Tag Archives: learning

The lost art of joy – Adaptability

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A few years ago, I performed in a Christmas musical.

Thankfully, I got the part of the narrator – lots of lines to learn but no singing, because I sing like a cat with laryngitis. I was also hoping to get away without any dancing, because I dance like a dyspraxic hippo, but the director was adamant – all the cast had to participate in the closing number.

Rehearsals for the dance were somewhat embarrassing. There was me – middle-aged, sedentary, overweight and unfit – surrounded by a bunch of skinny, limber teenagers and twenty-somethings. The dance instructor would take us through the warm up and while I would be struggling to get my feet more than shoulders width apart or my fingers much past my knees, the teenage whippets would be doing the splits all the way to the ground, or bending forward with their palms on the floor. Even those who weren’t very good dancers made up for it by the fact that their body had to strength and flexibility to adapt to the moves they had to learn. My body was tight and unforgiving, and I had to work really hard to do what the flexible people did very simply.

The world is in constant motion. Every day brings new challenges as the swirling currents of our social and physical environments push and pull us in different directions. Our inner world swirls just as much, as our feelings and emotions ebb and flow, churn and whirl. The collision of the swirling oceans of our outer world and the turbulent air of our inner worlds can create rain, storms or even hurricanes of psychosocial distress. Even without the bad weather, the constantly changing social and emotional forces creates never-ending demands on our ability to cope, and the exigencies can be exhausting.

Just like those people who were physically more flexible were able to better cope with the demands of the dance number, those people who are emotionally more flexible are able to better cope with the demands of our inner and outer worlds.

Psychological flexibility is being able to adjust our short term feelings in service of our long term values. In the research, psychological flexibility actually refers to a number of dynamic processes that unfold over time, such as how a person adapts to fluctuating situational demands, reconfigures mental resources, shifts perspective, and balances competing desires, needs, and life domains.

In other words, psychologically flexibility involves travelling in the direction of your deepest values, but being in touch with the present moment so that adjustments can be made to keep you on track.

Being psychologically flexible is like turning south for a little while to compensate for the northerly breeze so you can keep sailing in the direction of your long term values.

In day to day life, being psychologically flexible means not holding too tightly to our feelings, emotions or thoughts which can change rapidly and which aren’t always reliably in service of our deeper values.

So how can we become more psychologically flexible so that we can enhance the joy that psychological flexibility encourages?

It starts with knowing what your values are, and moving towards them.

We also need to work on acceptance, allowing our feelings and emotions, as strong and as distressing as they are at times, to ebb and flow as they do without rigidly fighting against them or trying to suppress them.

In order to build our capacity to cope with changing situational demands, we also need to “stretch” our mental “muscles” like I needed to stretch my physical muscles to be able to dance better. To become more mentally limber,
1. Learn something new every day, even if it’s something small
2. Do something differently, even if it’s a small change, but don’t always stick to the same routine
3. Do different things, things that you may not have done before. Again, doesn’t have to be much, but try a different coffee order, or a new meal at a restaurant. Listen to some new music.
4. Challenge yourself. Just a little bit every day. It’s ok to be a little bit mentally uncomfortable. Stretching is good for you!

As you continue to grow more psychological flexible, you will open yourself to new and greater experiences of joy.

The lost art of joy – Learning

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Solomon wrote: “Of the making of many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness unto the flesh”.

I loved that verse when I was at school. It was utilised more than once when my teachers wanted to give us more homework – “But, sir, the Bible says that too much homework is bad for you.” Not that my teachers cared, they just gave me more homework anyway.

Much study may be a weariness unto the flesh, but some study is actually very beneficial. Learning helps to promote joy, and joy helps to promote learning.

It’s been shown that learning is much easier when there’s joy involved. Co-founder of the NeuroLeadership Institute, Dr David Rock said,

“Engagement is a state of being willing to do difficult things, to take risks, to think deeply about issues and develop new solutions … Interest, happiness, joy, and desire are approach emotions. This state is one of increased dopamine levels, important for interest and learning.”

and

“There is a large and growing body of research which indicates that people experiencing positive emotions perceive more options when trying to solve problems, solve more non-linear problems that require insight, [and they] collaborate better and generally perform better overall.”

This makes sense. According to the classical psychology principle of the Yerkes-Dodson law, optimal task performance occurs at an intermediate level of arousal, with relatively poorer performance at both lower and higher arousal levels. Too much stress (anxiety) or not enough stress (boredom) results in reduced performance. When someone is happy and engaged, their learning is at its optimum level.

But while it’s true that happiness and engagement create the optimal conditions for learning, it’s also true that learning created a sense of joy.

