Some others have pointed out that the bad news is news because mostly life isn't like that. The good is mostly dull, quiet, ubiquitous. Tolkein pointed out that good times make bad stories. I don't remember the exact quote - he's describing, I think, the time at The Last Homely House.

One thing that producing art does for me is force me to focus. It helps that I specialize in arts that can easily maim me, but even when I'm wimping out and using non-lethal things like pencils, I'm focusing on the topic at hand. I'm seeing, often for the first time, that the curved plane where the nose meets the eye socket on this particular face is just so, and isn't it the most amazing thing ever, and this shadow on the paper or wood might capture it with just one more stroke right here...

Write down, or take pictures of, or draw, the pointless minutia of your life. That brings the fact that it is not pointless, it is YOUR LIFE, into focus. Your life is how the sun hits the table you eat at, the exact shapes of the pupils of your wife's eyes, the way the rain sounds on your window. Not the fighting in the Middle East, not even Microsoft's latest crime (unless you did it, which I doubt). The virtue of humility is not in the "aw, shucks", not "I am not worthy". It is in living your own life. That other stuff isn't yours. Let it go, and grab your stuff.

One very practical thing I noticed recently: I need conversation with people my own age who are in the same room. This networked community stuff is great, but it does not fill that need. Thursday, I was noticing myself starting to go into a depression. Got an email from the test lab in the other building that they were throwing out old equipment, so I went over to scavenge, and ran into colleagues I hadn't seen in a while and got to talking. Not about how I was feeling or anything, just general stuff. And I felt a lot better. Then I realized that, except for places like this, I've been efficiently communicating relevant information, but haven't had a good adult conversation in a while.