Start your day with kindness

When I was in my twenties, my parents got into watching the television series Cops.

Me, I never could see the draw.  The plot was the same every time:

• Bad guys do bad stuff.
• Cops get involved.
• Bad guys get arrested or shot.  Or both.
• Repeat x100.

I like my entertainment to have a few more in the way of unexpected twists.  But that's just me, apparently.

Anyhow, there came a point that Cops went into syndication, and on one station, it played every single night.  And my parents had it on.

Every single night.

At this point, I should explain that my parents, especially my mother, had a tremendous suspicion of the unknown.  If there's a word that means the opposite of "adventurous," that was my mom.  As an example, when I made my first trip overseas -- a one-month cross-country hike of England, from Blackpool to Whitby -- her last words to me on the night before I left were, "Don't trust anyone."

I know about correlation not implying causation and all, but I can't help but wonder how much her view of the world as a scary, unsafe place was reinforced by watching a television show that every single night showed the worst of humanity.  I'm guessing the causation probably went both ways -- she gravitated toward the series because she already had that attitude, and the series acted to reinforce the attitude, and round and round it went.

[Image licensed under the Creative Commons West Midlands Police from West Midlands, United Kingdom, 101 Non-Emergency Number - Cops and Robbers (8264612462), CC BY-SA 2.0]

Whatever the cause, her lack of comprehension of how I could possibly want to travel to Dangerous Foreign Countries Inhabited By Dangerous Foreign People (like the English, for fuck's sake) only got worse as she got older.  When we took our first trip to Ecuador back in 2001, not only going to (gasp!) South America, but (1) doing so three months after 9/11, and (2) bringing along both of our sons, at that point ages 11 and 13, she was aghast, but at least knew by then that it'd be futile to try to talk me out of it.

This all comes up because of a study in the Journal of Applied Psychology called, "Rude-Colored Glasses: The Contaminating Effects of Witnessed Morning Rudeness on Perceptions and Behaviors Throughout the Workday."  While on first glance, the study may not seem to have much to do with an overall perception of the world as dangerous, the two are connected.  The study shows pretty clearly that the behavior we are exposed to (or expose ourselves to) colors how we see everything -- and that the effect can last far beyond the time immediately after the incident in question.  The authors write:

Using an experimental experience sampling design, we investigate how witnessing morning rudeness influences workers’ subsequent perceptions and behaviors throughout the workday.  We posit that a single exposure to rudeness in the morning can contaminate employees’ perceptions of subsequent social interactions leading them to perceive greater workplace rudeness throughout their workday.  We expect that these contaminated perceptions will have important ramifications for employees’ work behaviors.  In a 10-day study of 81 professional and managerial employees, we find that witnessed morning rudeness leads to greater perceptions of workplace rudeness throughout the workday and that those perceptions, in turn, predict lower task performance and goal progress and greater interaction avoidance and psychological withdrawal.

I can vouch for this from my own personal experience.  When the first thing I'm faced with in the morning is a news story about how horrible people are, or -- worse -- someone online being awful to me or to a friend, I'm set up to be grouchy and irritable for the rest of the day.

However. I've found that the reverse is also true.  When I'm in a sour mood and something unexpectedly good happens, my frame of mind can flip just as quickly.  All of which is yet another indication that we should strive to be as polite and kind as we can; you never know whose life you may be touching.

And I think the same thing applies more globally to the people, media, and general context we're exposed to every day.  If you allow yourself to be constantly bombarded by rudeness, negativity, and bad news, it's kind of inevitable that you'll eventually get swallowed up by it.

I'm not trying to turn us into some modern-day version of Dr. Pangloss from Voltaire's Candide -- smiling blandly and chanting, "Everything happens for the best in the best of all possible worlds."  We shouldn't blind ourselves to the ills of society.  (Witness yesterday's post about the urgency with which we should be addressing climate change.)  But this is no excuse for meanness and cynicism.  Looking at the world honestly, and keeping in mind that the vast majority of people are kind, compassionate, and friendly, are equally important.  You certainly aren't going to do yourself or the world any favors by allowing yourself to be driven to the conclusion that humanity is irredeemably evil.

