Very Bad Day

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

“What is that?” I thought, as I spotted a white square-shaped blob on my driver’s side window. “It looks like bird…” It’s January in northern Indiana. Don’t most birds (except “friendly” Canadian geese) fly south for the winter? If I had wings, I would find somewhere warmer to live!

So I looked up, and sure enough, about 30 feet above my usual parking spot, nestled in the winter-bare branches of a hardwood tree, is a giant, scraggly bird’s nest. What are the chances?

Sometimes it feels like we have particularly unlucky days or weeks or months or years (2020, anyone?) Like those days when you’re running late, and have to stop for gas, and spill your coffee, and someone cancels on you, and it’s not even 9 am? You start ruminating on all the reasons it’s been a bad day, and when something else happens, you add it to the list.

There’s something called confirmation bias, where instead of being objective, you look for information that confirms what you already believe and ignore any other information. It can turn one bad bird dropping into an entire bad day. On the other hand, if I believe I am blessed, and look for information to confirm that- I can use this bias in my favor. If we look for the good, the beautiful, the admirable… we’ll be more likely to find it.