What is a Dream?

Is anyone else having a lot of dreams lately? I am, mostly about trying to help people who are not even in my life anymore. It is easy to see why, in these times, I might be wishing I could help people I cannot reach, but how are dreams about it supposed to help? And, if they are supposed to help, how can I help my dreams to help me more?

People ask these questions about play too. Like dreams, play is something we do separate from the more important things we do in life, as if dreaming and playing are pastimes that don’t really have any useful purpose in and of themselves. But that’s not right.

From an earlier post: “In fact, Harvard researchers have found that play not only relieves stress but improves brain function, stimulates the mind, boosts creativity, improves relationships, builds energy and resistance to disease.”

In the words of performance coach, Joe Robinson, on play:

“It’s the brain’s reset button. This tonic we write off as trivial is a crucial engine of well-being. In its low-key, humble way, play yanks grownups out of their purposeful sleepwalk to reveal the animating spirit within. You are alive, and play will prove it to you.”

Yes, that’s right, we sleepwalk. With the mind wandering all over the place 70% of the time, what else would we call it? Sleepwalking. Which brings us to dreaming. Dreaming is:

• Hallucinatory experience common to all human beings. It occurs most often during the paradoxical phase of sleep, known as the Rapid Eye Movement (REM) phase.
• Mental imagery or activity that occur when you sleep.

Dreams are a kind of fiction or make-pretend, like play:

Play may be a means by which individuals: practice skills that are essential to their survival and reproduction; learn to cope physically and emotionally with unexpected, potentially harmful events; generate new, sometimes useful creations; and reduce hostility and enable cooperation.

There is research to suggest that dreams are another great way for our brains to do more of the same, so let’s move on to that.

Why Do We Dream?

The threat simulation hypothesis of the function of dreaming holds that:

In the ancestral environment human life was short and full of threats. Any behavioral advantage in dealing with highly dangerous events would have increased the probability of reproductive success. A dream-production mechanism that tends to select threatening waking events and simulate them over and over again in various combinations would have been valuable for the development and maintenance of threat-avoidance skills.

Tufts researcher, Erik Hoel, mentions other theories on how dreams help us with memory, emotional regulation, and problem-solving—and adds one of his own. Hoel’s idea is that, since reptiles do not dream while mammals do, dreaming has something to do with a higher-level learning to survive.  

His idea is that our dreams can help knock us out of what he calls “overfit” thinking, the routinized, locked in manner of meeting life challenges and tasks that is not particularly open to adaptive upgrades.  

So, it’s good, then? Even if it is unpleasant, maybe especially if it is unpleasant, it is good when we dream? And is there something we are supposed to do with our dreams? I took a look at that. 

How Can We Use Dreams?

I did something with mine that I want to tell you about. Before I get to that, I assume most if not all have heard about dream interpretation.

For this, here is a great article from the Sleep Foundation on what Freud and others have had to say, in case you are interested in that sort of thing. The article also offers guidance on 4 specific dream themes: Teeth Falling Out, Sex and Cheating, Natural Disaster, and Falling.

Other researchers are exploring something called Lucid Dreams, during which time the sleeper is actually aware of the dream, and can even exert control over the environment right there in the dream.

WebMD posted on the benefits of lucid dreaming, including reduced anxiety and improved motor skills, problem-solving, and creativity. But the same post mentioned that there are potential downsides as well, including sleep interruption, and confusion that can be serious enough to affect mental health. 

So, I think I am going to pass, and recommend here that you do too, unless you work with a professional to help make sure there will not be more harm than good done.

Now, here is what I did with my own dream about trying to help where I cannot. Just for fun, I watch Instagram reels. There was one with a nice man who invited the viewer to do a visualization exercise with him, which typically I scroll past because I prefer the reels that make me laugh. Only this time I went with him.

His prompt involved a little bit of breathwork and then visualization of walking through a door, with a trusted other on the other side. I presented my dream theme to the trusted other, who said, “You take care of you; others will figure that out.” The weight of the world shifted off of my shoulders to where it belonged.

So, if you are noticing your own dream activity, this is something you can also try, then Practice, practice, practice…and let us know what you find. For help with this or something else, Contact Me at weissmadelaine@gmail.com 

Love,

Madelaine

Photo by Freepik

Who Is More Likely to Spend > 1 Hour/Day Outdoors?

Americans typically spend ~ 5 hours/week playing outdoors (e.g., exercising, sports, taking a walk or a swim…)  

Boomers are the most likely to spend more than an hour/day outdoors (41%) contrasted with Gen X’ers (33%) and Millennials (31%).

In other words, the younger the adults, the less time they spent, on average, outdoors—unless they were Parents who, with their children, spent as much time outside as Boomers.  

Why would that be? And,  why would that matter? For why that might be, we could speculate that: 

1. Childhood experiences: Boomers may have grown up in times and places where outdoor play was safer, more accessible, and less organized—leaving them with an ease and preference for more spontaneous outdoor play.

