Good News for Humankind
A daily dose of inspiration and inquiry.
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November 6, 2026 Good News for Humankind 🌏Your daily spark of possibility — one real milestone for change from around the world. New Hampshire elects Chris Pappas as the first openly gay man in the U.S. SenateDemocrat Chris Pappas won New Hampshire’s open U.S. Senate seat on Nov. 3 and is the first openly gay man elected to the Senate. Tammy Baldwin became the first openly gay person elected to it in 2012, and Kyrsten Sinema became the first openly bisexual senator in 2018. Pappas, 46, grew up working in his family’s Manchester restaurant and has served four terms in the U.S. House. He told supporters that voters “simply have had enough,” and said he is “ready to fight with everything I’ve got.” Reports showed only early returns when the race was called, so the final margin is not yet clear. But another barrier in the Senate has come down.
Chapter 5: Passion | 5-9 Your zone of geniusWe all have passions. We all have talents. We all have values. And fortunately, quite often, they overlap. There are activities that both inspire us and at which we naturally excel, and which align with what we most value. For Beethoven, for example, playing piano was almost certainly at once something that lit his fires and something that he excelled at innately. This area of overlap is what we might call our zone of genius. It’s similar to the Japanese concept of ikigai, or at least the Westernized version we tend to see, or dozens of other self-help frameworks. The premise is a bit stale and overused. But it’s helpful. When acting from our zone of genius, we make an often seemingly effortless contribution to something we care deeply about, while also refueling and enlivening ourselves in the process. It’s a win-win. Our lives gain a level of focus, clarity, and momentum that before might have seemed impossible. Rather than trudge through something that doesn’t bring us alive or at which we struggle to succeed, we follow our own internal gravity, where we naturally propel ourselves forward with ease. This is our best path to finding balance between the inflow and outflow of energy and doing something meaningful in the world. In our zone of genius, we innately have clean, renewable energy flowing in and sending it out efficiently to something worthwhile. Our genius is our home. It is not the person we think we ought to be, but the person we are. This is an excerpt from my upcoming book The Antihero's Journey: From Burnout to Real Contribution in Polycrisis Times. To read other excerpts, go here.
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​Good News for Humankind
A daily dose of inspiration and inquiry.