As author Ken Keyes put it, "A loving person lives in a loving world.  A hostile person lives in a hostile world.  Everyone you meet is your mirror."

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An act of faith

Over the last couple of months I've been dealing with a health problem that is one of those collections of symptoms that falls somewhere on the spectrum between "mild inconvenience" and "I'm going to be dead in three months."  Fortunately, at the moment the doctor is leaning strongly toward the former.  (I won't go into further details because I hate it when People Of A Certain Age begin every conversation with what my dad called "the organ recital" -- telling everyone they talk to intimate details of their various health-related issues.)

In any case, this kind of thing absolutely plays hell with someone who has chronic anxiety.  Frankly, over the last two months the anxiety has been far worse than the symptoms themselves, and I have no doubt that it's actually made the symptoms more severe.  But it's put making any firm summer plans on hold, given that my brain keeps shouting at me that I might not be able to follow through on them on account of being incapacitated, hospitalized, or dead.

But it started me down a line of thought that, for once, was productive instead of irrational and paralyzing.  It brought to mind the word faith.  I realize this is not one you'd expect to hear from a skeptical atheist type.  But it struck me that faith is what's invoked any time we make plans -- faith that we and the ones involved will still be around when the plans come to fruition.

That seems pretty dark and pessimistic, but actually it's the opposite.  None of us are guaranteed another day, another hour, another minute, so the only option is to act as if we do, to be right here in the moment and let the future take care of itself.  It's like what Jean-Luc Picard -- then in the mind of the character Kamin -- said to his daughter in the beautiful episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation called "The Inner Light:" "Seize the time, Meribor – live now.  Make now always the most precious time.  Now will never come again."

Being ill has made this thought come back to me again and again.  It occurred to me a couple of weeks ago when I bought a couple of tropical plants to replace some of the ones I lost this past winter when my greenhouse heater malfunctioned on one of the coldest nights in January, and I heard a sepulchral voice in my mind say, "Maybe I won't be around to see them flower."  When I saw the daffodils blooming in April and it occurred to me that this might be the last time I ever would.  When I was outside playing with my dogs and wondered how many more opportunities I'd have.

I know these thoughts are coming from my mental illness; I do trust the doctor that I'm probably going to be okay.  But really, isn't that the situation we're all in?  It's all an act of faith.  Getting out of bed in the morning is an act of faith.  We maneuver our way through this dangerous, unpredictable, endlessly weird world and plan for meeting some friends at the pub day after tomorrow, for a vacation this summer, for visiting with family during the winter holidays, simultaneously knowing that none of it might happen.  But that's what we have to do.  The only other option is to descend into panic now because of what might or might not occur later, to willfully destroy our present because our future isn't guaranteed.

My grandma used to tell me, "Worry is like a rocking chair; it keeps you busy but it doesn't get you anywhere."  I'd make it even stronger, though.  Worry wastes what we've got right here in our hands.  I'm not going to say it's easy to conquer; I've had anxiety disorder my entire life, and I'm not expecting it to go away magically.  But I have -- and so does everyone -- control over deliberately choosing to live life the best I can regardless of how much of it I have left.  It's all a risk; every action we take, or decide not to take.  As J. R. R. Tolkien wrote, in The Fellowship of the Ring, "It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door.  You step into the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there is no knowing where you might be swept off to."

The question is not whether you want to take a risk; the question is which risk you want to take.  For me, I'd rather risk the possibility of my plans and aspirations not coming to fruition than risk giving in to my anxiety, then getting to the end of the path and realizing what I missed.

So my advice: carpe the absolute fuck out of every diem you've got left, whether it's one or ten thousand.  I'm completely agnostic about whether there's an afterlife; maybe there is, maybe there isn't.  But as far as what I know for sure, this right here, right now, is all I've got.  And right now the sun is shining and the weather is warm and pleasant and there are people who love me.  There's music to listen to and stories to write and dogs to play with and books to read.  Okay, it won't last forever.  But I'll hang on to the sweetness I've got right now for all I'm worth, and have faith that whatever happens tomorrow, I'll have made the most of today.

