June 29, 2024

	By Melissa Kirsch

Good morning. Taking time to enumerate the things you like about yourself each day may sound terminally woo-woo or conceited, but in practice, the results can be pretty transformative.

In an illustration, a woman holds a bouquet of flowers at a market.

María Jesús Contreras

Best practices

I want to be a person with practices. A yoga practice, a mindfulness practice, a gratitude practice. I'm not totally sure when a nourishing activity passes into the realm of a practice, but I think it has something to do with intention and devotion. You prioritize doing this thing that has a positive effect on you or others or on the world you live in — say, sitting in quiet contemplation for 20 minutes each morning, or journaling every night before bed. You commit to doing it on a regular basis, and after enough reps, it becomes part of who you are.

I've been hesitant to declare — to myself, never mind anyone else — that I've established any of the aforementioned practices because I'm skeptical of my ability to stick with them. I tend to burn hot in the initial phases of something that promises to improve my life, and then lose steam very quickly. I've done the first day of the "Yoga With Adriene" 30-day challenge at least 30 times.

One need not be so doctrinaire about one's practices, I know. The point is to do and feel better, not to get a gold star. I've wandered away from many practices only to return to them, usually because I miss them, because seeing the benefits of doing something is often not as powerful as experiencing its absence. That's the case with something I've been doing for the past eight months or so — not every single day, but enough days to tentatively call it "a thing I do," if not a thoroughgoing practice.

At the end of the day, I try to write down as many things as I can think of that I appreciate about myself. It might be how I handled a difficult situation, or that I checked something off my to-do list that I'd been putting off. It might be something witty I said, or the way I reframed how I was thinking about a situation. Some days there's not much content to work with, and I might just appreciate that I made the bed even though I really didn't want to, or that my hair looked kind of good.

When someone first recommended I try this, I thought it sounded very self-involved, maybe a little pathetic — was my self-esteem so impoverished that I needed to ply myself with compliments? (It turns out that some days, in fact, I do.) But over time I realized that what at first seemed facile was actually sort of revolutionary.

I'd tried practicing gratitude before and found it quite effective. You take a few minutes to write down things you're thankful for — the kindness of a stranger, the way your child looks at you while you're reading a bedtime story, the smell of honeysuckle when you bike past that one tree. You remind yourself how lucky you are, that while you've been fretting or regretting or despairing, all these good things and people and possibilities are part of your story, too.

With gratitude, you think about things outside yourself. You remember that you're not alone, that there's more going on in your life than what's in your head, and this offers perspective. An appreciation practice entails thinking about yourself, but it's not the opposite of gratitude; it's a refraction of it. It's expressing gratitude for oneself, which at first feels conceited, but eventually, for me, has come to seem anything but.

Left to its own devices, my mind will take stock of the day like a detective, looking for things I did wrong, could have done better or left undone completely. With an appreciation practice, I start with, "What did I do right today?" These are the behaviors and moments we tend not to linger on because they're usually the parts of the day with the least tension. They're not the sort of headline stories you might think to tell someone when asked how your day went. They're not amusing or annoying. They don't really make for good cocktail party fodder.

But the cumulative effect of memorializing these situations, day after day, is you start to see patterns in your behavior, to note the positive effect you're having on those around you. And when you see that, you start to like yourself more. And who couldn't stand to like themselves more?

I've found myself behaving differently — more assertively, more compassionately — simply because I know that, tonight, I'll sit down and look at my day, and I know how good it will feel to appreciate these things about myself. I want to make future me proud. And on bad days, when I'm less than thrilled about how I dealt with things, I have a log of all the things that I've appreciated about myself in the past.

Once you start actively looking for things to appreciate about yourself, you realize how you've outsourced that task to other people. It feels wonderful when someone else tells you that you did a brilliant job in that meeting, that you really gave them solid advice, that you look great today. An appreciation practice enables you to bring that job in-house, to enlist yourself as your biggest fan. Other people are never paying as much attention to you as you are, so there's a lot about you to appreciate that goes unremarked upon if you wait for someone else to acknowledge it.

THE WEEK IN CULTURE

Film and TV

Jeremy Allen White stars in "The Bear." Courtesy of FX Networks

Season 3 of "The Bear" is out now. It has bitter screaming matches, elegant monologues and plenty of self-loathing, our television critic Margaret Lyons writes.
Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11" was released 20 years ago. It landed in a moment similar to our own, with wars abroad and division at home, Nicolas Rapold writes.
The actor Bill Cobbs died at 90. He wasn't a star, but his face was familiar to anyone who watched TV or movies over the past several decades.
Martin Mull, a comedic actor whose work spanned decades from "Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman" to "Veep," died at 80.

Music

A woman wearing all white holds a microphone close to her lips while gesturing with her left hand. She stands amid white smoke.

Charli XCX Christopher Polk/Billboard, via Getty Images

After years of flirting with mainstream success, Charli XCX has broken through with her sixth — and most daring — album, "Brat." The hosts of "Popcast" explored why.
"I Am: Celine Dion," on Amazon, documents the singer's struggles with stiff person syndrome. If her voice made her a star, "this film is keen on making her a person," our review says.

Fashion

Chappell Roan, her body entirely covered in sage green pain, holds up a microphone for during a Gov Ball performance. She wears a wig in the same shade of green and a Lady Liberty headpiece.

