A feature of human function too often offloaded to the subconscious mind.

People everywhere trying to make decisions and solve their problems. Travelling through the same highways in their head with hopes of getting to new destinations. But constantly being stalled by their mental traffic. Painstakingly inching their way toward their desired outcomes.

Little do they seem to realize the plethora of pathways they have available to them. And the variety of vehicles at their disposal.

A sad little mortal trudging along for hours in their toy car when they could’ve chosen to cruise over all mental hurdles with a juiced-up jetpack.

You, my dear reader, are going to be riding on that jetpack today. Or if you’d prefer, I can fit you with a custom-made squirrel suit? Or a submarine, if that’s more to your liking?

You might’ve heard about some types of specialized thinking before. Whether it’s design thinking, or systems thinking, or product thinking.

Those are the shortcuts that can fast-track your thought processes. And there are so many more that you don’t even know about.

In this post, I map out three levels of thinking styles, so you can start on your path toward genius-level outcomes today.

Level 1: The Terrains (Finding concepts)

In the realm of thought, a concept is literally everything.

A tree is a concept. A tree as a living thing is a concept. A tree as decorative is a concept. A tree as colourful, as green, as tall, as thin, as life-sustaining, as rooted, as… you get the point. Any idea that you have about a tree is a concept and ideas can be found everywhere. Which is especially helpful since they are the building blocks of thought.

In Level 1, we focus on the terrains, where ideas are abundant and are most often collected using these strategies:

• Observation: The art of noticing relevant sensory details from the outside world.

• Introspection: The practice of intuiting input from your internal environment, including memories and emotional states.

• Pattern recognition: The skill of spotting similarities between seemingly separate systems and grouping them accordingly.

• Deconstruction: The gentle act of breaking complex things down into their irreducible, component parts.

• Synthesis: The creative habit of melting down distinct elements to cast a completely new whole.

• Hypothesizing: The courage to propose testable explanations about the unknown based on the known.

• Evaluation: The ability to judge and filter ideas based on specific criteria.

• Abstraction: The craft of carving away excess to uncover an underlying skeleton.

• Conversation: The emergent process of mind melding with another.

Level 2: The Vehicles (Finding interesting concepts)

Because everything is a concept, it’s not enough to just collect them at random. Anybody can do that.

To level up your thinking you need to find interesting concepts. And you’ll need to travel to places where others dare not go to find them. And to get to those places you’ll need the right vehicles.

During moments when you need to call upon creativity or work your way through a problem, choosing the right vehicle will determine how quickly you get to your solution and how much friction you’ll encounter along the way.

Each of these vehicles is especially suited to travelling through a unique combination of terrains in pursuit of the most interesting ideas.

• First principles thinking [Deconstruction + Abstraction + Synthesis]: Dressed with a drill-shaped head, this dogmatic vehicle is skilled at digging deep into any complex terrain and excavating the undeniable, atomic truths behind any concept. It’s the ultimate antidote to conventional, inherited wisdom and drives you to question your assumptions, deconstruct complexity into core truths, and reassemble those truths into a revived concept stripped of its previous excess.

• Lateral thinking [Abstraction + Pattern Recognition + Hypothesizing]: Wearing wheels that twist and turn in all the ways, this whimsical off-road wagon is custom made for side-stepping paved paths. On the hunt for interesting concepts, it helps you venture into wildernesses where no one else is willing to wander.

• Second-order thinking [Hypothesizing + Pattern Recognition]: Well equipped with crystal balls and scrying stones, this mystical machine’s trick is tracking down concepts that will stand the test of time. It brings you straight to the potential butterfly effects and the scenes of all possible consequences that could occur.

• Inversion [Deconstruction + Hypothesizing + Evaluation]: Retrofitted with reflective armour, this crooked carrier has an especially peculiar power. It can hold a mirror to any concept and collect its reflection. Concepts then mutate from “how to” to “how not to”, forcing you to question the very nature of your reality itself.

• Analogical thinking [Abstraction + Pattern Recognition + Synthesis]: One of anything is never enough for this gluttonous gas-guzzler. If, in its quest for concepts, it finds one it likes, it will not stop until it finds similar ideas in foreign terrains. It believes that the best concepts belong in collections.

• Dialectical thinking [Deconstruction + Synthesis]: This magnetic ship with wings and wheels is a master of contradiction. With the ability to find the hidden harmony between seemingly polar opposites, it has a unique skill at synthesizing together ideas that would naturally repel one another.

• Embodied thinking [Introspection & Recall + Pattern Recognition]: Built like a suit of armour, this vehicle transforms your entire body into a concept collecting machine. Through your experiences, muscle memory, and general physicality, it uses signals from your body to pinpoint standout ideas.

Level 3: The Paths (Finding specific types of interesting concepts)

Even for the most avid daydreamers, thinking has purpose. No matter how frivolous or focused the reason for thinking, there is always a goal.

Up to now we’ve explored where to find concepts and, more importantly, where to find interesting concepts. Now it’s time to put them to work.

Even interesting ideas are useless if you don’t have a plan to use them. Deciding on one of these paths from the start of your thinking process will orient you straight to the specific types of interesting concepts you’ll actually be able to use.

• Product thinking: Those who tread the path of value aim to find concepts that are practically useful. They seek answers to questions like “How can I make this valuable?” or “How can I better align this with my goals?”. Choose this path if you want to identify the ideas with the most tangible impact.

• Design thinking: Those who embark down the path of empathy and iteration seek frictionless, beautiful, and emotionally resonant concepts. Select this scenic path if you want to stack up on concepts that facilitate momentum and emotion.

• Systems thinking: The path of ecosystems is chosen by those who seek a holistic perspective. Anyone who journeys here leaves with a solid understanding of the visible and invisible inputs, parameters, and feedback loops that sustain a system. Choose this path if you want to conceptualize complex interactions.

• Scientific thinking: The path of truth and testing is paved for those who seek ideas validated by data. Choose to trial and error down this tumultuous trail when you want to rigorously test your hypotheses against reality.

• Spatial thinking: One who ventures along the path of visualization can expect to find the most vivid version of ideas. Opt for this path when you crave clarity and animated explanations.

• Narrative thinking: A stroll through the path of stories is guaranteed to guide you toward emotionally resonant concepts. Choose this path when you want to rehydrate dry ideas into cohesive storylines with characters, conflicts, and resolutions.

• Strategic thinking: Only someone strong-willed should select the path of positioning, where competition reigns supreme. Pick this path when you want to optimize for the highest-leverage places to spend your limited resources.

• Computational thinking: Entering the path of engineered efficiency is a step into an idea trove for anyone looking to enhance resilience, scalability, and structural integrity. Choose this path when you want to prevent errors and catalyze growth.

• Curatorial thinking: It’s a quiet cruise down the path of comparisons, where noise is quashed and only the best concepts are selected to shine. Choose this path when looking to make your ideas meaningful.

Putting it into practice

You’ve been given a map of the terrain, a mess of motor vehicles, and a myriad of motives. Now it’s time for you to take ‘em for a test ride.

Let’s rev up your brain engines and test out a couple use cases:

Use case #1: Problem solving

You are a humble Substack writer. You’ve started posting frequently and you are on a mission to attain more subscribers. You want to think about how to accomplish that goal. What do you do?

Pick a path: Depending on how much time you want to spend with your problem, you don’t have to limit yourself to picking a single path. The more paths you explore, the more insights and ideas you’ll get.

For example, since your goal here is to position yourself in front of readers, an obvious path is strategic thinking. You’ll also want to understand how the Substack ecosystem works so you might decide to explore systems thinking. You also understand that readers are looking for value, so you could add product thinking to your GPS.

For now let’s assume you chose to venture down the path of systems thinking, where the general steps are to:

1. Identify the system’s components and its boundaries.

2. Map out how the components interact.

3. Understand how the system changes over time.

4. Look for leverage points where small interventions can have large impacts.

Choose your vehicles & terrains: After listing out the steps you’ll need to take on your path, your choice of vehicles and terrains is often already laid out in front of you.

When it comes to objective observational steps like identifying and mapping, you’d most likely benefit from the level one terrains.

1. Identify: Breaking down complex systems is a clear job for deconstruction. You could also choose your first principles thinking vehicle for this one, but since you’re not reassembling anything, you can keep it simple and just jot down the different components you notice [save buttons, like buttons, notes, readers, emails, etc.].

2. Map: For mapping out interactions, you might choose level 1 observation and pattern recognition. Here you might note an observation that your readers are more likely to hit the like button on your notes if your notes are shorter than two lines.