2. Technological advancements: Boomers had fewer technological distractions (such as video games, computers, the internet) to keep them indoors.

3. Work-life balance: Boomers, many of whom are winding down at work, may simply have more time to enjoy activities outside of the home.

We are, of course, dealing in generalization and speculation here, but there are benefits to being outdoors that we might pause to consider more than we have.

What’s So Great About Playing Outdoors?

Outdoor play has been found to improve fitness, relieve stress, enhance social interactions all of which have been found to be great for our overall well-being.

Click here for an abundance of research showing the benefits of nature for short and long term physical and mental health. 

So, there are the benefits of nature and, separate but related, there are the benefits of play—taken together a kind of bundling to make the most of our precious time.

But play is easier said than done for many because we, as a culture, tend to dismiss it for adults as unproductive. It can also make us feel guilty enough to want avoid it, and then we say it is because we do not have time. So, let’s look at a counterargument for that.

From Working Smarter’s Joe Robinson:

When you’re stressed, the brain’s activated emotional hub, the amygdala, suppresses positive mood, fueling a self-perpetuating cycle of negativity. Play can break you out of that straitjacket. It’s the brain’s reset button. This tonic we write off as trivial is a crucial engine of well-being. In its low-key, humble way, play yanks grownups out of their purposeful sleepwalk to reveal the animating spirit within. You are alive, and play will prove it to you.” 

Anybody who has ever suffered burnout will tell you how practical and serious it is to bring energy back to life – at work and at home

In fact, Harvard researchers found that play not only relieves stress but improves brain function, stimulates the mind, boosts creativity, improves relationships, builds energy and resistance to disease.

But maybe you haven’t played in a long time, and don’t even know what it would be for you. After all, there are so many kinds of play:

• Object (basketball)
• Locomotor (running)
• Social (pretending)

Some play doesn’t look like play at all. Take imagination. When we have a problem on our hands and may ask ourselves what someone we admire might do in a similar situation, is that not a form of playing up there in the brain. 

In fact, more than a few people I know spend most of what could be the best parts of their lives up there in the brain, more as spectators up in the stands than players out there on the field of their very own lives.

These folks spend time planning trips they never take, imagining love they won’t go out to find, wishing for their dream career from the desk they will not dare to leave. It’s a fine place to start, with that glimmer in the mind’s eye about how we dream things to be. But perhaps not the best place to be stuck.

Especially when we could go outside, so what’s in the way?

What’s In The Way?

What’s in the way for those who don’t or won’t play outside, or even at all, as much as they could? Fear? Fear of looking like a fool? Fear of making a mistake? Fear of being undeserving? Fear of work undone? You name it. Name it for yourself.

So, for example, when the spoiler in you says ‘You have work to do’ you may follow that with something like ‘Yes, I do, and it will be there for me when I’m done refreshing my mind to do it better’.

Or when the spoiler says ‘You will look like a fool out there on those roller skates,” you can agree again with something like ‘Yes, you are right, I might, but how I look is irrelevant for a physical activity aimed to improve how I think and feel.’

And for anyone having trouble figuring out what’s the best play for you, you may take a magic carpet ride back to your childhood, and picture yourself playing at what you loved to do.

What was it for you then? How do you dream about playing now? How about to start: One time a day designated just for play? Outdoors, even better. Practice, practice, practice, see what happens…and let us know.

Warm Wishes,

Madelaine

Photo by Freepik

What Free Time?

Last time we talked about post pandemic ‘time warping’:

“All of a sudden everything went on stop.… We could not be the people we were used to being in the world anymore,” says health psychologist Alison Holman of the University of California, Irvine.

“People who experienced temporal disintegration … got stuck in that past experience. They couldn’t put together the flow from past to present to future,” she says.

Now we have ‘time poverty’ too:

Defined as the chronic feeling of having too many things to do and not enough time in which to do them, ‘time poverty’ is on the rise. Research shows most people feel persistently ‘time poor’, and that time poverty can have severe and wide-reaching impacts, including lower wellbeing, physical health and productivity.

Taken together—people having trouble getting moving at the same time they feel time deprived—is something that a lot of people are having to slog through right now.

Not everyone, but nearly 50% of Americans are feeling time poor, leaving them stressed, tired, and depressed.

So much for free time. And yet, a new study found that not too much, not too little, but just the right amount free time is really good for us.

And where is that 2-5 hours supposed to come from? What does free time even mean?

What is Free Time?

Free time is discretionary time. So, does it matter how the so-called free time is spent. Yes, it does.

Psychologist and professor, Cassie Holmes, warns that too much free time can interfere with our sense of purpose, which then interferes with our happiness.

So, she recommends a variety of ways to spend discretionary time that increase sense of purpose and, in so doing, our sense of being more ‘time affluent’ too.

But I want to talk about play. Just play.

What About Play?