Learning new things is stimulating. Exposure to new information makes the brain work harder. We are very predictive creatures, and our brain has adapted to be predictive because it’s the most efficient way of processing the vast amount of information that we come across each day. After a while of being exposed to the same stimuli, our brains get a bit lazy. There’s no need to grow new branches and our brains become a bit stagnant. There’s no stimulation, so there’s no dopamine rush. We just get into our rut. But being exposed to new experiences, to new stimuli, is invigorating. Our brain can not longer rely on the same old predictive pathways, and new parts of the brain need to be engaged to process all of the different things we’re being exposed to. The dopamine cloud that comes from all of the novel stimuli is quite euphoric.

Learning something new helps our brain to stay supple. The brain is like a muscle – the only way to keep it flexible and strong is to exercise it. By constantly providing stimulation, our brain can better cope when unexpected events occur, because we’re already used to novel challenges. It helps us stay resilient by improving our psychological flexibility.

Learning something new can also give us a sense of accomplishment which is always good for our self-esteem and self-confidence.

There are many ways to learn new things – read new books, or if you’re not the reading type, find some interesting, factual documentaries. A great way of stimulating your brain is to learn a second language, which also gives you a great excuse to do the other thing that helps to grow your brain and your joy, which is to travel to a different country. Trying to speak a new language in a foreign country will really give your brain a workout, which may seem very daunting at first, but will help you grow immensely. You can also learn a new skill like craft, or a musical instrument. Your learning doesn’t just have to be about yourself – learn to juggle or make balloon animals, and use those skills to entertain people, or put a smile on a child’s face. That way the joy is shared through learning and giving.

Just remember your values when deciding what you would like to learn so that your learning is in step with your authentic self and enriches your life. And make sure you keep your work and life in balance as you carve out time to learn something new, all that study doesn’t become a weariness unto the flesh.

Going green – why envy is an adaptive process

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The Bible says, in Job 5:2, “For wrath kills a foolish man, And envy slays a simple one.”

A German proverb goes, “Envy eats nothing, but its own heart.”

Dr Caroline Leaf, communication pathologist and self-titled cognitive neuroscientist, posted today on her social media feeds, “Jealousy and envy creates damage in the brain … but … celebrating others protects the brain!”

Yes, sometimes envy isn’t good for us. Emotions guide our thought process, and like all emotions that are out of balance, too much envy can cloud our better rational judgement and bias our perception of the world. Thankfully, envy doesn’t literally eat out our hearts or literally cause brain damage.

If anything, envy when experienced in a balanced way can actually improve our brain functioning. According to real cognitive neuroscientists, envy and regret are emotions that help us because they both fulfil the role of effectively evaluating our past actions, which improves our choices in the future. As Coricelli and Rustichini noted, “envy and regret, as well as their positive counterparts, share the common nature that is hypothesized in the functional role explanation: they are affective responses to the counterfactual evaluation of what we could have gotten had we made a different choice. Envy has, like regret, a functional explanation in adaptive learning.” [1]

When it comes to the human psyche, there is no black or white, good vs evil distinction between different feelings or emotions. B-grade life coaches and slick pseudoscience salespeople dumb down our emotions into a false dichotomy because it helps sell their message (and their books). Every emotion can be either helpful or unhelpful depending on their context in each individual.

As Skinner and Zimmer-Gembeck wrote, “Emotion is integral to all phases of the coping process, from vigilance, detection, and appraisals of threat to action readiness and coordinating responses during stressful encounters. However, adaptive coping does not rely exclusively on positive emotions nor on constant dampening of emotional reactions. In fact, emotions like anger have important adaptive functions, such as readying a person to sweep away an obstacle, as well communicating these intentions to others. Adaptive coping profits from flexible access to a range of genuine emotions as well as the ongoing cooperation of emotions with other components of the action system.” [2]

If you find your thoughts and feelings tinged by the greenish hue of envy, don’t worry, it’s not necessarily a bad thing. Your heart isn’t going to consume itself and you won’t sustain any brain damage. Use envy or regret as tools of learning, tools to help you evaluate your choices so that you make a better choice next time. Having balanced emotions is the key to learning and growing, coping with whatever obstacles life throws at us.

References

  1. Coricelli, G. and Rustichini, A., Counterfactual thinking and emotions: regret and envy learning. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci, 2010. 365(1538): 241-7 doi: 10.1098/rstb.2009.0159
  2. Skinner, E.A. and Zimmer-Gembeck, M.J., The development of coping. Annu Rev Psychol, 2007. 58: 119-44 doi: 10.1146/annurev.psych.58.110405.085705