3. Understand: To understand how the system changes over time, second-order thinking might be the natural fit. Which in itself affords you its own set of tools like the 10-10-10 rule, where you ask yourself “what will be the consequence of only writing two-line notes in 10 minutes, vs 10 days, vs 10 weeks?”

4. Leverage: Looking for points of leverage can be found on the paths of computational and strategic thinking, so you could look to those to see if they offer any interesting strategies. But for simplicity’s sake you might also look at a level 2 vehicle, like lateral thinking or inversion. Here you might ask yourself something like: “What would I have to write to get zero people to hit the like button on all of my posts?” Asking a question like that might illuminate the types of things you should be posting more.

Use case #2: Emotional regulation

Let’s try a second use case to tie everything together.

Thinking is not just a problem-solving technique. We use it for everything and the benefits of these thinking types span far beyond searching for solutions. For this example, let’s try a different use case.

It’s been a long day. You just got back home from a coffee chat with a new potential friend. But all you can think about is the awkward moment you accidentally called them by the wrong name. All you want to do is die and stop thinking about that moment. What do you do?

Pick a path: For this one, two paths in particular seem interesting to explore:

1. With narrative thinking, you might be able to spin this story into one that’s more in your favour.

2. With curatorial thinking, you might be able to dull the noise in your head by finding a comforting comparison.

For the sake of this example, let’s stick with narrative thinking, where the steps in this case could include:

1. Structure your thoughts as a story.

2. Focus on cause and effect.

3. Reframe your story with you as the hero.

Choose your vehicles & terrains: Just like before, choose the most appropriate vehicles and terrains for the steps on your path .

1. Structure: For structuring your thoughts as a story, you can simply take a walk in your introspective terrain and recreate the scenes from your memory.

2. Focus: The point of focusing on cause and effect is to think of events as having logical links rather than being random. The idea is that if you can rationalize the reason you made your mistake, you’ll have an excuse to be kinder to yourself. To find ideas on why you might’ve accidentally called your new friend by the wrong name, perhaps you might consider exploring embodied thinking, where you might consider that your mouth was moving faster than your mind because your body was simply excited or nervous about the meetup.

3. Reframe: Finally, in order to reframe your story with you as the hero, you might try dialectical thinking in order to simultaneously hold the feeling that you did something wrong with the opposing label that you are the hero of the story. One tactic from dialectical thinking is to replace “but” with “and”. Instead of thinking “I had a nice hangout but I called them by the wrong name”, you could think “I had a nice meet up and I called them by the wrong name”. Pair that simple change with a little analogous thinking to paint that scene as a comedy instead of a horror and you’ve just awarded yourself a little forgiveness and a funny story.

Bottom line

On a normal day, you probably cycle through four or five level one thinking types.

You’ve grown accustomed to your defaults.

But there’s an entire landscape of thinking strategies out there for you to explore. Without them, some ideas will forever remain unreachable.

Expand your horizons.

Your unrealized potential will thank you.

If you found this useful, you’ll also like:

→ How to be the most creative person you know (even if you are not creative)

I’m Lamar Elimbo, a digital designer and developer exploring practical ways we can design spaces to improve how we think, feel, and function. I break down concepts from environmental psychology and product design into simple strategies you can start implementing today.

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Where does creativity come from? Is inspiration an internal process that happens behind the scenes of our brains? Or is it a product of our environment? And how much control can we actually have over when we feel creative or inspired?

I’m Lamar Elimbo, a digital designer and developer exploring the practical ways we can design our digital and physical spaces to improve how we think, feel, and function. I break down concepts from environmental psychology and product design into simple strategies you can start implementing today.

For those of you new around here, this is not what one would call a normal newsletter. You’ve stumbled into a space where the environments around us come to life. Each with a mind and a motive of their own. Where the sidewalks you step on whisper sinister superstitions of cursed cracks and broken backs in your ear. And where walls plastered with posters of cute cats conspire to co-opt your concentration. This is a place where we unveil the hidden influences that our surroundings have on our psychology.

Today’s creature feature is creativity.

To many of us, creativity is an elusive companion. Popular advice proves just how evasive and perfidious it can be when we need it most.

Some, for example, suggest it lives within us: that if we want to find fresh ideas we should “sleep on it” and hope consolidation connects the dots behind the scenes of our dreams.

Others suggest that it lives around us: that to cleanse our creative blocks we should go for walks between trees and let the sensory abundance of the natural world wash over us.

Herein lies our first misstep: we allow Creativity to run wild and free hoping it’ll return to us when we call for it. Hoping it’ll greet us in the morning. Hoping it’ll accompany us on our walk.

But when it doesn’t come, not only are we left with no ideas, we’re left with no ideas about where to look for ideas. We learn too late that its freedom comes at the cost of its compliance.

To reliably call upon our creativity at a moment’s notice, we must first domesticate it. In this post, I’ll reveal the 5 tactics I’ve found most effective for house training my furry friend, Creativity.

1. Characterizing Creativity: How not to be creative

You don’t need to be creative to benefit from creativity.

Creativity as a human identity is a heavy burden to bear. A creative person is permanently condemned to embody traits that, to many others, borders on supernatural.

But much more forgiving is acknowledging creativity as a character in your life. Like the Greeks with their Muses, a person who personifies creativity is one who benefits from the company of an expert in the field of ideation.

When one gets to know creativity as a character instead of a characteristic, they’re rewarded with the ability to internalize its strengths and weaknesses as separate from their own. A person, then, who believes they don’t have a creative bone in their body does not need to adopt creativity into their identity to profit from its potential, they simply need to learn to converse with a character they created.

To develop Creativity into a character of your own, here’s a research-backed baseline profile to get you started:

Strengths: Idea generation

At the top of its skillset is its adeptness at all aspects of ideation, encompassing proficiency in both divergent and convergent thinking.

When it comes to divergent thinking, Creativity’s skills are unparalleled. Here it aims to generate as many ideas as possible with three goals in mind:

• originality: uniqueness compared to other ideas

• fluency: number and speed of ideas

• flexibility: categorical distance between ideas

After fetching together its treasure trove of ideas, Creativity’s convergent thinking phase begins. Where quantity over quality was bedrock to divergence, convergence focuses on filtering ideas down to a select few. This is where Creativity’s artistry shines and seemingly disparate ideas are synthesized together into something novel.

Weaknesses: Insatiability

Be wary of Creativity’s appetite for inspiration. Its insatiable curiosity left unchecked will consume purposelessly to no end. But when proper boundaries are in place, it will work tirelessly to track down the sparks of inspiration most resonant to you.

Personality: High openness to experience, low latent inhibition

Spend a little time with your Creativity, and you’ll notice that it is often hyperactive.

Its inability to sit still can be attributed to its extremely low level of latent inhibition, which makes it so that everything around it acquires meaning and significance.

From a young age, it develops an addiction to its hypersensitivity to sounds, light, textures, and small details in its environments. And because of its high level of openness to experience, without your guidance, it can find itself lost down many an irrelevant rabbit hole.

2. Feeding Creativity: How to find inspiration

Like a dog on a mission, Creativity will venture far and wide to collect the most random shiny objects to stockpile at your feet.

Its childlike curiosity and hunger for novelty are among its most powerful qualities. Yet, if its unbridled consumption is left unmanaged you’ll likely find yourself buried under bookmarks and drowning in the deluge of directionless inspiration you’ve collected over the years.

It’s only with a proper input diet that you’ll be able to train Creativity to tastefully curate your inspiration reservoir.

In order to make a meaningful meal plan for your Creativity, you must prime it with what you value. The usefulness of your capture collection is directly correlated to your ability to notice and note the tastes you value most.

How to notice better: Develop a rudimentary understanding of your tastes.

Identifying the ingredients that make up your taste profile is essential bonding between you and your new pet. It’s the scent list it’ll use to track down the delicious ideas you dream of.

Try starting out with an Interest Audit. Simply make a list of everything that interests you right now and highlight the ones you feel the strongest toward. A good trick if you’re feeling stuck is to look back through the content you’ve liked in your socials and try to spot trends between them.

If you were to make a habit out of doing this once a year, you’d end up with a timeline of all of your interests. An objective way of identifying your most stable fascinations throughout life.

How to note better: Prioritize friction-free capture and retrieval.

Be prepared, because with your tastes at top of mind, Creativity will start noticing even more. The transition between the aimless wanderings towards whiffs of wonder and the militantly mindful march toward meaningful sparks of inspiration will be notable in itself.

And for that you will greatly benefit from a capture system.

For any Notion users out there, I’ve written two tutorials about how to make it as easy as possible to input information into your workspace and just as easy to find it again afterward.

