Some nuggets of good medicine for these times
- elaine@elainecornick.com
- Sep 26
- 4 min read
Wisdom perspectives can bring more joy and aliveness
The Cultural Butterfly Project is intended to be an antidote and good medicine for the many disempowering, inaccurate cultural beliefs, stories, and worldviews we live by and the negative feelings they engender.
The following nuggets are just a few of many examples of the more accurate, life-giving perspective that we are actually already “Weaving a world of well-being for all in a life-aligned culture of right relationships with a future worth living into.”
I’m sharing these “good medicine nuggets” to give grounded inspiration, real hope, and actual substance to the new world we’re in the process of creating. These are listed in no particular order.
“Our deepest reason for creating the Next Economy MBA is . . . cultivating the vibrant community and collective momentum essential for a fundamental cultural shift towards an economy that truly nurtures life. . . But here's the revelation: this isn't a call to austerity or endless struggle. . . actualizing this new reality means less stress, less screen time, and more joy and play in our lives. . . humanity hasn't even scratched the surface of the abundance, joy, connection, peace, and reliable prosperity possible for all beings."
"The opposite of play is not work—it's depression.”- Stuart Brown
“In 1966, Charles Whitman climbed a tower at the University of Texas and became America's first mass shooter. The commission investigating this tragedy . . . concluded unanimously that if Whitman had experienced normal childhood play, he would have developed the emotional regulation skills needed to cope with stress without violence.
“Your nervous system is sabotaging your joy: When you're stressed or in "hustle mode," your nervous system sends danger signals that make play feel threatening to survival. Your body literally interprets fun as unsafe when it's stuck in fight-or-flight mode.
“Meanwhile, achievement addiction hijacks your dopamine system. Every completed task gives you a neurochemical high . . . You become addicted to the very behaviors that drain your creativity and joy.
“. . . here's the hope: your brain remains plastic throughout life. We can bring play back.
Companies like Google prove this—their "20% Time" policy for unstructured play has generated breakthrough innovations . . .
“Play is not a reward for finished work. It's not a luxury for people with extra time. Play is rebellion against a culture that has forgotten what makes us human. It's WD-40 for your mind and soul, creating the environment for flow states where breakthrough thinking happens.
“The definition matters: Play is engaging in activity for enjoyment and recreation rather than a serious or practical purpose. Not everything needs to optimize, improve, or achieve. Sometimes the point is simply joy.”
“The phrase nice guys* finish last was born in a Dodger dugout in 1946. A casual sneer . . . that tunneled into the culture until it calcified into doctrine. One that cast kindness as weakness, empathy as failure.
“Then came Garry Shandling, trickster sage, detonating that doctrine with a single line: “Nice guys finish first. If you don’t know that, then you don’t know where the finish line is.”
“As Maya Angelou said: “People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. That is the true ROI of kindness. It might not appear directly on the ledger but imprints human experience and memory.
“The ruthless may break the tape first. But it’s the wrong tape. Wrong line. Wrong story. A hollow race staged on false ground.
“Kindness takes a different course altogether. It’s longer, deeper, more effective in the long run, and more human.”
“Our Hopescroll accounts didn’t go viral—our posts hardly got any attention at all. . . . Stories of progress and problem-solving don’t get a lot of attention or engagement.
“. . . what my students told me . . . surprised me and gave me hope. My students reported that they didn’t care about the attention and engagement metrics. They felt that spending time intentionally seeking out solutions journalism about environmental problems being solved, human health and welfare advances, diseases being eradicated, renewable energy adoption rates, and advances in childhood education (and more!) was itself joyful.
“Many students reported that they shared what they learned with their roommates, on their family chat groups, and in conversations with random folks throughout their week. They liked having something positive to talk about, and they found that folks wanted to hear about the good news.
“Many . . . reported that the experience was both illuminating and healing. . . . Some students even noticed that their social media algorithms began to change, as they started to see more positive content on their feeds instead of quite so much doom.
“Intentionally focusing on solutions journalism once a week helped some students to cope with the daily torrent of doom in their feeds. “I often felt overwhelmed,” one student wrote, “but this gave me a sense of agency.”
These are a continuation of the 200+ specific examples detailed in my ebook of actual on-the-ground, life-aligned, regenerative projects, programs, movements, and initiatives that have been and are occurring increasingly.