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Sitting on public transport looking out of the window not your phone and listening to music is ok but probably not podcasts. Also showers are very good for the
by whywhywhywhy 1y ago
Sitting on public transport looking out of the window not your phone and listening to music is ok but probably not podcasts.
Also showers are very good for the right state of mind.
- stavros 1y agoAll my good writing ideas come to me in the shower. I don't know why, but at least I don't smell.
- SirFatty 1y agoThe shower, every time. No idea what the difference is if I stand in the shower or sit on the couch in my living room. Sometimes I end up looking like a prune.
- NoMoreNicksLeft 1y agoI suspect the shower is more relaxing than the couch. When I sit on the couch I'm just anxious... I know there are things I should be doing other than being lazy sitting on the couch. When I'm in the shower, I know that I am doing what I'm supposed to be doing. And it just happens to be something pleasant.
- dowager_dan99 1y agodon't discount sitting vs. standing, even if it is under a stream of deliciously hot water for longer than you probably should.
- pfannkuchen 1y agoNot very many of our ancestors were eaten in hot springs, I guess? It’s hard to hunt when the ground is so slippery. Then our body feels safe and allows attentional resources to be diverted away from safety and towards ideation? Same thing happens for me, and that’s my working theory.
- Etheryte 1y agoThese kind of evolutionary theories often make for captivating and plausible stories, they are also pretty much universally false. Similar trains of thought were used in the middle ages for example to rationalize male and female roles in society, all of which have been debunked many times over at this point.
- oasisaimlessly 1y ago> Similar trains of thought were used in the middle ages [...] The theory of evolution was conceived way after the middle ages, so that seems beside the point.
- Etheryte 1y agoSimilar does not mean the same. A good example is the story of prudism and genitals, where women were expected to be prudent with the rationale that god hid their genitals away.
- bhouston 1y agoIt is unlikely hot springs were omnipresent enough across the environment to have an impact on overall human evolution.
- pfannkuchen 1y agoThe safety instinct complex likely has components shaped in pre-human and even pre-ape and perhaps even pre-mammal ancestors. Pressure comes from duration as well as frequency of encounter. A feature encountered infrequently but consistently across many millions of years can exert a pressure equivalent to a feature encountered more consistently for a shorter period. Also note that the effect size to be explained here is not that large - just a nudge towards relaxation in what seems to be a subpopulation of humans. What do you think about that?
- bhouston 1y ago
- munificent 1y agoIn the shower, you can't be doing anything else, so it quiets the inner critic in your mind that says "You should do something productive right now instead of daydreaming."
- lukan 1y agoWater is a vitalizing factor as well. Gets the blood flowing, more oxygen to the brain ..
- an_aparallel 1y agoSwimming. And showers (water touching/passing skin) is essensially lymphatic drainage.
- immibis 1y agoYou can listen to podcasts in the shower easily enough by putting your device outside of the shower, or having a waterproof Bluetooth speaker. It's not true that you can't do anything in the shower besides showering.
- dowager_dan99 1y agoI think it was more that you CAN do nothing else, guilt free. If you are down are yourself because you're not efficiently multi-tasking during your shower, that might be a deeper issue.
- munificent 1y agoListening to podcasts isn't really doing something. The part of your brain that's like "you should be fixing the leaky faucet right now" will be quelled when you're in the shower because, I guess aside from consuming audio media, there really isn't much else you can do.
- hahajk 1y agoha, rue the day your brain realizes your phone is waterproof
- thijson 1y agoI was going to say shower too. Also walking the dog.
- koolba 1y agoI think being naked is a factor as well. Have not been able to A/B test that part of it in an office environment yet though.
- echelon 1y agoThis has been my experience for optimal creativity tasks: - Best: walks, running, walking in circles, walking in circles talking over the phone (1:1 planning), walking in circles talking out loud to myself - Good: showers, daydreaming in place, daydreaming on trips where I'm not driving, "pair program" white boarding with one other (exceptional) person - Okay: white boarding by myself, trying to put ideas to pen and paper by myself, meetings with the right people in a physical space - Bad: at the computer, on the phone, walking or running to podcasts, walking or running to the wrong type of music, video conference meetings, and generally all other meetings - What are you even doing: YouTube, Netflix, or podcasts on in the background at any level
- klabb3 1y agoI agree but what is the root cause? Which things are generally bad for the brain? Because if it was social, meetings would be good. And if it’s reality escape, going to the movies would be bad.
- echelon 1y agoPerhaps it's in putting the brain in a place where the body is on autopilot and the verbal / spatial centers of the brain can be free to wander in and out of focus. Podcasts kill this mode for me, so you can't have the brain thinking about other people's thoughts or words. Playing a video game doesn't work, so I think your spatial thinking has to be free too. It's as if distracting the brain's non-verbal/spatial modes or burning some amount of calories from those centers gives the "thinking" parts of the brain some "alone time". That's an incredibly non-scientific and unserious hypothesis though.
- imhoguy 1y agoI would also add toilet, without phone obviously.
- harrison_clarke 1y agoIP67+ on your phone is bad for mental health
- xp84 1y agoYeah my lifehack in that department is assuming that the seals might not be perfect anymore. Plus a brief brush with seawater splashes made my iPhone speaker sound like crap for a few days a few years ago so I've decided it's not worth the risk!
- Etheryte 1y agoSeawater destroys everything you ever loved and cared for, no IP rating will defend against that for long.
- smileysteve 1y agoIf my phone gets dirty watered, i ensure I rinse it with fresh water; really confuses the onlooker.
- BlueTemplar 1y agoI have never had a (smart)watch damaged by seawater. (I am not a sailor though, I guess keeping exposure fairly short matters.)
- jajko 1y agoThat's how I pass my (2x a week) trips from work in the office. I just put away my phone and look out of the train at one of most beautiful sights I've ever seen in my life - huge (by my standards) clear Geneva lake with boats and Swiss & French alps in the background, and if weather is clear also Mont Blanc and surrounding peaks towering above it all. I've proposed to my wife on top of it some time ago during a grueling and dangerous ski tour - one way to forever change a look at some sight. Walking in some easy nature is great too, somehow relaxes subconsciousness so I end up with few todos marked in my phone after each such walk. When I occasionally smoke weed at such walks somehow this feed becomes a firehose and sometimes struggle to note it all. Nature is amazing in any form, recharging, healing and somehow at lowest level that connection just feels right.
- jimnotgym 1y agoI used to get this from smoking cigarettes. I'm convinced that half of the relaxation was being forced to take a break and concentrate on your breathing.
- dowager_dan99 1y agoCombined with the social aspects (though these days it's single smokers getting their fix asap) I think there probably IS a benefit here, just not outweighed by the smoking part.