For anyone else, the fundamentals are the same:

• Reduce touch points: The fewer number of clicks or steps, the easier and stickier the experience. Make the process of saving ideas as frictionless an experience as possible.

• Make it easy to find: The less we have to think about where something is, the more we can think about what to do with it. Make your ideas searchable and surfaceable so they don’t collect dust.

3. Conjuring Creativity: How to get in a creative mindset

Up to this point we’ve explored processes that occur before the creative moment that you’re likely looking for. We’ve made the effort to understand Creativity and we’ve set in motion it’s ability to keep an eye out for interesting things in our everyday life.

But now we’ve reached a point in time where we need to call on Creativity to come home and help us get some creative work done.

As mentioned at the start, Creativity can be a hard one to catch since it’s always out venturing for valuable insights.

Which is why when we need to call it home, it helps to lure it in with something it loves. And what it loves are environments designed to make it feel comfortable.

One approach is to design spaces for Creativity like we design our beds. Our beds are what I like to call “cause-and-effect spaces”. The type of space whose effect is so strong that it reliably causes a consistent reaction. And we can take inspiration from that in order to design other environments to evoke the states we desire.

The key is to question the conditions of the state.

What happens when we sleep? We lie horizontally. We shift around. Our body temperature decreases. Solutions: a horizontal platform, a mattress for comfort, and blankets for warmth.

Similarly, if we want to beckon Creativity, we should consider its natural conditions. Its affinity for open minds, curated tastes, and friction-free note-taking could lead us to open spaces, reference materials, and chalkboard desks.

An evocative environment is one that mirrors the mindset we’re motivated to achieve, and in this case the pet we’re eager to play with.

Designing your external environment is a solid first step. But as mentioned at the start, Creativity has a habit of jumping between our outside and our inside worlds. So it’s just as important to make your internal environment equally as accommodating.

You know that Sylvia Plath quote about how self-doubt is the enemy to creativity. It isn’t just a cute quip. It’s practical psychology aligned with an overlooked theme that ties together so much of the research around conjuring creativity: that in order to call upon Creativity we must first mute the parts of our mind responsible for critical thought.

For any other neuroscience nerds out there, we essentially need to set the stage for transient hypofrontality by disengaging our prefrontal cortex and activating our default mode network.

Disengage to prime yourself for creativity.

The strategy you employ for silencing your inner voice should be based on your preferences. Some research will suggest that sensory deprivation is the creativity hack to employ. While others show how sensory rich spaces are better at evoking ideation. The true trick is to figure out for yourself how to flip that brain switch.

So get lost looking at art or meditating in nature or listening to music. Just prime yourself with an activity that quiets your mind. Once you learn to do that, creativity will be just one call away.

4. Training divergence: How to have creative ideas

Priming is the point at which a lot of advice stops. It’s the point where we’ve reached that hopeful state again. The passive state of waiting for creativity to come. But this step is the fun part. This is where we can take an active role toward getting the outcomes we want.

Divergent thinking is the one that most people think about when they think of Creativity. It is the quantity over quality type of brainstorm where Creativity’s excitement to show off its finds is at its highest.

But its excitement is evenly matched with its sensitivity to critique. One wrong word of disapproval about something it’s brought back to show you and it will shy away from any future offerings.

This is partially why the happy-go-lucky nature of children is said to make them masters of Creativity. Their willingness to walk along any branch of the imagination is a perfect match for Creativity’s personality.

You may have come across Dr. George Land’s NASA creativity tests which demonstrated how divergent thinking skills rapidly decline between childhood and adulthood. As it turns out, the true origins of that study are a bit fuzzy so we can’t be confident about the veracity of its claims.

But logically it makes sense. And emotionally it resonates.

Young children aren’t yet biased by the conceptual constraints we’ve learned about as adults. Not to mention, they haven’t yet been corrupted by the convergent thinking assembly line the school system forced most of us through, where value was placed on correct conclusions over quality questions.

Which, by the way, brings us to one of the greatest hacks for divergent thinking: to come up with more creative ideas, just come up with more ideas.

Adults are particularly susceptible at falling for the trap of switching to convergent thinking the second they settle on the first “good” idea they have. Instead, Creativity often lies a few layers deeper.

How to truly engage the divergent part of your brain.

• Set up an idea quota. Roll a die, multiply that number by 10 and don’t stop until you’ve come up with that many ideas.

• Write vs edit modes. This is one of the most effective pieces of writing advice I’ve ever been given. When writing, make a division between writing mode and editing mode. When you’re in writing mode, stream of consciousness is your friend; critique is your enemy. You should aim to write without thinking about any corrections that need to be made. In editing mode, you can return back to what you’ve written with your critical eye.

• Play: Be playful. Ask questions that don’t make sense. Pretend that you’re someone you’re not.

5. Training convergence: How to connect the dots

Finally, we’ve reached the stage of convergent thinking, where we take stock of all the ideas Creativity’s brought to us. And we try to find patterns by connecting the dots between the most interesting ones.

Even though it’s our ultimate goal-post, convergence gets a bad rap for its association to the institution a lot of us blame for stifling our Creativity in the first place.

But in spite of the definite lack of holistic training our Creativity received in school, it is likely especially well-equipped at consolidating its now fruitful finds and synthesizing them into unique outcomes.

In the instances, however, when faced with a jumbled arsenal of ideas and a lack of clarity about what to make of them, you might try taking a stab at learning from Creativity’s training yourself.

Sniff out the ideas most strongly connected to your tastes, values, and history. Listen to your subconscious hunches which could be noticing something your overactive frontal cortex can’t. And take a step outside of reality. Because you’ll often find that there’s a lot more sense to be made out here than in there.

Thank you for spending this time with me. As I wrap things up I’d be remiss if I didn’t make a plea for you to cut yourself and your Creativity some slack. Bonding takes time, critique is easy, and Time and Energy are eager to work against you. (Remind me to properly introduce you to those two someday… they are real pieces of work).

Your relationship with Creativity has the potential to be a beautiful one, if you’re patient.

Appropriating The Year of the Rat to Memorize Dates

We all lose track of time.

Some of us, a little more than others…

As for me, I’ve managed to make a talent out of it.

Ask me what year it is. Gimme a couple seconds to remember.

Ask me how old I am. Lemme get my calculator.

Ask me what was going on in the 1800s? 👁️👄👁️

But lately, I’ve been studying up on architectural history and while my temporal agnosia could make for an impressive neuroscience case study, I’ve been determined to bypass my handicap with a little intellectual ingenuity.

Which is why I’ve been working on developing my historical chronoception with a DIYed mnemonic strategy.

Historical Chronoception Level 1 — Centuries

You know how the Chinese calendar has things like The Year of the Rabbit and The Year of the Pig, my memory technique is pretty much like that. It associates different periods of history (mostly centuries) with an animal, thereby creating visual anchors to dates.

So for example, if I wanted to remember that the Salem Witch Trials took place within the 1600s, I could imagine a witch being burned at the stake, until a bunch of racoons come to her rescue by peeing on the fire. And since I know that the 1600s are The Years of the Racoon, I’ve created a image that’s hard to forget and tied it to a century.

Historical Chronoception Level 2 — Years

Let’s say we wanted to get more specific and remember that the Salem Witch Trials started in 1692. For the second half of the date we could use something called the Major Memory System, which essentially allows us to translate numbers into words.

Under the Major Memory System, each number from 0 to 9 represents certain sounds.

Vowel sounds (a, e, i, o, u, y), and /w/ and /h/ sounds do not correspond to any number, so they can be used freely.

So back to our example, we know that The Salem Witch trials took place in the 1600s, but now we want to remember that they started in 92 (1692), according to this system, the number 9 corresponds to the “p” or “b” sounds. And the number 2 corresponds to the “n” sound. So, I would think of a visual word that uses those sounds in order, like bun, or pin, or pen, or bone.

So, we could imagine that after the racoons put out the fire they chewed the witch free and she cast a spell that reduced all of her onlookers into a pile of bones.

In the end, thinking of the Salem Witch Trials will trigger the image of racoons + bones, which equals 1692.

Writing it out like this kinda sounds like a laborious system, but once we get the hang of the animal-date and the number-sound relations, coming up with mental images becomes a surprisingly quick and fun process.

🛠️ Idea I’ve Been Thinking About

Gesamtkunstwerk & DIY Design Decisions

A new word I learned this week is gesamtkunstwerk. Roughly translated from German, it means “total work of art”.

Originally derived from the art world to denote works of art incorporating various artistic disciplines, its use in architecture is to describe projects where an architect has had “an all-inclusive ownership over the exterior and interior design of a project, creating harmonious works of art by intimately unifying the whole, from the garden to the tableware.” 🔗 / Source /

The idea of an architect with full control over all elements of a space got me thinking about whether or not people generally appreciate a lack of DIY decor on their part.

