The Week on the PAHM: 24 October 2026

The Week on the PAHM is a Saturday series: five headlines from the week, each placed on the map. The book's claim is simple: of the nine positions on the Present Attention and Happiness Matrix, only one, Present + Neutral, is in contact with what is actually happening. The other eight are thoughts about it, and the book calls them poisonous, because each one costs something in the present, whether it feels good or bad. News is where a great deal of attention goes every week, and nearly all of it goes to those eight. So this is not a summary of the week. It asks one question of each story: where did it put everyone's attention, and what did that cost?

The short version

• Seventy-two percent of American adults now say stress is just something they have to live with, and nearly half have pulled back from some part of social life
• Sixty-two percent of employees in six countries say they are looking, or likely to look, for a new job within six months, up from 52 percent
• Six minutes of a garden on a screen lowered activity at the front of the brain compared with a plain room, in a small study
• Sixty-four percent of workers say technology problems have left them frustrated, anxious or angry, according to a hardware company's survey
• The Brewers waited eight days between winning the pennant and the first pitch of the World Series

Which of these does your mind visit most? See your mind score - free.

1. Stress, accepted

The American Psychological Association's Stress in America survey, published this week, found that 72 percent of adults agree that stress is just something they have to live with, 68 percent say they have grown used to living with uncertainty, and 47 percent pulled back from at least one form of social engagement in the past year (Carrier Management, 22 October). Among those who use AI, one in ten said they rely on it more than on friends and family for advice.

On the map: Future + Dislikes (worry), made permanent: a future that is expected to be unpleasant, visited so often that it has stopped feeling like a visit, and the present paid for it every day without anyone noticing the bill. Stress accepted as permanent is a future with dislike attached, moved into and furnished. The book's account of the position is that it contracts attention in the present, and the social withdrawal in the same survey is what that contraction looks like from outside. The post on stress for no reason is about the version that has lost its original object, which is where "something I have to live with" ends up.

2. Six in ten, looking

G-P's World at Work report, from 7,100 leaders and professionals in six countries, found 62 percent of employees looking for a new job, or likely to look, within six months, up from 52 percent a year ago, while 80 percent say their organisation is confident about the year ahead (TechNode Global, 21 October).

On the map: Future + Likes (anticipation): the next job, visited from the current desk, which gets a little less of the day each time. This is the pleasant kind of leaving, and the book's account is that it costs the present as surely as the unpleasant kind; a desk that attention has already left is a poor place to be sitting. Last week's edition had the mirror image, workers who fantasise about quitting and plan to stay. The post on I will be happy when is the sentence under both.

3. Six minutes of garden

Researchers at Drexel University had 32 adults watch six-minute 360-degree recordings of gardens and a forest, and of a plain indoor room, while a forehead sensor tracked activity at the front of the brain. Activity peaked lower during the green scenes than in the plain room, and participants rated them more restful; the authors note the sample was small, each scene was seen once, and nothing about attention or mood was measured afterwards (Earth.com, 17 October).

On the map: Present + Neutral (presence): eyes and ears given something to be on, and for six minutes nothing else. The cost is nil, which is the point of the position. The map makes no claim about the brain, and this is research for context, not proof of anything here. But the shape is the one the book describes: the five physical senses can only deliver now, and when they are handed a garden, even a recorded one, attention is in the present by force. A real garden adds the breeze, which the study could not. The post on why exercise reduces stress is the same mechanism with the body doing the handing.

4. The printer

A survey of more than 9,400 workers commissioned by Logitech, a company that sells office hardware, found 64 percent had felt frustrated, anxious or angry because of technology problems, and 58 percent said their desk setup had caused physical discomfort (Mezha, 19 October). The company's interest in the result is obvious; the feeling it describes is familiar anyway.

On the map: Present + Dislikes (resistance): the thing in front of you, now, and the wish that it were otherwise. The cost is the hour, spent on the wish rather than on the jam. This is the one position in the present row that still costs something, in the book's account: the printer is here and so are you, but attention is on the argument with it, not on the paper tray. The post on why you feel overwhelmed is what happens when several of these are running at once.

5. Eight days to the first pitch

The Milwaukee Brewers swept their way into the World Series on Thursday 15 October. The first game is on Friday 23 October, eight days later, against Tampa Bay (MLB, World Series schedule).

On the map: Future + Likes (anticipation) for a whole city, eight days of it, with the first pitch visited a thousand times before it was thrown; and Present + Neutral for the players in the practice sessions, where there is only the next ball. The waiting is not the game, and the book's account is that eight days spent at a first pitch that has not happened are eight days not spent anywhere. Last week's placement stands: the series will be played one pitch at a time, whoever is on the mound, and the post on how to stay calm says why that is also the practice.

One practice for the week

The edition before this one is The Week on the PAHM: 17 October 2026.

What this does not do

This post uses the Present Attention and Happiness Matrix, the author's own model from The Return of Attention. It describes experience, not a diagnosis. How the matrix works.

It does not judge the news or the people in it. The stories are theirs; the map only says where they put attention.

It is not advice. Stress, jobs and printers all need practical decisions, and the map does not make them for you. If stress has become constant, or comes with low mood that has lasted two weeks or more, please talk to a doctor or a crisis line.

Common questions

What is the Week on the PAHM? A Saturday post that takes five headlines from the week and places each on the Present Attention and Happiness Matrix: when the story put attention, and how it felt about it, and what that cost.

Why look at the news this way? Because news is where attention goes for most of the day, and most of it sits in the past or the future. In the book's account those are the poisonous positions, and seeing that is the first step it asks for.

Where do the headlines come from? From the week's reporting, linked in each item. The summary is ours; the reporting belongs to the sources.