The world can be so triumphantly shitty sometimes. So astoundingly bad that it's very tough to believe that good even exists. Lately, I've had a pretty bad time, and I made a promise to myself. In order to keep myself afloat in a perpetual sea of crap, I have to remind myself constantly of the seemingly insignificant little things that make this world good. Here's just a select few of those things:

1. Clean notebooks

2. Bulk packs of pens

3. Multi-colored Post-it cubes

4. Those fat little birds on the street that just kind of boing around wherever they need to go.

5. Saturday afternoons

6. The existence of Netflix

7. My best friend down the street

8. The friend that I've managed to keep for 14 years so far

9. Full, overstocked bookshelves

10. The class schedule for an upcoming semester

11. Robert Downey Jr.

12. The Walking Dead

13. Movies

14. Polite children

15. Oversized hair accessories

16. The sheer act of writing, putting pen to paper.

17. A full bank account on pay day

18. Slam poetry

19. Anything with Guy Fieri

20. The existence of the phrase "Flavor Town"

21. Food porn

22. I can't lie, sometimes actual porn

23. Watching one side of the book get bigger as you get closer to finishing it

24. Quirky mugs

25. Photobooths

26. Beanies in the winter

27. Adult coloring books

28. Fun socks

29. Yearbooks

30. Posters

31. Memes

32. Straight, unwrinkled bedspreads

33. Empty, undecorated walls

34. Chandler Bing

35. Relationships like Jim and Pam Halpert

36. Filled journals

37. Empty beds

38. Comic books

39. The storage/organization section at Target

40. Quiet walks

41. A fully charged iPod

42. Pretty much anything to do with Hamilton

43. Beef

44. The glorious combination of garlic and mashed potatoes

45. Summer thunderstorms

46. Oversized sweaters

47. Neil Patrick Harris

48. Jaunty Broadway tunes

49. Taking off your bra after a long day at work

50. Giftcards

51. Big cupcakes

52. That little butt wiggle you do when you try on cute new underwear

53. Super chubby birds

54. Big dogs that have no idea how big they actually are

55. Old dogs

56. Particularly fluffy dogs

57. Baby dogs

58. Happy dogs

59. Dogs

60. That little squeak that kittens make

61. That badass onion volcano at Benihana

62. Air conditioning

63. Large, spacious couches

64. Smelly hand sanitizers

65. Sales on overpriced clothing

66. Bags full of previously overpriced clothing

67. Unlikely animal friendships

68. Much needed silence

When I first started to feel a little bit depressed, I promised myself that I would never turn into that kind of person who relies on medicine and constantly wallows in their own self pity. Yes, the world can be terrible. And it's pretty easy to fall into that pit and not be able to claw your way out. But if you take the time to sift through the piles upon piles of crap, you'll find that there exists so much good that you may not have noticed before. So I try to take stock of the little things, and that's the best form of self-medication that I can think of.