The Ikea Effect describes how consumers place a disproportionately high value on products they partially created. So I wonder to what degree giving people more control over the design of a place is a key factor in fostering human-place bonds.

🚘 Research I’ve Been Thinking About

The Power of Place on Petitions

🔗 / Phys.org / Nature Article /

“A recent South African study showed that ‘willingness to sign a petition that calls for higher taxes on the wealthy increases in the presence of a high-status car’. Just seeing a BMW 3-series car near the petitioner made people more likely to favour wealth redistributive policies.”

So it seems that if we want to get people to take action against economic disparity, it helps to surround them with a visual indicator that they’re getting the short end of the stick.

If the closer we get to luxury, the stronger we feel a push to close that gap, then I wonder in what other scenarios picking the proper place amplifies our powers of persuasion.

• Want to convince your routine-ridden partner to take a vacation, exaggerate the idea that you’re current lifestyle lacks novelty by taking them to a minimalist environment and showing them some pictures of all the cool places you want to visit.

• Want to convince potential customers to dine in your restaurant, exaggerate their hunger by wafting the scent of your food onto the sidewalk near your front door.

• Want to convince a carefree kid to study more, exaggerate their ambition by taking them on a field trip to their dream job.

Perhaps, an environmental key to persuasion is to immerse ourselves in an exaggerated showcase of the distance between where we are and where we’d like to be.

🪴 Innovation I’ve Been Thinking About

Bioengineered Plants 🔗 / Neo Plants Website /

I’ve written before about Spaces Designed for Better Breathing and the effect that air and aroma can have on our minds. Turns out there are some really cool companies working in this area.

I recently came across NeoPlants, whose goal is to create plants that have been bioenginieered and optimized to absorb dangerous air pollutants in our indoor spaces.

“We believe that nature is the most powerful piece of technology in the world and that a greener future is necessary.

Our mission is to put nature at the heart of innovation to drive positive change.

We are building the first generation of bioengineered plants that fight air pollution.”

Their white paper describes how certain indoor air pollutants have the ability to impair our cognitive health and functioning.

I focus a lot in my writing on the subliminal influences of our spaces on our psychology, I think it’s also really interesting to think that there’s a whole invisible environment that is also constantly at work impacting us.

🔍 Person I’ve Been Thinking About

Walter Wick — The Art of Savouring & the Savouring of Art 🔗 / Video /

Outside of instagram, where does art show up in your life?

Do you have them hanging on your walls? Do you have them rotating on your screens?

What do you do when you find a piece of art that you love? How often do you return to it?

What do they do for you? Do they inspire emotion, a thought, a memory?

Do you save them?

Do you savour them?

Walter Wick is the photographer and photo-illustrator whose work I know most from the I Spy books.

For those who don’t know, the I Spy books are hidden item games, where the goal is to hunt for a list of items within each elaborate scene.

I find it really interesting to think about how we all have our own unique ranges of emotion. Some people experience sadness more strongly than others. Some people are quicker to anger. And I'd suspect that some people are better at savouring a moment.

Similar to the I Spy books is the genre, Wimmelbilderbuch. They are the Where's Waldo type images, filled to the brim with active scenes. They compel us to take our time scanning their page’s details. They compel us to savour their worlds.

Studies show that when we savour the art we enjoy, we awaken the same part of our brain that is activated through meditation. 🔗 / Source /

So, I think it’s really interesting that us fans of horror vacui art might actually find savouring images of chaotic places to be a meditative experience.

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I spy with my little eye a ❤️ button. How about you lemme know you found it by giving it a click? Thanks for reading, I hope something interesting! Have a great one, Lamar ✌️😁

Enter the World Where All Eyes Are on You

A couple weeks ago, I explored what happens to our thoughts and behaviours when we’re immersed in an environment under surveillance.

So, if you haven’t already, mind your step as you enter the world where surveillance affects your morality, personality, and peace of mind.

🫖 Project I’ve Been Working On

Tea Wall

I never used to be a fan of public displays of affection. But a serendipitous encounter with a new love a few years ago completely shifted my perspective.

To protect his privacy, let’s call him David T.

David was absolutely delicious. He was the whole package. Beautifully gift wrapped and sorted neatly into a complex array of 36 flavours of personality. He was sweet at times, full of depth at others, and even hot and spicy when the mood was right.

Ever since we met, I’ve been declaring my deep love for him to everyone I meet.

Some people express their PDA by holding hands or locking lips. But I’m a big fan of the psycho model of showcasing my obsession with a shrine.

I call this my Tea Hive 🐝

Moral of the story, the world could always use more love, so I recommend making an effort showcase yours 💝

🌆 Experiment I’ve Been Thinking About

TV Tours

I’ve been going on a lot of architecture tours around Toronto lately.

In one of these last ones, I was introduced to the Robarts Library at the University of Toronto.

It’s this beautiful beast of a brutalist building and for some reason it reminded me of one of my favourite shows, La Femme Nikita.

It was a Canadian spy-action-drama series, largely filmed in Toronto and Robarts got me thinking that it could be a fun personal project to rewatch the show, then track down and visit the nearby places where scenes were shot.

I first watched the show when I was in middle school and every time I see an episode nowadays, it feels nostalgic. When I went to visit the Robarts Library, it also felt weirdly nostalgic, even though I’d never been there before.

Nostalgia is one of my favourite feelings, so I often find myself thinking about ways to make the present moment feel nostalgic in the future. And this experience got me wondering, if I ever have kids, maybe it could be a worthwhile gift to spend some time with them flipping through photographs of places I think they’d enjoy visiting in the future. Then when they’re older, they’d be able to feel a comforting sense of familiarity to a bunch of places they’ve never been.

🤥 Idea I’ve Been Thinking About

Psychology of Scale

In my superhero fantasies, I fall in love with a guy named Scopic. His powers are Ant-Man-esque, in that he has the ability to manipulate the size of anything he wants.

(I’ve still got his personality profile under construction, but I figure that he definitely went through a phase of vigilante Pinocchio-ism. Where he went around cursing a bunch of egregious liars with oversized schnozes.)

There’s a special kind of control one gets by being able to carry around a world in their pocket. And some believe that that’s the reason why we tend to love miniatures so much.

Lately, I’ve been wondering what role the scale of our surroundings plays on our psychology.

There is evidence, for example, that supports the cathedral effect.

The cathedral effect is a phenomenon that suggests working in spacious environments with high ceilings can enhance creativity.

Research by Joan Meyers-Levy, a professor of marketing at the University of Minnesota Carlson School of Management, for instance, found that people working in rooms with higher ceilings displayed more abstract, creative thinking than those in rooms with lower ceilings.

So, I think it would be fun to see some “Goldilocks studies” on the topic. Something like, given three rooms:

a) one that makes us feel small,

b) one that makes us feel normal, and

c) one that makes us feel large…

how would each one affect our sense of power or creativity?

There’s other research out there that shows how cute things tend to make us more prosocial and attentive. So maybe our Goldilocks studies might show that Room C elicits those characteristics in us too?

Perspective is everything. So the idea that the size of our spaces could have a sizeable impact on our psychology makes me wonder, have the majority of our spaces fallen into a Goldilocks trap of making sure that everything fits us a little too perfectly?

👁️ Research I’ve Been Thinking About

Pupillary Reactions

A topic I’ve come across a couple times lately has been “light independent pupillary reactions”.

Most of us know that our eyes dilate when we’re looking at someone we’re attracted to. Mirroring that, there’s also evidence that shows how we find people whose eyes are dilated to be more attractive.

While listening to an episode the Many Minds podcast, I also learned about studies that describe how our eyes will also dilate when we’re shown a picture of the sun. And even when imagining light or dark things. Sometimes, even while just reading the words “day” or “night”.

I love learning about environmental psychology (how our surroundings influence our mind and behaviour), but I’ve never considered how interesting environmental physiology could be (how our surroundings influence our physical body).

💔 Reflection I’ve Been Thinking About

Love It or Hate It Design Philosophy

I don’t remember their name, but I learned recently about an architect who would believe that his work was a failure if it didn’t elicit any emotional reactions. Love it or hate it, as long as it made people feel something, then he succeeded.

As an architecture/design observer, how do you feel about that philosophy? Can you appreciate a design you hate, based on the fact that it got you to hate it?

Personally, I know I can have this mindset with actors who play a character I hate. Excluding the scenarios where I hate a character because I think the acting is bad, I applaud the skill of those actors who get me to loathe the character they play.