Chappell Roan Cheney Orr/Reuters

"She wants to go as big as possible": The stylist to the singer Chappell Roan discussed the joys and challenges of dressing the bombastic rising star.
The Row, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen's minimalist label, has opened an outpost in the Hamptons.
Lanvin, the oldest French fashion house in continual existence, named Peter Copping as its new artistic director.
Christie's auctioned items from Vivienne Westwood's personal wardrobe, the proceeds of which will go to charities, Women's Wear Daily reports.

THE LATEST NEWS

The Supreme Court

Eric Lee/The New York Times

The court sided with a Jan. 6 Capitol rioter, ruling that federal prosecutors overstepped when they used an obstruction law to charge him for impeding a congressional proceeding.
The ruling means that lower courts could dismiss charges against hundreds of other rioters. But it may not affect the Jan. 6-related obstruction charge against Donald Trump.
In a separate case, the court's conservative majority curtailed government agencies' power, threatening regulations on the environment, health care, consumer safety and more.
The court also upheld an Oregon city's ban on homeless people sleeping outdoors, ruling it did not amount to cruel and unusual punishment. The decision will likely alter how cities address homelessness.
Steve Bannon, the longtime Trump adviser, will go to prison on Monday after the court rejected his effort to avoid a four-month sentence for contempt of Congress.

2024 Election

Haiyun Jiang for The New York Times

President Biden acknowledged his shaky debate with Trump in an energetic, defiant speech in North Carolina. "I don't debate as well as I used to," he said, but added, "I would not be running again if I didn't believe with all my heart and soul I can do this job."
Biden's allies have rushed to assure worried Democrats that he should still be the nominee.
Viewership for the debate was down 30 percent from the first Biden-Trump debate in 2020, and it was the lowest-rated general-election debate since 2004.

CULTURE CALENDAR

	By Alexis Soloski

🎥 "MaXXXine" (Friday): Summer is of course a time for sweating. But some of us would rather shiver. In Ti West's new movie, the third in a trilogy that began with "X" and continued with "Pearl," Mia Goth stars as a mid-1980s porn actress looking to break into mainstream film. Critics diverge as to whether West has elevated the slasher genre. Is this, as one character puts it, a B movie with A ideas? Could be. But when sex, celebrity, sleaze and carnage collide, how much elevation do we really need?

RECIPE OF THE WEEK

Christopher Simpson for The New York Times

By Melissa Clark

Jalapeño Grilled Pork Chops

As the heat dome lifts in many parts of the country, you can practically hear grilling enthusiasts let out a collective sigh of relief. If grilling is on your weekend agenda, and you're craving something meaty, spicy and herby, you can't do better than Eric Kim's jalapeño grilled pork chops. Marinated in a pungent mix of cilantro stems blitzed with garlic, chiles and just enough sugar to encourage caramelization, the thin chops cook quickly, singeing appealingly at the edges. Eric tops them with a zippy onion and cilantro relish that makes good use of the leaves, and suggests serving rice (preferably cilantro rice) on the side — to which I'd add a ripe tomato salad for a touch of juicy sweetness on your plate.

REAL ESTATE

Sara Naomi Lewkowicz for The New York Times

The Hunt: Two software engineers wanted a home in Manhattan with enough space to start a family. Which did they choose? Play our game.

What you get for $2.2 million: A 1929 Colonial Revival house in Greenwich, Conn.; a six-bedroom Prairie-style house in Chicago; or a 1901 Queen Anne Revival home in Houston.

New York: The High Line, which opened 15 years ago, offers a master class in urban gardening.

LIVING

An illustration of a person standing at their bathroom vanity, looking in the mirror. Their reflection is upside down.

Albert Tercero

Midlife: See how to navigate aches, weight gain, memory loss and more.

Dating: X recently made "Likes" private. Keeping tabs on crushes and exes has become that much harder.

The Berkshires: A writer shares his favorite ways to experience an often overlooked river in western Massachusetts.

Health care: Contraception is free by law. So why are a quarter of women are still paying for it?

ADVICE FROM WIRECUTTER

How to keep mosquitoes from multiplying

Mosquitoes need just a few ounces of water for their eggs to hatch. Getting rid of standing water is the easiest way to prevent them from breeding. There are a few ways to do this: Stick to a weekly "dump and drain" schedule. Pay close attention to man-made items like pet bowls, tarps and toys that often become larval hot spots. Drill a few holes in the bottom of garbage cans and recycling containers to allow any water that collects in them to drain right out. — Rose Lorre

Related: Create a robust bug strategy with spatial repellents — like these gadgets — and a great topical spray.

For more expert advice, independent reviews and deals, sign up for Wirecutter's daily newsletter, The Recommendation.

GAME OF THE WEEK

Eduardo Munoz/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

United States vs. Uruguay, Copa América: The U.S. men's soccer team was an early favorite in this tournament, which features the best teams from North and South America. But a stunning loss to Panama on Thursday has put it at risk of elimination before the knockout rounds even begin. In the final match of the group round, they'll face Uruguay, another favorite — and one that, unlike the U.S., has met those expectations with two dominant wins. "We have to go and play the best game of our lives," Christian Pulisic, the U.S. captain, said. Monday at 9 p.m. Eastern on FS1

NOW TIME TO PLAY

Here is today's Spelling Bee. Yesterday's pangram was voltage.

Take the news quiz to see how well you followed this week's headlines.

And here are today's Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. (In case you missed it, Strands is now in The Times's Games app.)

Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. — Melissa

Editor: David Leonhardt

Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner

News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti

Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson

News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu

News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar

Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch

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