Excerpted from an earlier post:

Here’s a good statement from performance coach, Joe Robinson:

“When you’re stressed, the brain’s activated emotional hub, the amygdala, suppresses positive mood, fueling a self-perpetuating cycle of negativity. Play can break you out of that straitjacket. It’s the brain’s reset button. This tonic we write off as trivial is a crucial engine of well-being. In its low-key, humble way, play yanks grownups out of their purposeful sleepwalk to reveal the animating spirit within. You are alive, and play will prove it to you.”

Anybody who has ever suffered burnout will tell you how practical and serious it is to bring energy back to life – at work and at home.

In fact, Harvard researchers found that play not only relieves stress but improves brain function, stimulates the mind, boosts creativity, improves relationships, builds energy and resistance to disease.

Wow. But then, if it’s that good, how come we don’t play more. Seems to me right up there with the best of ways to spend our time. And yet, a lot of folks don’t look at play that way. As one author put it:

“Our society tends to dismiss play for adults. Play is perceived as unproductive, petty or even a guilty pleasure. The notion is that once we reach adulthood, it’s time to get serious. And between personal and professional responsibilities, there’s no time to play.”

So that’s my pitch on play. And, yes, I am aware that I am talking about the purposefulness of the supposed purposelessness of play. Kind of like asking if there is really such a thing as true altruism if it’s that good to do good for the one doing the good. Doesn’t matter.

Two to 5 hours of discretionary time per day and, if you care to, go ahead and include play. Practice, practice, practice…and let us know what you find.

Warm wishes,

Madelaine

Photo by pexels-cottonbro

Why Working ‘Off’ Hours Matters

‘Off’ hours would be times we think that we should not be working. To quote the Cornell and London School of Economics authors of the study:

“Even if you’re still working 40 hours a week, you’re working during time that you’ve mentally encoded as time off, or as time that should be for a vacation, and that can make you feel suddenly that your work is less enjoyable,” said Kaitlin Woolley, associate professor of marketing in the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management, in the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business.

So, this could be working on federal holidays, or while we are on vacation, and I am supposing this would apply to working during evening hours for those who have encoded they should not really be working then either.

Of course, with WFH and Hybrid, the situation has gotten a whole lot messier, and more challenging, in terms of setting good boundaries about when to work and not. It also depends on how we define work.

Does thinking about work on ‘off’ hours count as work? I think it does. Seriously, if messed up work hours takes that big a toll on work satisfaction, well then, no wonder so many people are resigning or rethinking their work.

People who dislike (ok fine…hate) their jobs are less motivated, less supportive of others and their common goals; they are less passionate, productive, and less able to build strong, positive relationships too.

So, if you or someone you know happens to dislike or hate their job, it is clearly not just about them.

Here is the part that is more about them: Low work satisfaction is very bad for individual health. Adverse effects can include: sleep problems, anxiety, depression, and all the many disorders related to these.

But even all of that is not just about them. Typically, there are family, friends, and coworkers counting on our physical, emotional, mental wellness—not only because it affects them directly but also because they care.

The people I know who work ‘Off” hours, actually know better. They know something is not right about what they are doing. And, they do it anyway. So why don’t they stop? What makes that hard?

What Makes Setting Work-Life Boundaries Hard

The authors of the study that found the 9% decline in work satisfaction believe that part of what is going on is a perception that other people are off and having fun while the worker who is expected by their employer to work during evening, weekend, vacation, or holiday hours is not.

But it is not always an employer imposing the ‘Off’ hours work. Often, it is self-imposed which can be driven by or associated with any number of internal factors:

• Need for reassurance about one’s competence.
• Distraction from emotional challenges.
• Personality traits, such as highly conscientious, extraverted, neurotic, narcissistic

It is also true that some professions are simply more demanding than others. Doesn’t matter.

No matter what the cause, working ‘Off’ hours seems a serious matter with serious effects.

For the good of all then…for individuals, families, and organizations, here are a couple of tips for employers and individuals to get things under better control.

What Can Be Done

The authors of the study that found the 9% decrease in work satisfaction suggest that employers could build off hours work groups so people can feel that they are in it with other people. Sounds like they are talking about FOMO without using that word.

For individuals, again, there can be a variety of deeply embedded psychological or even cultural drivers. Still, I think that what matters more than the ‘why’ could be the ‘how’ to get better control over the impact of the drivers, whatever they are. How can we stay focused on our work when we think we are supposed to be working and then put the thing down. From an earlier post:

Ever notice how hard it can be to stop yourself from doing one thing to move on to the next? Ever notice how much the last thing you never really put down gets all over everything else? So maybe you wind up exhausted from carrying all of this around all day long, not paying a whole lot of quality attention to anything—and it shows.

One poorly attended activity after another can ruin both the enjoyment and results of that activity and burden you with an overall sense of fatigue and dissatisfaction that really doesn’t need to be there.

Poorly disciplined work habits are just that. Habits. And, my sense of the best way to break a bad habit is to build a new and better one. It’s like planting a new garden and letting the old one go to seed.

Here is something that can help, a free exercise called Focus and Release, which you can grab off my website. Scroll down to the “Complimentary…” box at madelaineweiss.com for the simple 1-page exercise instruction. Please enjoy, and let us know what you find!