So, I think I can get there with architecture too. So long as I only consider buildings with “bad character”, as opposed to “bad skill”.

💎 Visual I’ve Been Thinking About

Water on Walls

When I moved into my place, one of my first acts of decoration was adding sun catcher crystals to my window, so that they’d project disco rainbows all across my walls.

While it does the job on a good sunny day, watching this video from Dami Lee reminds me of the effect I’d truly love to experience.

Water refraction onto walls is like the aurora borealis in liquid form and I’m living for it!

👃 Innovation I’ve Been Thinking About

The Smell of May vs The Smell of June

I went to visit a garden whose flowers were designed to bloom at different times of year — creating a scentscape, so that visitors would be able to distinguish whether it smells like May or June, for example.

I thought this was fascinating and I wonder what it would look like if we took more time to consider the scentscapes of the spaces we build.

✨ Place I’ve Been Thinking About

Light Galleries

I love the idea of a light gallery.

I came across this video showcasing a lighting showroom.

And of course, my highly suggestible motivation now wants to make it his life’s mission to explore how different lighting setups can affect people within a space.

When I think about the scenes in my life where I felt a strong sense of awe, they almost all had a strong element of light:

• Watching the street lights pass by when I was a preschool passenger in my parents’ car during our cross-country drives between the US and Canada to visit family

  

• Overlooking the glistening city lights while perched above Montreal on Mount Royal at night

  

• Being immersed in the starry projections of a space documentary in a 360 degree dome planetarium

  

• The reflected lamps within Yayoi Kusama’s infinity mirror room, "The Aftermath of Obliteration of Eternity"

  

There are numerous studies about how light affects our mood, energy, and even our behaviour. So lately, I’ve been daydreaming about how cool it would be to have some sort of museum or gallery, whose sole purpose it was to present exhibits which illuminates the influence that light has on us.

🎨 People I’ve Been Thinking About

Camille Walala 🔗 / Profile / 🔗 / Elle Decor /

How absolutely gorgeous and fun is this studio design!?

I came across it recently and I decided to dive a little deeper into its designer.

According to the about page on her website, Camille finds inspiration in the “pattern to transform atmospheres, elevate moods and spark positivity”.

That bio, alongside this picture of her

got me thinking about the power that of pops of colour can have on people.

We’ve seen it before, when I wrote about Edi Rama’s revitalization of Tirana’s cityscape in Albania and Publicolor’s Paint Club.

I love a full black fashion statement as much as the next guy, but knowing that there’s power in colour, I wonder… in a hypothetical world, where we’d each wake up into a black and white canvas, how many pales of vibrant paint would we each contribute in a lifetime?

ENJOYED THIS ISSUE?

Thanks for reading! I hope something in here inspired you, as much as it did me. If so, feel free to let me know by clicking the ❤️ button! Have a great one, Lamar ✌️😁

WELCOME TO MIND YOUR STEP - ISSUE 15!

There’s a special place in hell for anyone who wishes for fame.

Or at least that’s what an old jinn buddy of mine once told me 🧞

The genies tend to be tricky hustlers. So I wasn’t surprised at the sinister smirk he had on his face as he reminisced the myriad of times he condemned fame wishers to the Realm of Wicked Watchers.

It’s a dingy dystopia where judging eyes are fixated on your every move. Each moment being broadcast to the voyeuristic eyes of your neighbours and enemies.

Blackmail, hidden spy cams, peep holes, camera hacking, secret listening devices… They’re all encouraged rites of passage.

It’s a hellscape, where privacy is hunted for sport and the billboarding of the intimate moments of others is rewarded by the government.

With the rise of micro-influencers and their audiences yearning for similar fame, the boundaries between dimensions is beginning to blur.

🔗 / Source /

As more and more people crave recognition, our world is increasingly resembling a watered-down version of the Realm of Wicked Watchers.

Paparazzi, claims that our phones are listening to us, cameras in every corner of our cities and in every citizen’s hand…

What exactly does it do to our psychology to live in an environment that seems to be under constant surveillance?

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🙋🏽‍♂️ Surveillance and The Main Character

Is believing in privacy the new delusion?

Most psych grads talking to someone feeling self-conscious will eagerly remind them about the Spotlight Effect. Where people tend to believe they’re being noticed more than they really are.

But, I’m a people watcher. So, while it’s reassuring to recognize that most people are too focused on their own worlds to take the time to reflect on ours, I also know that there are people like me out there.

People who sit on buses and benches, scoping out the people around them. Taking note of what everyone is reading, and wearing, and looking at.

And when we’re not in the vicinity of a people watcher, there’s a good chance we’re in the view of a street camera. Or the surveillance camera in a nearby shop. Or, especially true for those of us who live in a big city, the view of the lens of the dozens of tourists or tik tokers around us.

And when we’re not in the vicinity of a person with a camera, we are the person holding the camera. Whether it be in our computers or in our phones. We cover our webcams and question the prying ears of the smartphones we believe are listening to our conversations.

After the movie The Truman Show came out in 1998, some people started identifying with Jim Carrey’s character. They believed that they too were the main character in a tv show. That the world around them was an elaborate production set and that they were constantly being watched.

While not considered to be a new diagnosis, this Truman Show Delusion was thought to be a variance on known persecutory and grandiose delusions. But in a modern day society where a lot of us are actually often being filmed and watched, is the Truman Show Delusion a delusion anymore?

I wonder if nowadays the true delusion is going outside and believing in complete privacy? Could it be the case that believing in the Spotlight Effect is the modern day delusion?

❤️‍🔥 Surveillance and Better Behaviour

Are we better people when we’re being watched?

There’s a phenomenon in psychology known as the "watching-eye effect". It describes how the visible presence of images depicting eyes nudges people towards slightly, but measurably more honest and more pro-social behaviour 🔗 / Study /.

But that got me wondering, what about reality TV?

So many of the people we see on reality shows often seem like outrageous caricatures. Ethical behaviour doesn’t usually seem like a top priority.

Are we better performers when we’re being watched?

Surveillance doesn’t augment the ethical behaviour of reality stars, but maybe knowing that they are immersed in a filmed environment, they produce the behaviour that they think the eyes watching them want to see?

But then that got me wondering…

If that was the case, then why do so many of us nervous public speakers fail to meet ours and others’ expectations when we’re on stage? Shouldn’t the watching eyes make us perform better, considering that’s the ideal scenario most watchers want?

Turns out, psychology’s got a theory for that: social facilitation and inhibition — where the presence of others can lead to either enhanced or hindered performance, depending on the task at hand. For simple or well-learned tasks, people tend to perform better in the presence of others. That’s social facilitation. However, for complex or novel tasks, the presence of others can lead to impaired performance, known as social inhibition.

So perhaps, a better question to ask ourselves is what can I become better at by being watched?

Perhaps, the watching-eye effect and social facilitation can be combined to build us up.

Maybe all we need to do to level up in our current goal is to tape a poster of a pair of eyes near our training zone.

🙇 Surveillance and Public Shaming

How have spaces been designed to augment ethical behaviour?

Knowing about the watching-eye effect, it’s not uncommon to find creative surveillance strategies incorporated into the design of spaces.

I mentioned in a previous issue the design of panopticon prisons.

“Jail cells lined along a circular perimeter.

Guards posted in a watchtower in the centre of the ring.

A 360 degree vantage point with a clear view into each and every cell.

…

The interior of the watchtower, however, is veiled. And prisoners are unable to see the guards inside.

The (potentially) watchful eye of a panopticon prison is designed to shackle both the body and the mind. Prisoners know they could be being watched at any given moment, but they can never know when.”

🔗 / Mind Your Step Issue 7 /

Symbolic of the watchful eyes in the watching-eye effect, some storefronts opt for a public shaming strategy by taping snapshots of the faces of people who’ve stolen from them onto their front door. A not-so-subtle reminder that we’re all being watched when in their store.

Similar public shaming strategies have even been incorporated into city designs.

Cities in four Chinese provinces, for example, have shamed jaywalkers by posting their personal information on public screens using facial recognition to trace the identities of jaywalkers. Cameras take several snapshots of errant pedestrians, as well as a 15-second video which is then displayed on a large screen. Facial recognition software matches the faces of these offenders with those in a provincial police database. A police officer then checks them for their accuracy, and if they pass muster, the offender's photograph and personal information (like portions of their ID number and home address) gets displayed. 🔗 / Article /

In a world with daily uploads of public freak outs and Karen callouts, I find the people who don’t seem to be affected by the watching eye effect particularly interesting.

Are they completely immune to the social pressures of their environment or are there still some undiscovered environmental interventions that can be used to augment ethical behaviour?

