Beany Brain: loving our jumping-bean brains!

Welcome to this issue of the Beany Brain! I hope today’s newsletter will bounce us up as we contemplate the upsides and challenges of being neurodivergent, a little beauty, some creativity, and just general yeehawesomeness.

Table of Contents

• Beany Brain: loving our jumping-bean brains!

  • Welcome to this issue of the Beany Brain! I hope t …

• Bookishly Bookish Books

  • Ha Ha Haiku

  • Give Attention

    • Yeehawesome!

    • Quote of the Week

  • Wonderful Wednesday

  • Today’s Beany-full Summary:

Bookishly Bookish Books

Not only are Gen Z (zoomers) going to movie theaters in droves, but zoomers and millennials are also leading a surge in the sales of good old paper books and are visiting brick-and-mortar libraries.

Good on ya, zoomers and millienials!

They’re also joining book clubs at a fast clip, and reworking them to fit their own style (such as silent book clubs or genre-specific book clubs).

Sounds fun to me!

I’m still running my own online gathering that I call Rebel Monthly Media Moment—we talk about any media we are consuming, whether it’s podcasts, music, movies, books, articles. Like Show and Tell. It’s not a traditional book club because we’re not all reading the same thing—I don’t ever want someone to tell me what I have to read. I’ll take recommendations, though.

I love this quote, and I find it apt for my own life:

Speaking of mindfulness…

Do you ever reread?

If so, what do you reread?

I do. For me, it’s usually:

• Anything by Jane Austen (haha, no, Anything is not the name of one of her novels)

• Resurrection by Tolstoy

• Jan Karon’s Mitford series (Father Tim and Cynthia and Dooley are some of my favorite characters ever, plus Jan Karon loves food and there are plenty of food descriptions—yum)

• Wonderful Fool by Shusaku Endo

• Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier

Reading, rereading, and sometimes talking about it with buddies are good therapy for me.

And when I’m reading, my busy brain is not so internally loud with my own catastrophizing yelling at me like a silent and annoying Mrs. Bennet. It’s better to go reread Pride and Prejudice instead of stewing. I can then vicariously enjoy someone else’s stewing.

Ha Ha Haiku

A funny haiku for you every week in every newsletter, whether it’s one of my own or one I curate for you. HA. Ha. Haiku.

Give Attention

Who decided that we need to “pay attention”?

I do enough paying: bills, past mistakes, groceries.

I sometimes have enough spoons to give attention, though.

This is what I decided to do one day this week: give my attention to notice varying shades of green. And because the UK had a lot of rain over this past winter, there are a lot of verdant variations at the moment.

Light green. Yellow-green. Dark green. Kelly green. Bottle green. Olive green. Neon green.

I think it was pretty sage of me (see what I did there?) to use a bit of mental energy this week on the color green and all its pretty hues.

It was a lovely experiment and a good excuse to stop along the way and take even more photos.

But it’s not easy being green and having to say “cheese” all the time to the American lady with the itchy camera finger.

Yeehawesome!

Yeehawesome! is a happy-brain roundup in each issue of Beany Brain. What’s happening that’s good in brain land? What’s bringing me joy?

1. I just passed my 600-day streak on Duolingo. Now, I have to add a caveat: I missed ONE Sunday about a month ago because I was too busy and engrossed while watching Black Orpheus, a Brazilian film from 1959 (a retelling of the Greek myth set in a favela in Rio), and TOTALLY FORGOT my Duolingo. Fortunately I had a lot of points and that meant I could continue my streak.

2. Speaking of streaks, this week on April 25th a couple friends and I marked our 250th day of working out in a row (taking Sundays off)!

3. One of our sons shows me the photos from The Guardian’s Week in Wildlife every week, and I simply must pass on his recommendation. It’s a good one and it really perks up my day. Beautiful, quirky, adorable photos.

4. Here’s a bonus life hack for giving yourself more space in Gmail: Just follow these easy directions to clean up your inbox.

Quote of the Week

Beany Brownie Points and Extra Bonus Funniness

Wonderful Wednesday

Wonderful Wednesday was a day once a year in college when they would suddenly and surprisingly call off all classes and we’d play all day. The cafeteria provided special fun food and we’d do stuff outside like slip ‘n slides and jello wrestling in sumo suits. This segment of Beany Brain is dedicated to that memory of silliness and fun—no words, just a photo from the week that I’ve taken or found that reminds me to let the joy in. Since Beany Brain is published on Wednesday every week (at least, Wednesday in Japan), I hope you enjoy this Wonderful Wednesday.

Today’s Beany-full Summary:

• Reading and rereading can be a form of mindfulness and good for your mental health.

• What do we give attention to? Sometimes it’s fun and rewarding to give our attention to something new and really focus on it for a day or so.

• Go forth in Beany joy. What will help you feel yeehawesome this week?

Thank you for reading this installment of Beany Brain! You’re very welcome to hop on by any old time.

If you’re enjoying Beany Brain, please share with a friend or seventeen at www.beanybrain.com. Cheers big time!