Warmly,

Madelaine 

Photo by pexels-nataliya-vaitkevich

Are You Playing Wordle?

Are you one of the 2.5 million people playing this new word game, Wordle?

Wordle is an online 5-letter word game invented by Josh Wardle (Wardle, Wordle, good one). The story is that Josh made up the game during the pandemic because he knew his partner loved word games. Awww…

This game really is a wonderful ‘build it and they will come’ story. In fact, so many players came so fast that the New York Times just bought Wordle for over a million dollars.

This also means that, even though it is free to play now, it is not clear how long that will last.

So, if you are wondering whether you should get on (or off) the bandwagon now, let’s look at what some of the benefits of Wordle are and are not.

2 Benefits of Wordle: Real

Two benefits of Wordle found by Professor Penny Pexman and her colleagues, University of Calgary, are “Shared Experience” and “Need for Cognition.”

Shared experience is something people might be craving, now more than ever after years of pandemic. As Dr. Matt Baldwin put it on NPR (from the transcript):

I think it’s because we’re all working toward the exact same thing. So, the word is the same for everyone. And the number of guesses is the same for everyone. And so, it is a truly shared experience. There’s not a lot of variety there.

And psychology suggests that, when we all work toward a common goal, we really coalesce around that goal. And sort of group boundaries are broken down. And we come together. And, yeah, in Pokemon, there’s a lot of variety. Even in Sudoku or Words With Friends, it’s not necessarily a common goal despite being a shared experience. So, I think that’s one thing that sets Wordle apart.

The satisfaction of need for cognition, which varies among us, is also considered a benefit of playing Wordle. One definition of this psychological term is: “Need for cognition refers to an individual’s tendency to engage in and enjoy activities that require thinking (e.g., brainstorming puzzles).”

However, if you check out a few of the articles about need for cognition on the internet, you too might come away unclear if need for cognition is more about enjoying the brain exertion for its own sake, or is there something more deeply meaningful that is required.

I imagine Wordle would satisfy the former but not the latter for me. That is, I would rather read and write about why 2.5 million people are playing Wordle and I am not, than actually play the game. Epistemic hunger, thirst for knowledge, as my professor once said.

To each their own enjoyment. But there are people, maybe a lot of them, who have imagined certain benefits of Wordle that may or may not be there.

2 Benefits of Wordle: Imagined?

There is a commonly held belief that puzzles impact the health of our brains. Thus, there may be people who might figure that Wordle is a good use of their time because: 1) it makes us smarter, and 2) it wards off the effects of aging on the brain.

Maybe, maybe not. Studies have shown that there is a connection between doing jigsaw puzzles and brain health. Some of beneficial effects have been found in cognition, reasoning, short term memory, problem solving—perhaps imagination, creativity, and productivity too.

Sad to say, though, according to Pexman, Wordle makes us better at Wordle—rather than measurably smarter or somehow immune to the effects of aging on our brains.

To Play or Not To Play

So what if it is just for play? What if people on the high side of need for cognition play Wordle simply and only because it feels good to challenge the brain?

And, what if millions of people are playing Wordle because communing in play, with shared common goal during times of heightened social isolation, also feels good?

What’s wrong with feeling good, especially at a time when there is so much on our hearts and minds challenging us about everything else?

Surely, there would have to be people around the Wordle player who would benefit by the Wordle player’s improved mood. Even if that’s all there is, it is a lot.

Bottom line, if you want to play, play! From my earlier post on play, a pep talk by performance coach Joe Robinson:

When you’re stressed, the brain’s activated emotional hub, the amygdala, suppresses positive mood, fueling a self-perpetuating cycle of negativity. Play can break you out of that straitjacket. It’s the brain’s reset button. This tonic we write off as trivial is a crucial engine of well-being. In its low-key, humble way, play yanks grownups out of their purposeful sleepwalk to reveal the animating spirit within. You are alive, and play will prove it to you.

Would love to hear if you are playing, how you are playing, and what you have found. Comment here below or contact me at madelaineweiss.com

Warm wishes,

Madelaine

Photo by verve.com

Deep Time, a $1.5 million research project on human adaptation to 40 days in a damp, dark cave with no clocks, no phones, no contact with outside world—finds 67% of subjects wanted to stay in isolation longer.

Staying Connected While Staying In

No surprise to me. It’s exactly what I’m noticing about invitations to go out and play that I’m putting off a bit longer myself! And it’s not just me, although it is especially interesting on me given how much I wished I could go out and play all that time I spent in isolation for talking back to my dad.

I’m also reminded of a 1994 movie, The Shawshank Redemption. If I remember correctly, there was something in the ending about Morgan Freeman actually preferring incarceration, where his comfort and community had grown. Much like the many now who have figured out how to both entertain themselves and connect with others in news ways that work surprisingly well.

But just because something is comfortable doesn’t necessarily make a steady diet of it right.