😶‍🌫️ Surveillance and Sense of Privacy

There’s a sort of serenity I seem to find in solitude.

I’m not sure if it’s a universal feeling.

It’s most apparent when I’ve found a lonely pocket outside in the big city. Away from everyone and yet surrounded by everyone.

Sometimes I even notice it when I’m by myself in large crowds. I start to think about how anonymous I am within the crowds of people. An island surrounded by waves of rushing passersby.

I wonder what emotions and psychological states private spaces make us feel?

Do our surroundings play a role in determining when we feel lonely when we’re alone vs when we feel serenity in solitude? Or is that solely a consequence of our personality or current scenario?

Last month I watched the show Jury Duty.

It’s a modern day Truman Show where an unwitting participant was placed into what he thought was the position of a juror on a real court case. What he didn’t know was that he was the main character in a show and that everyone around him were all actors.

The show got me thinking about what happens to our thoughts and behaviours when we’re immersed in an environment under surveillance.

Arisa Cox, Canada’s Big Brother host, always ends her live episodes by reminding the audience that “someone is always watching”. And maybe it’s true. Or at least, maybe it’s becoming the default perspective.

And if that’s the case, then maybe the world is our stage and we should live life like we’re the main character. Assuming that all eyes are on us and acting accordingly.

ENJOYED THIS ISSUE?

I’ve got an agreement with the genie community so that people who click the ❤️ button are exempt from the Realm of Wicked Watchers 🙌 So enjoy your wish for fame, free of crooked contingencies!

How amazing would it be if we were all born with our own biological battery pack.

So that whenever lethargy started to leech, we’d just plug ourselves into our external energy reserve and feel as good as new.

No more coffee cravings, afternoon naps, or slothful procrastinations. We’d live in a world where our energy was abundant and our couches would become sculptures, as opposed to the soul sucking magnets they currently are.

Until my transhumanist double-A-powered daydreams come to light, our next best energy source for now is rest.

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🫁 Enter the Rest Zone

I think that a lot of us think of rest as a response to spending energy. It's the thing we do after we tire ourselves out.

But I believe that we can benefit from thinking more about how rest can be the thing we do to prepare for spending energy. By preparing the right way, I believe we can increase the amount of energy we have to spend.

One of my favourite swimming pool games as a kid was Ring Diving — where someone would throw a bunch of weighted rings into the deep end of a pool and the kids would race to see who could retrieve the most.

I like to think of energy and rest like that game.

Anywhere above water is our rest zone. Anywhere below water is our energy spending zone.

Two primary behaviours happen in the rest zone during the game:

• recovering mode - when we come up from the water gasping for air and

• refuelling mode - when we take in a deep breath in preparation for descent.

Not to brag (🤴🏽), but I always dominated this game. And it was all because I discovered a refuelling hack — hyperventilation. Somehow I realized that I was able hold my breath longer than everyone else if I took in a lot of quick deep breaths before my final hold.

According to my inner bootleg biologist, by increasing the oxygen content in my blood, my body was less desperate for air compared to everyone else, so I was able to waste a lot less time going back and forth for air. In other words, I was able to win, because I realized that my lungs weren’t the only energy source I could rely on. While everyone else was targeting the oxygen in their lungs, I was targeting the oxygen in my blood.

I’ve come to realize lately that we might be able to apply a similar principle into our lives. By figuring out the types of energy we rely on, we can use rest to better equip ourselves for spending our energy efficiently.

⚡ The 7 Types of Energy

When you have a hard day, how do you recover afterward? How about when you have a hard day coming up, how do you prepare?

I was recently inspired by an idea from a Ted Talk about how there are 7 different types of rest we can take advantage of:

• creative,

• emotional,

• mental,

• physical,

• sensory,

• social,

• spiritual.

Whether it be bubble baths, reading, or going out dancing, there are tons of different ways to relax. But, which ones should we use? And when?

What if we should be engaging in specific techniques depending on the type of energy we’ve depleted?

Another interesting concept I discovered from this talk was the idea of passive vs active rest:

Perhaps, just like in Ring Diving, we could benefit from taking some time to reflect on how to best spend time during our active and passive rest sessions for each of the 7 types of energy.

Here’s what that looks like for me 👇

What would it look like for you?

🎡 Different Spaces Energize us in Unique Ways

I think it’s really interesting how different spaces have the ability to affect our energy.

Walking through a botanical garden affects our energy on a whole ’nother dimension than walking into a stadium with a choir of cheering fans.

For me, I might choose to immerse myself in a botanical garden if I wanted to help my spiritual energy source recover from a taxing experience. And I might choose to immerse myself in the sounds of a sports arena if I wanted to excite my physical energy source.

Different spaces serve as battery packs for our different energy sources.

For now, these are my battery packed places 👇 Where would yours be?

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A little birdie told me that people who click the ❤️ button are the swans in a world full of ugly ducklings 🦢 Have I mentioned that you’re looking great today?

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😶 Enter the World of The Place-Personality Pendulum

The Place-Personality Pendulum

You ever notice how place-dependent our personalities can be?

Like, you know how some spaces seem to make us come alive? Maybe for you it was the excitement you felt when you last went to an amusement park. Or the peace you feel when you look at a forest in autumn. Or even just the comfort you feel returning back home after a long day.

These places are our identity connectors — the ones where we feel most ourselves.

On the opposite side of the spectrum there are the spaces that act as identity disconnectors — the ones that seem to make us lose sight of who we are.

A mindset I've been resonating with lately is that every place has something to teach us about ourselves. So a question I've been asking is “where are my soulmate spaces?”. Where are the places that will make me feel the most alive?

The way I see it everywhere we go we are at the whim of a Place-Personality Pendulum: a constant recalibration of our personality depending on the environment we’re in.

When it comes to how places make us feel, I think that there are 2 main spectrums at play:

1. Does a place make us more or less connected to the person we are / want to be?

2. Does a place amplify or dampen the personality we’re wearing? Does it give our persona a megaphone or a gag?

On the top-left of the pendulum are places that make us feel possessed. We look back at how we acted or felt in those spaces and question: "how could I have acted that way? Who even was that person? Those were the times where we perhaps felt the need to play some sort of character in order to fit into our surroundings.

On the bottom-left of the pendulum are places that put us into zombie mode. They are the soul-sucking spaces that seem to smother our personalities. It's what I'd imagine I'd feel like if I woke up in the military barracks of an army movie like Men of Honor or Cadet Kelly.

When it comes to the left side of the pendulum, few things can illustrate the power of an environment that disconnects us from ourselves like the Zimbardo Prison Experiment.

The Zimbardo Prison Experiment, conducted in 1971, aimed to investigate the psychological effects of perceived power on individuals in a simulated prison environment. Participants were randomly assigned as prisoners or guards in a mock prison. However, the study spiralled out of control as the guards became increasingly abusive and the prisoners endured psychological distress. The experiment was abruptly terminated after six days due to ethical concerns. It highlighted the potential for ordinary individuals to exhibit cruel and dehumanizing behaviour when placed in positions of authority.

While places in the upper-left corner amplify the parts of our personality we least like, the ones in the upper-right corner amplify the parts of ourselves that we most like. These are places that I'm dubbing Les Chambres de Chat du Cheshire (my desperate attempt to conjure my high school french, in order to take advantage of the tongue twisting alliteration which loosely translates to Cheshire Cat Rooms). These are the ones where we can't help but smile — the spaces that for some reason make our personality shine.

Finally, in the bottom-right of the pendulum are the zen places we love to go when we want to mellow. Research on places where we experience awe, for example, have demonstrated their ability to inhibit our ego-centric thinking. They compel us to zoom out, focus less on ourselves, and focus more onto the greater world.

As we move through the world, our place-personality pendulum is in constant motion. And it makes me wonder:

• What if we treated our pendulum like a game of hot and cold? Where we keep an ongoing monitor of whether we're getting hotter or colder from the places that make us feel most like ourselves. Can we more easily live life as our true selves if we hunt down our Chambres de Chat du Cheshire?

• How can we protect ourselves against possession? Is there a practice we can implement or some training we can go through to ensure our ideal personality remains consistent in the face of spaces we don't resonate with?

• What's the easiest personality spark of ours to maintain? In those prison / army movies, some characters never seem to completely lose their spark. What's the baseline personality trait we'd hold onto no matter what?

• Assuming that both monk and Cheshire modes have their benefits, what's our ideal balance? How much time should we be / have we been spending in each?

🥸 Enter the World of Anonymous Spaces

Identity Strippers

I judge people before even speaking to them.