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The power of relentless positivity

I have a friend whom I frequently take out for walks.  I'll call him Jim.  Jim doesn't have it easy; he's of normal intelligence but has a lot of serious developmental disabilities, and things that most of us don't even give much thought to -- brushing teeth, shaving, showering, changing clothes -- are time-consuming and arduous chores for him.  His only living relative is a five-hour drive away, so he is completely reliant on non-family members for his care.

Despite this, Jim is the single most positive person I've ever met.  Whoever coined the term "sunny disposition" must have known him.  Whenever we get together, he always tells me how much he appreciates my help and companionship.  At the end, he thanks me again, and says, "I had a lot of fun.  It was a good outing.  Thank you so much."

He also cares deeply about the people around him.  He always asks me how I'm doing, and unlike with some people -- for whom "how are you?" is a perfunctory and rather meaningless greeting -- Jim honestly seems delighted when I tell him what's going on in my life.  

He's like that about almost everything.  One Friday I told him I wouldn't see him till Monday, but I hoped he had a good weekend.

He gave me a big smile and said, "Gordon, I hope you have a great weekend more than you hope I have a great weekend."

Yesterday we went for a walk in Cass Park, a big, sprawling piece of parkland along the west shore of Cayuga Lake.  We'd only been out for a few minutes when Jim said, "It sure is a beautiful day.  Isn't it a beautiful day?"

For the record, at the time he said this it was about thirty degrees Fahrenheit, spitting snow, and there was a stiff breeze off the lake.  Here's a photo I took of Jim's beautiful day:

Okay, the Finger Lakes region of New York, where we both live, is pretty gorgeous even in midwinter, but I was immediately struck by the fact that no one I've ever met -- other than Jim -- would have characterized the day as "beautiful."  We were both well-wrapped with coats, scarves, and gloves, so we were comfortable enough, but it was still gray, chilly, and windy.

But for Jim, it really was a beautiful day.  For him, a beautiful day is a long walk with a friend out in the fresh air in a place he loves.  He's not impervious to discomfort; when we got back to the car, I turned the heater up, and he said, "That feels nice.  My hands are cold."  But what stands out to me is that Jim chooses to accept the discomfort because he appreciates what he has so deeply.

As we walked, it came to me that there was a descriptor for Jim: he's relentlessly positive.  There's nothing forced about it.  It's completely genuine.  He doesn't do it to be polite, or because it'll get me to come back and walk with him another day, or to make me feel good.

He's relentlessly positive because he chooses to focus on the beautiful things in his world rather than the (many) difficulties.

I wonder what it'd be like if more of us were like Jim.  Recognizing the problems we face and doing what we can about them, but first and foremost appreciating what we have.  As a lifelong sufferer of depression and anxiety, I know that telling a person "just be happy" is the opposite of helpful; and that's not what I'm saying.

What I'm saying is make the choice to look at the positive things first, and be grateful for them.  Make a practice of aiming for relentless positivity.

Jenny Lawson puts it differently in her amazing book Furiously Happy: A Funny Book About Horrible Things, which should be on everyone's reading list.  Lawson has struggled with serious, debilitating mental illness her whole life, and this memoir (and her first book, Let's Pretend This Never Happened) are the only books I can think of that made me ugly cry and howl with laughter, sometimes on the same page. 

Hell, sometimes in the same damn paragraph.

Lawson writes:

I’ve often thought that people with severe depression have developed such a well for experiencing extreme emotion that they might be able to experience extreme joy in a way that “normal” people also might never understand, and that’s what Furiously Happy is all about.  It’s about taking those moments when things are fine and making them amazing, because those moments are what make us who we are, and they’re the same moments we take into battle with us when our brains declare war on our very existence. It’s the difference between “surviving life” and “living it”... To all who walk the dark path, and to those who walk in the sunshine but hold out a hand in the darkness to those who travel beside them: Brighter days are coming.  Clearer sight will arrive.  And you will arrive too.  No, it might not be forever.  The bright moments might be for a few days at a time, but hold on for those days.  Those days are worth the dark.