The Case For Play

Here’s a good statement from performance coach, Joe Robinson:

“When you’re stressed, the brain’s activated emotional hub, the amygdala, suppresses positive mood, fueling a self-perpetuating cycle of negativity. Play can break you out of that straitjacket. It’s the brain’s reset button. This tonic we write off as trivial is a crucial engine of well-being. In its low-key, humble way, play yanks grownups out of their purposeful sleepwalk to reveal the animating spirit within. You are alive, and play will prove it to you.”

Anybody who has ever suffered burnout will tell you how practical and serious it is to bring energy back to life – at work and at home.

In fact, Harvard researchers found that play not only relieves stress but improves brain function, stimulates the mind, boosts creativity, improves relationships, builds energy and resistance to disease.

Wow. But then, if it’s that good, how come we don’t play more. Seems to me right up there with the best of ways to spend our time. And yet, a lot of folks don’t look at play that way. As one author put it:

“Our society tends to dismiss play for adults. Play is perceived as unproductive, petty or even a guilty pleasure. The notion is that once we reach adulthood, it’s time to get serious. And between personal and professional responsibilities, there’s no time to play.”

Make time. You know you can. Somehow we all manage to find time for whatever it is we really want to do.

Defining Play For YOU

But maybe you haven’t played in a long time, and don’t even know what would be play for you. After all, there are so many kinds of play:

• Object play (basketball)
• Locomotor play (running)
• Social play (pretending)

Some play doesn’t look like play at all. Take imagination. When we have a problem on our hands and may ask ourselves what someone we admire might do in a similar situation, is that not a form of playing around up there in the brain.

In fact, more than a few people I know play most of what could be the best parts of their lives up there in the brain, more as spectators up in the stands than players out there on the field of their very own lives.

These folks spend time planning trips they never take, imagining love they won’t go out to find, wishing for their dream career from the desk they will not dare to leave. It’s a fine place to start, with that glimmer in the mind’s eye about how we dream things to be.

But it’s a terrible place to be stuck.

What’s In The Way?

What’s in the way for those who don’t or won’t play as much as they could? Fear? Fear of looking like a fool? Fear of making a mistake? Fear of being undeserving? Fear of work undone? You name it. Name it for yourself.

So for example, when the spoiler in you says ‘You have work to do’ you may follow that with something like ‘Yes, I do, and it will be there for me when I’m done refreshing my mind to do it better’.

Or when the spoiler says ‘You will look like a fool out there on those roller skates,” you can agree again with something like ‘Yes, you are right, I might, but how I look is irrelevant for a physical activity aimed to improve how I think and feel.’

And for anyone having trouble figuring out what’s the best play for you, you may take a magic carpet ride back to your childhood, and picture yourself playing at what you loved to do. I, for one, spent hours on end writing books as a little girl, with construction paper covers, sewn up the middle with a big needle and yarn.

For me, reading and writing were play, and still are favorite ways to spend my time. Hence, the indoor-ness of it all. But I really loved to bike too, so I could get the bike out of the storage locker where it has lived for the entire pandemic. But then, where will I put it now that I have 3 indoor pieces of gym equipment already inside. I have to figure that out.

And you? What was it for you then? How do you dream about playing now? How about to start: One time a day designated just for play? Or something else you might devise. Practice, practice, practice, see what happens…and let us know.

Warm Wishes,

Madelaine

Epistemic Hunger

Probably because I asked too many questions, a professor once told me I had epistemic hunger. If you don’t know what that means, look it up. That’s what people with epistemic hunger do. We, the hungry, look everything up. Knowledge for the sake of knowledge. More, More, More…like a psychoactive drug.

People say that knowledge is power. I’m saying knowledge is fun, my kind of fun anyway. So I’m always looking into something, mostly about ‘why we are the way we are and how it matters in everyday life’. And I always want to get it out there in case it matters to you too.

Learning harnesses my attention. So, for example, when I’m reading about “Attention” in “The Discourses of Epictetus,” I’m not thinking about the past, not thinking about the future. No, my mind is completely captivated by what I’m learning…in this case about attention.

So What is Attention?

Attention is the brain’s ability to pick what it wants to concentrate on. This ability can not only keep us from falling off a cliff, and greatly improve our productivity, but bring us incredible pleasure as well. Psychologist Mihály Csíkszentmihály called it a flow state, which is a state of full absorption and full enjoyment to go with it.

Same thing said differently, philosophers tell us to focus on the working surface because that’s where the bliss is. The idea here is to put the attention exactly where the dishrag hits the dish, the paint brush hits the woodwork, the speaker’s voice hits your ear… Why?

Why We Should Pay Attention

Here’s what we know. The mind wanders about 70% of the time. But when we take control of the mind and the placement of our attention, it makes sense that everything that plagues or distracts us takes a back seat. Then we can do a good job at whatever it is and enjoy it a whole lot more too.

As Epictetus points out, would the carpenter’s work be any better with inattention? Would the helmsman steer the ship any better? Would anything really be made any better doing it with our minds somewhere else?