I don't tend to believe in my judgements until they're confirmed, but I definitely make it a habit of channeling my inner Criminal Minds-esque profiling abilities to imagine up a personality profile for people I don't know.

Posture, style, accessories, aesthetics, grooming, pace, affect, social company, volume, vigilance, scent, expression, clothing, smile...it all factors in.

I watched an Architectural Digest video recently and this clip drew my attention to places that strip people of their outward identity markers.

🔗 / Architectural Digest Video /

I think this notion of a sauna as a place where pre-judgement nearly ceases to exist is really fascinating. It got me wondering:

• What other places tend to strip outward individuality? Any place where a uniform is prescribed, I'd assume.

• What places tend to increase our judgements toward others based on their outward appearance? Thinking of those fancy shops in Pretty Woman.

• In which circumstances would a lack of outward individuality be disarming vs alarming? In the video about the saunas, it seems that a lack of identity markers put people at ease and made it easier for them to commingle. But at the same time, I could easily imagine feeling on edge around someone who I couldn’t figure out. I wonder what the balance is here?

Thanks for reading!!

ENJOYED THIS ISSUE?

I read a super legit study once which proved that people who click the ❤️ button will get full say over the identity they’ll be reincarnated with in the next life 👻

🙅 Enter the World of Anti-Social Architecture

How environment design can pull people apart

You walk into a bus. There’s just one person sitting in a double seater.

Where would you sit?

You walk into a public washroom. There’s a dude using the urinal at the far end.

Where would you go?

You walk into an elevator. There’s one other person in there and they shift to the far corner to give you space to enter.

Where do you stand?

Some spaces have a seemingly scripted ability to pull us apart. And the way we think about personal space seems to depend a lot on the environment we’re in. More specifically, it seems to be dependent on:

1. The size of the environment. The smaller the space, the less personal space we need. The larger the space, the more personal space we need

2. Where people are in the environment. If we walk into a lecture hall and there are 10 students in the first 3 rows, we’d probably be more likely to gravitate to the front of the class. Our desire for personal space seems to want to imitate how other people are using their personal space.

3. Third things in the environment. Our need for personal space can be diminished if there’s something in the environment that pulls our attention toward it. Things like art, seating, light, food, drinks, entertainment, windows, and media displays make it easier to reduce the amount of personal space people feel they need.

It seems to me that:

the bigger the space,

the blander the space,

and the more space around the people already within a space,

all increase the amount of personal space we desire.

How environment design can pull people together

Social architecture is the intentional design of a space to encourage any range of social behaviours. It focuses on the connection between people, activity, and place and it forces us to question how we can design inclusive spaces that make people feel comfortable and motivated to interact with each other.

If I was going to design a space for an event where I wanted people to socialize, I’d look to the study of social architecture for inspiration and here are some questions I’d think about:

• What are the most magnetic third things? I’d be really interested to see a study that compared the magnetism of different objects. Like, in an analysis of 10 completely different rooms and 10 different social events in each room, where do people tend to gravitate? Potentially more interestingly, where do the first arrivals tend to gravitate? I believe those magnets are the keys to pulling people together.

• How do maximalist vs minimalist environments foster conversation? If I had to guess, I’d imagine that maximalist spaces are more likely to facilitate conversation. The easiest conversation starter is often commentary about the environment. The weather tends to be a fan favourite. So, I wonder if the presence of weird objects and eclectic designs give people an easy topic to spark conversation.

• Where do different personalities naturally gravitate to in a room? Some of us feel safer on the sidelines. Our level of comfort can be easily deduced by how far into the room we get. Putting magnetic elements along the edges of a room could keep the sidelines interesting for people who don’t tend to gravitate to the centre floor.

🏠 Enter the World of Branded Homes

The Productized Home

You can name the brand behind most of the consumer products you own, like your sneakers, wrist watch, or smartphone. But what about your house? Could there be benefits to conceptualizing your home as a product, similar to how you view your smartphone?

Veev thinks so. The California-based building technology company believes that traditional construction methods leave little room for the innovation we’ve come to expect from other consumer products. That’s why they build all the components for their homes off-site.

This allows Veev to efficiently integrate modern technology into those components, including in-wall touch panels, custom lighting and blinds systems, and walls that come with electricity, plumbing, and sensors pre-installed.

Veev is neither the first, nor the only company attempting to productize pre-fabricated homes. And the concept has a lot of practical benefits like:

• manufacturing in a controlled environment,

• optimized material and labor costs,

• decreased construction time,

• and significant less wastage.

However, there are some thought-provoking concerns that have been raised, like:

“My concern with treating homes as a product is that with the positives of product design there come negatives. Planned obsolescence, restricting maintenance to only Veev approved people, having to buy only Veev approved materials. I don't want to have to call Veev to replace a lightbulb or fix my furnace. Gives them way too much power.”

“Retrofitting homes with better tech is important too. Eg; Electric heating, better insulation, better windows, electric boiler, electric oven/stove.”

When I think of “home brands”, I think about the names of architects, designers, decorators, embedded technologies, and property management companies. I’m sure most of them would think about their work as being a part of their brand too. But I’m actually pretty surprised that we don’t already have major home brands, like we have major car brands, for example.

When it comes to brands taking over markets, I think about how so many phones, and cars, and buildings, and homes look nearly identical. So, I wonder if the rise of the “home brand” will lead to an even more obvious decline in bespoke novelty in home design.

It looks like some companies are addressing that exact concern by standardizing housing building blocks while leaving enough opportunity for aesthetic customization.

🤖 Enter the World of AI Architecture

AI Architecture • 🔗 / Dezeen / How AI software will change architecture and design /

What does the future of architectural photography look like in a world with AI?

I've been thinking that I might enjoy playing with architectural photography (AP). My plan for this weekend was to deep dive into every YouTube video on the topic. I wanted answers to questions like:

• What makes AP good vs bad?

• What styles do I gravitate toward?

• How can good AP compensate for a lacklustre environment?

• Who are respected photographers in this domain and what makes their work so special?

• How has AP evolved through history?

• What will the future of AP look like?

Once I hit that last question my mind felt a jolt.

What will the future of photography look like in general? Should I bother studying this if it's potentially destined to be an antiquated skill in the near future?

I wonder if this is what it feels like to be a high school student nowadays?

I remember the stress I felt in those days trying to plan out my future. Heck, I'm still experiencing that pressure. I’m constantly wondering if I'm cursed with an inability to cope with ambiguity. And my inner dialogue usually sounds something like:

How do other people live in the now?

Isn’t stressing about our future a universal consequence of having ambition and dreams?

Hmm I don’t know, maybe more adaptive people than you have adopted some sort of helpful mindset, like:

• No path you choose is irreversible. The first step is to take a first step.

• No matter what, I'll always be able to adapt and change course if I need to.

• As long as I'm staying consistent and each little step is going to move me forward.

• Even if I'm not stepping in the right direction, there's no experience I can't gain or learn from.

• I'm confident it's all going to work out in the end, as long as I focus on x, y, & z.

I often find myself coming back to these mindsets, but the little ambiguity-averse voice inside my head seems to be a long-term companion.

Perhaps AI will take over AP. But at the same time, perhaps the only way to fully take advantage of AI as a tool is to understand the basics. I’ve been looking into AI tools for visuals and it seems that the people who get the best results are the ones who are able to prompt the AI with specific styles or artists to reference as inspiration. In other words, all the power seems to be in the quality of the prompt and the more basics we know, the more specific we can be in our request.

When it comes to learning a new skill that’s likely to be impacted by AI, maybe a good first question to ask nowadays is how exactly an understanding of the basics is going to help us use Al as a tool more effectively.

💪 Enter the World of Liz Ogbu

Why I'm an architect that designs for social impact, not buildings | Liz Ogbu

One of my main goals in writing this newsletter is to better understand what it is about environment design that attracts my interest so strongly and to hopefully figure out a way to channel that interest into a productive and rewarding career for myself.

I love when people use their skills and expertise in non-traditional and unexpected ways. So I was quickly drawn into this Ted talk when Liz proclaimed:

“I'm an architect that doesn't design buildings.” … “The things that I design, the things that I build are actually opportunities for impact.”

🍬 Enter the World of Kids in Candy Stores

Giddy Abundance

Where would you go to get that “kid in the candy store” feeling?

Touted as one of our main aesthetics of joy by Ingrid Fetell Lee, the person who wrote the book on joy, she describes the abundance aesthetic as the joy we find in quantity and variety of sensory stimulation.

If you were to open the door to a room full of treasures designed just for you, what’s one thing you’d want that room to be filled with?