It's like my walk yesterday with Jim.  There were probably people walking that same path in Cass Park yesterday who spent the entire time focusing on how miserable the cold is, how gray it all was, how a cold snap on the first day of April was a bummer.  Jim chose to look instead at the stark beauty of the lake under the gray clouds, the way the wind was making the fallen leaves tumble and rattle under our feet, how pretty the snowflakes looked swirling past our faces.

All of us were cold, out there in the park.  But some of us were cold and miserable; Jim was cold and relentlessly positive.  And I'm guessing that despite the continuous difficulties he lives with, he's the only one who got home and grinned and said, "Nice to be in a warm house again... but wasn't that fun?"

I'll end with one more quote from Jenny Lawson, that captures what I'm trying to say better than I ever could: "I see that there is dust in the air that will eventually settle onto the floor to be swept out the door as a nuisance, but before that, for one brilliant moment I see the dust motes catch sunlight and sparkle and dance like stardust.  I see the beginning and the end of all things.  I see my life.  It is beautifully ugly and tarnished in just the right way.  It sparkles with debris.  There is wonder and joy in the simplest of things."

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The sad truth of our history is that science and scientific research has until very recently been considered the exclusive province of men.  The exclusion of women committed the double injury of preventing curious, talented, brilliant women from pursuing their deepest interests, and robbing society of half of the gains of knowledge we might otherwise have seen.

To be sure, a small number of women made it past the obstacles men set in their way, and braved the scorn generated by their infiltration into what was then a masculine world.  A rare few -- Marie Curie, Barbara McClintock, Mary Anning, and Jocelyn Bell Burnell come to mind -- actually succeeded so well that they became widely known even outside of their fields.  But hundreds of others remained in obscurity, or were so discouraged by the difficulties that they gave up entirely.

It's both heartening and profoundly infuriating to read about the women scientists who worked against the bigoted, white-male-only mentality; heartening because it's always cheering to see someone achieve well-deserved success, and infuriating because the reason their accomplishments stand out is because of impediments put in their way by pure chauvinistic bigotry.  So if you want to experience both of these, and read a story of a group of women who in the early twentieth century revolutionized the field of astronomy despite having to fight for every opportunity they got, read Dava Sobel's amazing book The Glass Universe: How the Ladies of the Harvard Observatory Took the Measure of the Stars.

In it, we get to know such brilliant scientists as Willamina Fleming -- a Scottish woman originally hired as a maid, but who after watching the male astronomers at work commented that she could do what they did better and faster, and so... she did.  Cecilia Payne, the first ever female professor of astronomy at Harvard University.  Annie Jump Cannon, who not only had her gender as an unfair obstacle to her dreams, but had to overcome the difficulties of being profoundly deaf.

Their success story is a tribute to their perseverance, brainpower, and -- most importantly -- their loving support of each other in fighting a monolithic male edifice that back then was even more firmly entrenched than it is now.  Their names should be more widely known, as should their stories.  In Sobel's able hands, their characters leap off the page -- and tell you a tale you'll never forget.

[Note: if you purchase this book using the image/link below, part of the proceeds goes to support Skeptophilia!]

Racing against your brain

Being a devoted (if not especially fast) runner, and also ridiculously competitive, I'm always interested in ways to increase my speed and endurance.

It's not, honestly, that I am under any illusion of my becoming a world-class marathoner, or anything.  I'm 58 years old, and don't think there's any way I'd ever have the determination to train intensely enough to be a contender for first place.  But I'd like to see some improvement -- specifically, more improvement than I've seen over the past two years, when I've been stuck averaging around a ten-minute mile while younger and more athletic guys are clocking in with seven-minute miles or better.

Yesterday I found out that some of my problem is probably in my brain, not in my legs.