Probably not, but you can try this for yourself. Pick something: food, sex, reading, whatever you like. Then see for yourself if it’s more fun when you are into it than when you are not, and let us know in the comments below.

Warm wishes,

Madelaine

How being hunter-gatherers boosted human brainpower and taught us to love exercise….New research suggests that the link between exercise and the brain is a product of our evolutionary history and our past as hunter-gatherers, and the same parts of the brain that are taxed during complex tasks such as foraging also benefit from exercise.*

It’s called the Adaptive Capacity Model to mean that when we were hunter-gatherers, 2 million years ago, we were multitasking all the time. We used our memories to make decisions about where to go for food and how to get back home, at the same time we had to manage our bodies over challenging terrain.

If this physical/mental complexity of foraging fortified the brain then, as with any other organ – Use it or Lose it. No surprise researchers are now thinking of the aging brain’s cognitive decline as a loss in capacity (neurons and their connections) associated with diminished use.

But even more interesting than this inextricable mind/body connection is how the mind can actually think the body into the exercise that is so good for the body and mind.

• Prisoners found their post-prison golf scores actually improved via visualization of improved swings during prison time.
• Hotel maids showed positive physical impact on a variety of health measures when told that their work was physical exercise.
• People who thought they were less active physically than others had shorter lives.
• People who think life is good lead healthier, longer lives.

Life is what our thoughts make it (Marcus Aurelius). And although it appears the brain can sometimes impact the body without moving a thing, it is good to work the body to keep the “thinking thing” (Descartes) strong enough to do all of its magic for us.

In other words, Get Moving, any way you like. I take dripping wet Latin dancing fitness classes at the gym. What gets me there, more than telling myself how good it is for me, is that my dear departed parents were Latin dancing trophy winners. It’s in the blood. Brings me, and in the way them, alive.

Another woman I know** got going, not as much by telling herself how good it was for her, as by reconnecting with how much she loved and missed the fiercely competitive soccer player she once was. If there is anything to the studies above, she and I both might:

• Visualize ourselves at it and into it, when we can’t or don’t feel like exercising.
• Tell our minds that we are exercising, when we are.
• Think of ourselves as Exercisers as part of who we are.
• Remember that being able to exercise at all means in no small way that life is good.

And for those who are not yet The Exerciser our brains and bodies need us to be, you too can take a mental magic carpet ride back to a time and place when physical was fun. Then you can graft that delicious memory onto whatever form of exercise best helps you to be The Exerciser researchers believe we were all meant to be. Practice, practice, practice…and See What Happens.

For help with this or something else, or to let me know what you think, Contact Me at:

Email:  Madelaine Weiss

Phone:   202-617-0821

* Borkhataria, C. “How being hunter-gatherers boosted human brainpower and taught us to love exercise.” DailyMail, June 30, 2017 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-4655218/How-hunter-gatherers-taught-love-exercise.html#ixzz4oE8w2uzi

** Examples and illustrations are fictional composites inspired by but not depicting nor referring to any actual specific person in my practice or life experience.

Copyright © 2017. Madelaine Claire Weiss. All rights reserved.

What is a fate as bad as death?….in the past, estrangement from family or friends, along with the corresponding exile away from the campfire or town gates, meant literally getting thrown to the wolves. Not surprisingly, our brains are wired with circuitry so that we can scrupulously avoid such fates….The neurological wiring that makes us feel [social] pain, new research suggests, also means that a common painkiller could ease the sting.*

Recent blog posts have centered on the health and overall benefits of PLAY at work and in love. But what if someone doesn’t want to play with you. What if you get rejected. Take Tylenol. TYLENOL for Social Rejection – social pain that hurts even worse than physical pain. You know yourself (or if not try this and see) that you have a harder time vividly re-experiencing a physical pain than re-experiencing the kind of social pain you feel at the thought or sight, let’s say, of the one who rejected you in love. In work, play, love – doesn’t matter where, hardly even matters who did the rejecting. OUCH. Social rejection – the team that didn’t want you, the job you didn’t get, the old love you see with his/her new love, the person who snubbed you on the street – hurts out of the same part of the brain as physical pain and can therefore be treated as such. Tylenol. So what’s all this social fuss about?

The answer lies in our evolutionary past. Humans are social animals; being rejected from our tribe or social group in our pre-civilized past would have meant losing access to food, protection, and mating partners, making it extremely difficult to survive. Being ostracized would have been akin to receiving a death sentence. Because the consequences of ostracism were so extreme, our brains developed an early-warning system to alert us when we were at risk for being “voted off the island” by triggering sharp pain whenever we experienced even a hint of social rejection.

