Morning Routine will be our next topic, but it seems I have a pattern—I like to riff on a few things between topics.
This riff was prompted by Gisele Bündchen.
Have you read Salt Sugar Fat by Michael Moss? It’s about how Big Food uses those three elements to hook us. Thanks to our bodies’ unrelenting drive for the species to survive, we like salt, sugar, and fat. A lot.
And when you put all three together, you get a food that is difficult to resist:
- Salted caramel ice cream
- Honey-glazed ham
- Peanut butter (and with even more sugar and fat, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups)
The Salt + Sugar + Fat combo is tantalizing when it comes to food. My hypothesis is that there is a human equivalent: Looks + Money + Fame. For example…
- Beyonce
- Brad Pitt
- Jennifer Lopez
I believe that just as food can hook us with salt, sugar, and fat, people can hook us with looks, money, and fame. There is nothing wrong with looks, money, or fame, and I’m guessing most of us would be happy with more of any of them.
But we have to be careful when people with Looks + Money + Fame become our trusted information sources. For example…
Insight Timer has begun offering live events with their teachers. Breaking 200 attendees is uncommon, and breaking 1000 is rare.
Tara Brach, a co-founder of a medication center, author of several books, and a meditation teacher with over 30 years’ experience, recently had 1,700 people sign up for her live event.
But the attendee count for Brach was trounced by the count for a teacher I’d never before seen on Insight Timer: Gisele Bündchen, with 27,400 people.
I’m not saying Gisele isn’t a good meditation teacher, and I’m glad whenever the circle of meditators expands, especially in 2020—the year that is testing and remaking us all.
I am saying we need to be careful. In these days of questionable news and questioning the news, we must always consider the source. And we must be especially conscious when the source has Looks + Money + Fame.
Podcast Update
Yesterday’s podcast post didn’t go so well. I’m still working to figure out what went wrong. In the meantime, here’s the 78-second trailer for the podcast.
https://hard-times-hope.simplecast.com/episodes/trailer-hard-times-hope
Chewing the Cud of Good
Thankful for an autumn afternoon in the woods and the sound of water tumbling over rocks.