A study published last week in Nature: Human Behavior called, "Learning One's Genetic Risk Changes Physiology Independent of Actual Genetic Risk," by psychologists Bradley P. Turnwald, J. Parker Goyer, Danielle Z. Boles, Amy Silder, Scott L. Delp, and Alia J. Crum of Stanford University, suggests something astonishing; your performance in a race is more dependent on whether you think you have a variant of a gene that improves stamina than whether you actually have the gene.

The setup was simple.  They tested volunteers to determine which variant of a (real) gene called CREB-1 they had.  One version tends to increase endurance, and the other reduces it, so which variant you have determines how easily you tire.  They then split the entire group four ways; (1) those who have the high-endurance gene and are told they do; (2) those who have the high-endurance gene and are told they have the low-endurance variant; (3) those who have the low-endurance gene and are told they do; and (4) those who have the low-endurance gene and are told they have the high-endurance variant.

The results were unequivocal.  Those who were told they had the low-endurance variant of CREB-1 processed out carbon dioxide less efficiently, tired more quickly, ran more slowly, and gave up sooner than the ones who were told they had the high-endurance variant -- regardless of which variant they had.

Me at the end of a race in Montezuma, New York last year.  It was 95 F and about eight krillion percent humidity, and I definitely was not thinking, "I have excellent endurance and stamina."  My mindset was more, "I hope I can make it across the finish line before I die so at least I won't block the trail for the other runners."

The most amazing thing to me is the carbon dioxide part.  The rest of it I can attribute to attitude -- if I think I'm going to crap out more quickly because of some factor beyond my control, I'm likely to interpret all the stuff runners have to put up with -- the little aches and pains, shortness of breath, sweating, and heart pounding -- as evidence that I'm not going to be competitive no matter what I do.  It's easy to see someone paying unwarranted attention to what happens to all of us when we run, and giving up more quickly, if they figure that it's just their unfortunate genetic makeup causing it.

But the carbon dioxide part is fascinating, because that's not something under any sort of voluntary control.  It's hard to see how you could affect the rate at which carbon dioxide is cleared from the blood by some kind of power-of-positive-thinking phenomenon.  But that seems to be what happened.  "What people haven’t fully appreciated is that that information also puts you into a mindset: 'I’m at high risk or I'm protected,'" study co-author Alia Crum said.  "And that alone can have potent effects on physiology and motivation."

Of course, what I want to know is how.  How could simply thinking that you have good endurance change your physiology drastically enough to result in a measurable increase in speed and stamina?

And more to the point, how can I tap into that?

I've always been pretty dubious about the results of positive self-talk.  I mean, it's probably better than negative self-talk, but I've always thought it was only from the standpoint of making you a generally happier person.  (Not that this is inconsequential, mind you.)  But apparently athleticism has as much to do with mindset as it does with genes, and when elite athletes say that the only way to succeed is to believe you can, there might be something scientific to it after all.

But for me, it falls into the "Now that I know this, what do I do?" department.  I suppose I could try convincing myself that I'm fast and powerful and all the rest, but I have this sneaking suspicion my brain would be saying at the same time, "C'mon, you know that's not true," which would probably spoil the effect.  Or maybe I could have a genetic test for CREB-1 and have my wife lie to me about the results if it turns out I have the low-endurance variant.

Whatever I do, it's probably more important simply to keep training.  But maybe cursing myself when those young bucks zoom past me isn't the best approach -- maybe I should be thinking, "Next time, that'll be me."

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This week's Skeptophilia book recommendation is Michio Kaku's The Physics of the Impossible.  Kaku takes a look at the science and technology that is usually considered to be in the realm of science fiction -- things like invisibility cloaks, replicators, matter transporters, faster-than-light travel, medical devices like Star Trek's "tricorders" -- and considers whether they're possible given what we know of scientific law, and if so, what it would take to develop them.  In his signature lucid, humorous style, Kaku differentiates between what's merely a matter of figuring out the technology (such as invisibility) and what's probably impossible in a a real and final sense (such as, sadly, faster-than-light travel).  It's a wonderful excursion into the power of the human imagination -- and the power to make at least some of it happen.

[If you purchase the book from Amazon using the image/link below, part of the proceeds goes to supporting Skeptophilia!]