Take the ball-tossing game. Goes something like this: Three people (2 researchers, one subject) sitting in a waiting room. One researcher starts tossing a ball to another, which goes around evenly among the 3 of them until on the second round when they skip passing it to the subject. Silly as it sounds, dozens of studies have shown how this mild a rejection can cause mood and self-esteem altering emotional pain. And that’s nothing. Total strangers in a waiting room, so makes sense how much more painful social rejection can be where it might matter a bit if not a lot more. You know that party you didn’t even want to go to, and still you felt bad that you didn’t make the cut. Or that meeting, or the memo you didn’t get. Who cares? We do because, like it or not, the brain is wired to care. Happens to the best of us. I can remember myself having been rejected in love one time around a special birthday. People sent me flowers because they loved me and it was my birthday. So there I was stretched out on the sofa with a serious case of physical and emotional blah’s staring into space, at some point noticing the flowers all around, and realizing, Holy Hannah, I’m in my coffin. For heaven’s sake girl get moving, get up.

Some get it worse than others. The brain’s natural pain killing response (μ-opioid, morphine) varies among us. And, some personality types seem even to thrive on social rejection. For example, one study found that some independent types may take social rejection as a validation of their specialness, inspiring creativity and productivity; contrasted with other types for whom there has been found a lowering of cognitive functioning during the post rejection phase. The fear of social pain is so great for numbers of clients** that they are willing to constrict their lives severely in work, play, and love to keep themselves feeling safe. Talk about blah’s though, and good for them knowing there must be a happier, healthier, more productive way to live their lives, if they can learn to modulate the pain. A couple of them are, as we speak, considering experimenting outside of their comfort zones in love and work with Tylenol on hand, and I for one cannot wait to hear whether and how that worked out. What fun!

There are, of course, ways other than Tylenol to deal with life limiting social pain. One is to bring some care and discipline to the self-talk judging you relentlessly for it. Talk Back. Welcome to the human race. It’s normal, okay. It helped us to survive and thrive as a species and is not going away anytime soon. Better to know we might feel pain, and then to venture forth anyway than to be blind sided by it, which is worse if for no other reason than how foolish we might feel to have not seen the possibility for it coming. Just so you know, it’s ALWAYS possible, because there is no accounting for taste and what makes people a good match in work, play, or love over a long enough haul to prevent rejection. But life is what our thoughts make it, thoughts are not facts, and people who manage social rejection constructively tend to do so with a different mindset than those who do not. So here’s a list from succeedsocially.com of ways people who deal with it well tend to think about rejection:

• They know when someone doesn’t want to talk to them or hang out it’s often not a true rejection at all. The person was just distracted or had other plans, and has nothing against them as an individual.
• When they are rejected for real, they know it’s not always a reflection on them and may be because the other person was having a bad day.
• They know they can’t be a good match for everyone they meet.
• They know that rejection is just part of the process of trying to do things like form a social life. They realize making friends is partially a numbers game. They think long term, and focus on what their end goal is, rather than worrying how any one interaction plays out.
• They realize everyone gets rejected at times, even self-assured, good looking people who seem to have it easy.
• They realize that trying to avoid all rejection would mean embracing a safe, boring, people-pleasing life.
• They view rejection as a way to screen out people who wouldn’t have been a good match for them anyway. They almost see getting rejected by someone as a favor, since they’ve been given a clear message that they should put their energy into pursuing other prospects.
• They realize some rejections are a good thing, like if a bigot rejects them for being non-prejudiced.
• They realize no one else cares all that much if they get rejected. They may even admire them for having the guts to risk going after what they want.
• They see every ‘no’ as one step forward towards them getting a ‘yes’.
• They see rejection as an opportunity to gain feedback and learn from their mistakes.

And, remembering that the injury causing the pain was related to an age-old fear of dying as a result of not belonging, seems like a no brainer what else there is to do. Plant yourself firmly among people, ones who love you if possible, just to soak in all that love and belonging. And, if no one is around, go to the movies, go to church, join a meet up… Plant yourself among people just to show your brain everything is okay. You may be in pain, again happens to the best of us, but it will pass and, even if it feels like a fate worse than death at the time, you can get up and get moving among the living, life goes on and you are not going to die. Practice, practice, practice…and see what happens.

For help with this or something else, Contact Me at:

Email:  Madelaine Weiss

Phone:   202 617-0821

*Gary Stix, “Feeling the Pain of Rejection? Try Taking a Tylenol.” September 1, 2010, Scientific American, https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/social-analgesics/

** Examples and illustrations are fictional composites inspired by but not depicting nor referring to any actual specific person in my practice or life experience.

Copyright © 2017. Madelaine Claire Weiss. All rights reserved.

  “Play refreshes a long-term adult relationship. In a healthy relationship it is like oxygen: pervasive and mostly unnoticed, but essential to intimacy. It refreshes by promoting humor, the enjoyment of novelty, the capacity to share a lighthearted sense of the world’s ironies, the enjoyment of mutual storytelling, the capacity to openly divulge imagination and fantasies….these playful communications and interactions produce a climate for easy connection and deepening, more rewarding relationship – true intimacy.

