Our psyche is more connected to our physical reality than we realize

If you want to change your mental state, it is easier to do that by taking some physical action than by pure thinking. Want to feel calmer? Begin breathing slowly, with 4-second inhales and 6-second exhales. Want to pump yourself up? Put some Eminem on. (My favorites are Fall, Not Afraid, and Believe.) And so on.

But over the past few years, I’ve come to think that this is just the tip of the iceberg. Apparently, our psyche is more intricately connected to our physical reality, both inside the body and in the body-world relationship, than we realize.

Some examples:

• For millions, pushing through a tough workout translates to feeling “I’m getting over whatever I’m dealing with.”

• Posture communicates confidence, not just to others but to your own brain. Jordan Peterson even made it a separate rule in his 12 Rules for Life book.

• Marie Condo, Google researchers, and millions of laymen worldwide observed that tidiness and organization of our surroundings directly relate to that of our minds. “When I want to clear my head, I clean my apartment” is what millions reported, including yours truly. David Allen of Getting Things Done made a similar observation in the domain of productivity. Diligently working through his famous 200-something-item trigger list for incompletes has helped many people feel less stressed, more clear, and generally relieved.

My own observations:

• Physical movement often translates to a feeling that “I’m moving forward in my life/work/project/etc.” whereas spending a lot of time in one place makes me feel stuck.

• Ascending hills, stairs, escalators, etc., brings to mind information related to progress. “Going down” usually does the opposite (and very rarely conjures up the feeling of “diving into” something).

• High altitude reduces anxiety and makes me feel “on top of things” and often even “on top of the world.” This is why I love flying so much.

• Sitting in a hotel lobby or a train station invokes a curious mental state of “a new chapter,” that I’m about to embark on something new.

This connection raises some interesting questions:

1. What are the other “translations” of physical reality into our mental states/feelings that we face daily, both positive and negative? How can we design our lives to have more of the good stuff and less of the bad?

2. What does work from home do to us in light of this relationship? During Covid lockdowns, many people reported feeling stuck and depressed. Depression levels in the US are all-time high. Perhaps we feel “encaged, imprisoned, stuck, and hobbled” because that’s what we subject our bodies to?

3. What about knowledge work more broadly? A modern office full of cubicles doesn’t look much different from a farm where livestock is packed so tightly they can’t even turn. We’ve free-range beef now, but do we really have free-range humans? Given that we need knowledge work, how should we design our days to account for our psycho-physical nature?

I will close with this brilliant talk by Bret Victor on how ridiculous our modern environments are. Give it a watch if you want to think more about this subject.

Don’t lock yourself up,
VS