Start your day with kindness

When I was in my twenties, my parents got into watching the television series Cops.

Me, I never could see the draw.  The plot was the same every time:

• Bad guys do bad stuff.
• Cops get involved.
• Bad guys get arrested or shot.  Or both.
• Repeat x100.

I like my entertainment to have a little more in the way of unexpected twists.  But that's just me, apparently.

Anyhow, there came a point that Cops went into syndication, and on one station, it played every single night.  And my parents had it on.

Every single night.

At this point, I should explain that my parents, especially my mother, had a tremendous suspicion of the unknown.  If there's a word that means the opposite of "adventurous," that was my mom.  As an example, when I made my first trip overseas -- a one-month cross-country hike of England, from Blackpool to Whitby -- her last words to me on the night before I left were, "Don't trust anyone."

I know about correlation not implying causation and all, but I can't help but wonder how much her view of the world as a scary, unsafe place was reinforced by watching a television show that every single night showed the worst of humanity.  I'm guessing the causation probably goes both ways -- she gravitated toward the series because she already had that attitude, and the series acted to reinforce the attitude, and round and round it went.

[image courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons]

Whatever the cause, her lack of comprehension of how I could possibly want to travel to Dangerous Foreign Countries Inhabited By Dangerous Foreign People (like the English, for fuck's sake) only got worse as she got older.  When we took our first trip to Ecuador back in 2001, not only going to (gasp!) South America, but (1) doing so three months after 9/11, and (2) bringing along both of our sons, at that point ages 11 and 13, she was aghast, but at least knew by then that it'd be futile to try to talk me out of it.

This all comes up because of a study published a couple of months ago in the Journal of Applied Psychology called, "Rude Color Glasses: The Contaminating Effects of Witnessed Morning Rudeness on Perceptions and Behaviors Throughout the Workday."  While on first glance, the study may not seem to have much to do with an overall perception of the world as dangerous, the two are connected.  The study shows pretty clearly that the behavior we are exposed to (or expose ourselves to) colors how we see everything -- and that the effect can last far beyond the time immediately after the incident in question.  The authors write:

Using an experimental experience sampling design, we investigate how witnessing morning rudeness influences workers’ subsequent perceptions and behaviors throughout the workday.  We posit that a single exposure to rudeness in the morning can contaminate employees’ perceptions of subsequent social interactions leading them to perceive greater workplace rudeness throughout their workday.  We expect that these contaminated perceptions will have important ramifications for employees’ work behaviors.  In a 10-day study of 81 professional and managerial employees, we find that witnessed morning rudeness leads to greater perceptions of workplace rudeness throughout the workday and that those perceptions, in turn, predict lower task performance and goal progress and greater interaction avoidance and psychological withdrawal.

I can vouch for this from my own personal experience.  When I get to school and the first thing I'm faced with is an obnoxious email or a surly student -- both, fortunately, uncommon occurrences -- I'm set up to be grouchy and irritable for the rest of the day.

However.  I've found that the reverse is also true.  When I'm in a sour mood and something unexpectedly good happens, my frame of mind can flip just as quickly.  All of which is yet another indication that we should strive to be as polite and kind as we can; you never know whose life you may be touching.

And I think the same thing applies more globally to the people, media, and general context we're exposed to every day.  If you allow yourself to be constantly bombarded by rudeness, negativity, and bad news, it's kind of inevitable that you'll eventually get swallowed up by it.

I'm not trying to turn us into some modern-day version of Dr. Pangloss from Voltaire's Candide -- smiling blandly and chanting, "Everything happens for the best in the best of all possible worlds."  We shouldn't blind ourselves to the ills of society.  But it's equally important to keep in mind that the vast majority of people are kind, compassionate, and friendly.  You certainly aren't going to do yourself or the world any favors by allowing yourself to be driven to the conclusion that humanity is irredeemably evil.

As author Ken Keyes put it, "A loving person lives in a loving world.  A hostile person lives in a hostile world.  Everyone you meet is your mirror."