Take play out of the mix and, like a climb up the oxygen-poor ‘death zone’ of Mount Everest, the relationship becomes a survival endurance contest. Without play skills, the repertoire to deal with inevitable stresses is narrowed. Even if loyalty, responsibility, duty, and steadfastness remain, without playfulness there will be insufficient vitality left over to keep the relationship buoyant and satisfying.”*

Someone I know** once said that couples do all this vacation, theater, movies stuff because they are bored out of their minds with each other. If people are really into each other, she said, they don’t need all that. And if they’re not into each other without all that, they shouldn’t be together. She makes adult play sound lame. Researchers on play make it sound not only normal and natural, but really, really smart. Here’s why.

In American anthropologist, human behavior researcher, and self-help author Helen Fisher’s Why We Love, we learn about phases of love:

“Lust, the craving for sexual gratification, emerged to motivate our ancestors to seek sexual union with almost any partner. Romantic love, the elation and obsession of “being in love,” enabled them to focus their courtship attentions on a single individual at a time, thereby conserving precious mating time and energy. And male-female attachment, the feeling of calm, peace, and security one often has for a long-term mate, evolved to motivate our ancestors to love this partner long enough to rear their young.”

As you may know, there is a bit of a trade off over time. Rather like wine pairing for multi-course meals, different wines for different phases of the meal, Fisher tells us about the different hormones accompanying different phases of love. So the crazy, wonderful, roller coaster buzz we feel at the beginning, left to mother nature, over time not so much. She has other things, like the long-term stability of our nest, in mind for us. Hence the calm, peace, and security that can morph into boredom if we are not mindful of the potential for just that. Boredom.

Fortunately, a lot of people know this. They know what to do, and they do it. All manner of adult play together, including, according to Bloggers Brett and Kate McKay: Body play (dancing), Object play (golf), Social play (dining with friends), Pretend play (role play), Narrative play (sharing stories), Creative play (trip planning), Attunement play (viewing together TV, sports, movies, theater, the Grand Canyon…). Whatever feels to the two of you like play, meaning that even if there is some point to it (like sex for procreation), if the delight of it outweighs the point of it, it can qualify as play.

To repeat: “…these playful communications and interactions produce a climate for easy connection and deepening, more rewarding relationship – true intimacy. Take play out of the mix and, like a climb up the oxygen-poor ‘death zone’ of Mount Everest, the relationship becomes a survival endurance contest.”*

Okay, so in truth, just because there is no apparent point to the play other than for the fun of it, there really is a point to it. That’s a good thing. Play is a good thing, although theories abound on what the fundamental and enduring point of play is. Studies have shown playfulness in adults to be positively associated with academic performance, work performance, stress management, sense of well-being, physical health, social bonding, and problem solving abilities, to name a few. Nice outcomes. They go on to posit that the positive emotions associated with these outcomes may explain at least in part why men and women rank playful, fun loving, and sense of humor so highly when asked what they are looking for in a mate. That is, playfulness would be seen as good for the relationship, the well-being of each individual partner, and their long term excitement and affection for each other – to help us to pair bond and reproduce in ways that helped us to survive and to thrive as a species, no less.

But alas, not only do too many couples get buried in the daily grind of everyday life, as in, Who has time for play?, but researchers have mentioned as well that it is hard to get funding for research on play – precisely because it’s all so positive in the face of a hardwiring for negativity, known as the “negativity bias.” Here’s how that goes: In what we call the environment of evolutionary adaptation, millions of years ago when our modern brains were forming, if something great happened (like a mating opportunity) and we missed it, oh well, too bad, but there will be another. If, on the other hand, something terrible was coming down the pike and we missed it, no oh well, too bad’s about it; we just became somebody’s lunch. So it makes sense we’d be more vigilant about the negative than the positive as a survival rule. Trouble is we’re no longer in that environment and, though it may feel at times that we are about to become someone’s lunch, we’re not, not really. There are, therefore, much happier, healthier, more productive ways to spend our energy and our time than in the default of this normal, natural negativity mode.

Some of us live more in the negativity mode than others. Someone has to keep an eye out for danger and, if your partner has taken on that role more than you have, it would be nice if you expressed your gratitude (Thank you for your service) and took some of it on yourself some of the time. Just to be nice. And nicer still, would be if, as a team, you acknowledged that the normal hormonal shifts over time in relationships, coupled with the negativity bias in humans in general, are significant forces to contend with, together. Then, you two can, on purpose, plant play into your lives, as a habit forming staple from the start and for the long haul. Then you two can be and stay happy in love.

So how are you as an individual and as a couple going to Play today just to Play? Start today? Why not? Play Together. Stay together. For a happier, healthier, more productive Love. Practice, practice, practice…and see what happens.

For help with this or something else, Contact Me at:

Email:  Madelaine Weiss

Phone:   202 617-0821

* Brown, Stuart, M.D., Play: How it Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul. New York: Penguin, 2010, p..166

**Examples and illustrations are fictional composites inspired by but not depicting nor referring to any actual specific person in my practice or life experience.

Copyright © 2017. Madelaine Claire Weiss. All rights reserved.