” –Mary Read More...
Tapping the creative force, art changes minds in a changing climate
“The arts matter because we matter, and our stories matter. We are moving miracles, walking creators engaging in a cosmic dance. The art we express is timeless.” –Mohammed Sheriff, Division Coordinator at the National Endowment for the Arts (USA) By Oliver Kammeyer At The Optimist Read More...
Vitality and connection: A round-up of our week on Love…
“Life without love is like food without salt,” - Isabel Allende At the Optimist Daily, we work to put a spotlight on the solutions that abound around us. While much of what we tackle are the “big” issues like the environment, medicine, science and energy, some of the most salient Read More...
Finding the courage to be confident: A peek inside "Dare to Own You"
"Just because you have a voice and can speak, does not necessarily mean you are being heard; find your voice." - Liz Brunner In 2021 people were quitting their jobs at an unprecedented rate. The media had fun creating phrases like "the Great Resignation" and "the Big Quit" to characterize the Read More...
Managing self-care (again) when things fall apart
This article was originally published in May of 2020, but we are bringing it back to the top of our feeds, because we all still need self-care. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy. - Pema Chödrön By Kristy Read More...
Empowered activism is cultivating a marketable skill - A dispatch from Colombia
“Part of doing something is listening. We are listening. To the sun. To the stars. To the wind.” – Madeleine L’Engle By Jackie Gilbert We all catch ourselves making remarks like “I’m starving” or “we’re dying of hunger”, but fortunately for most of us in my middle-class Read More...
Book Excerpt: ‘The Sleep Fix: Practical, Proven, and Surprising Solutions for Insomnia, Snoring, Shift Work, and More’
“Sometimes finding just one place to start, one thread to pull on, can shift the momentum in the other direction—sleep improvement leads to more sleep improvement.” -Diane Macedo In today’s Optimist View, we’re delighted to share an excerpt from ‘The Sleep Fix,’ the newest book from Read More...