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🕳️ Enter the World of Tunnels

A Cenotaph’s Corridor: The Light at the End of the Tunnel

There’s something so visceral to me about this image of a person walking into the depths of a seemingly endless corridor, to then be greeted with an overwhelming amount of awe-inspiring magnificence.

“In order for you to reach the inside you need to walk into this long tunnel. You're walking for almost 150 meters in the darkness. The more you walk you feel yourself getting farther and farther and farther from reality.

Once you reach the end you're in this grand concrete sphere. You feel this sense of release. And you're inspired by the magnitude of the space.”

You ever notice how some places have the ability to make us more alert to the world around us. Like how after spending time in a movie theatre, the outside looks so much brighter and we seem to become painfully more attune to the details in our surroundings.

We have the phrase “tunnel vision” to describe the state of extreme focus on one thing. But what do we have to describe the “post tunnel vision” experience? The one where after an extended period of peripheral deprivation, our focus expands into an immersive blast of sensory overload.

The world is often brighter at the end of the tunnel and if it’s true that we’re more vigilant after periods of sensory deprivation, then I wonder if we can use that concept as a tool for creating more wonder-filled experiences.

What if there was a scientific study that successfully proved a connection between temporary sensory deprivation and subsequent increased openness to wonder. Since, I don’t know of any such research off the top of my head, for now, we can call it the post-tunnel vision hypothesis.

Post-tunnel vision hypothesis: If a person engages in temporary sensory deprivation, then they will become more alert when re-exposed to sensory stimuli.

If we accept the post-tunnel vision hypothesis, then questions we might consider are:

• Where could our world benefit from “tunnels”? For example, let’s say we have two amusement parks: one where we have to walk through a dark tunnel in order to reach the park and the other without a tunnel. Would our initial reaction of the park with a tunnel feel more awe-inspired?

• Could simply closing our eyes more often increase how vigilant we are afterward? Have you ever gone into a room that seemed so dark that you weren’t able to see your own hand right in front of your face. And then noticed that if you close your eyes really hard for several seconds and open them again, you could see details through the darkness? I wonder if we could take advantage of that process in daylight in order to increase our vigilance.

• Are we under-designing our bedrooms? If we were to look up bedroom design inspiration for different ages, we’d notice that the older we get, the more simpler the design becomes. As adults, we hear advice about sleep hygiene and how we should design our bedroom for the purpose of effective sleep. If sleep is our longest everyday version of sensory deprivation, then I wonder if we should instead be asking how we can design our bedroom for the purpose of waking up more effectively. Just like how re-entering a seemingly brighter reality after leaving a movie theatre gives our system a healthy jolt, I wonder if we can jumpstart our days more effectively if we were to wake up in a more wonder-filled environment.

🌬️ Enter the World of Aromatherapy

Bottled Biographies

Scent has a special power to teleport us back into the spaces of our past. What if we could use the art of parfumerie to bottle our biographies?

Imagine a scratch and sniff photo album, for example. Where we could take scented snapshots of the smells that define our life in the same way we take pictures. Where we could flip through an album of our life, land on a picture of us baking gingerbread cookies with our Nonna on a Christmas when we were kids. And where we could scratch the photo, take a sniff, and smell the freshly baked cookies and the faint smell of Chanel No. 5.

Augmented Air: How to Use Air & Aroma to Augment Our Mind

You ever notice how our bodies seem to forget how to breathe when we're afraid?

• We gasp in shock and inadvertently hold our breath.

• We scream when terrified and forget to inhale for a couple seconds.

• We wake up from our nightmares in quick shallow hyperventilation.

• We pass a paper bag for a person to breathe into when they’re panicking.

• We grasp for our inhalers when fear triggers our asthma.

• And when we're feeling anxious, we remind ourselves to focus on our breathing and we recite instructions on how to do it. Take slow deep breaths. Inhale on four. Hold on four. Exhale on four. Hold on four.

For us fans of fear-fuelled horror, forgetting how to breath is a favourite past time. But in these days where it seems like a lot of us are experiencing some degree of anxiety, breathing experts seem to agree that 8 in 10 people have forgotten how to breath correctly (effectively and beneficially).

I had a stressful week last week. And when it comes to coping with stress, I've tried using breathing techniques in the past, but I’ve never felt them to be a big help. But something happened recently that re-convinced me to their potential benefits.

Two magnolia trees bloomed outside my window.

The smell of their flowers has been wafting in with the wind. Plus, it's been a rainy week here in Toronto, so the smell of petrichor along with the smell of these magnolia trees have been fully saturating the air in my place.

In spite of feeling stressed, I noticed myself taking in deeper breaths to savour the scented air. And in those moments, I clearly noticed myself feeling calmer. And it got me wondering about how aroma might be used to augment air and motivate more intentional breathing.

Even more specifically, I started to question:

• how different scents influence our neurology? For instance, there are fragrances and odours that actually change brain function. Ex. lavender is a chemical. Not only does it smell sweet and make us feel calm, it's a chemical that has been shown to induce slow wave sleep in animals.

• whether nice smelling spaces truly result in us breathing better? I wonder if we truly are more likely to breathe more deeply and potentially more effectively in places with certain scents.

• whether fortified air is a thing and how we can use it to influence our health? In the same way that some people squeeze lemon into their water for the health boost, I wonder if there’s anything we can add to our air to make it nutritious or beneficial.

🚽 Enter the World of Marked Territories

Pee Shields

🧭 Enter the World of People Who Know Where to Go

Comfort & Wonder

Comfort and wonder are two of my favourite feelings and I love trying to emulate those in the design of my home.

Few things make me happier than when someone walks into my place and says something like:

• “it’s so cozy in here”,

• or “there’s literally something interesting to look at in every corner”.

There are some people we call up because they know all the tastiest restaurants or all the coolest clubs. They’re known by their friends as the person who knows where to find all the best { insert environment here }.

I think it would be so cool to be able to fill in that blank with qualities like comfort or wonder for myself.

Any idea how you’d want to fill in that blank for yourself?

🌿 Enter the World of Natural Medicine

The Psychological Benefits of Nature

I sometimes entertain the daydream that someday I’ll feel knowledgable and creative enough to start a YouTube channel. And if I ever did, then this video would be in my inspiration board for the type of videos I think I’d really enjoy making. — An aesthetic and thought-provoking exploration of how our surroundings influence our mind and wellbeing.

Here are some of my favourite highlights:

• Despite spending 99% of our evolutionary history outdoors, we now spend 93% of our time either indoors or in vehicles.

• In one study of 400 Londoners, life satisfaction fell by 0.5% for every extra 10 milligrams of pollution in their area.

• In a study of 2000 men, environmental noises like traffic of 50 decibels led to a 20% increase in hypertension or high blood pressure.

• In another study of 5000 adults, a 10 decibel increase of noise at night resulted in a 14% rise in hypertension.

• Studies have found that having a school near an airport leads to lower scores in reading tests.

• Walks in the forest have been found to decrease cortisol levels by 12%, blood pressure by 1.3%, and heart rate by 6%, for days and days after.

• Studies have confirmed that being in nature reduces anxiety and improves mood.

• One experiment showed 120 individuals films of accidents in workshops. The researchers measured things like sweat levels, heart rate, blood and pressure. They were divided into 2 groups and one group was shown scenes of nature and the other was shown urban scenes. Those who were shown the scenes of nature were back to their baseline in 5 minutes. Whereas those watching urban scenes were only partway back 10 minutes later.

• Another studied groups of businessmen hiking in the woods for a few hours each day. It found that immunity boosting white blood cells were 40% higher after their walk and still 15% higher a month later compared with those who did not walk.

• Studies have shown that creativity improves by up to as much as 50% 3 days after hiking.

• Hospital rooms with windows of nature tends to reduce patients’ recovery time.

• Housing estates with views of nature have less crime.

• One study of 40 million people found that people that live in greener areas have lower death rates.

• Some have found that people walking in nature ruminate over negative thoughts less.

• In another study, researchers showed one group of people scenes of nature that were simple, flat, and predictable. While showing another group scenes of nature with winding paths, unpredictable landscape, and obscured scenery — scenes that evoked a sense of adventure and mystery. The latter group remembered the details of the scenes more successfully. In other words, exploration activates memory.

• A study found that people who watched awe-inspiring videos were more likely to help them pick up the pens they pretended to drop.

I’ve been really enjoying studying all things environment design lately. But sometimes I think to myself “okay it’s nice that you’ve found something that interests you so much, but where are you going with all of this.” And long lists like this are a good reminder of the potentially life-altering benefits we can find from thinking critically about how we interact with our spaces. Where environment design meets positive wellbeing is the place where I aspire to make a meaningful impact.

Thanks for accompanying me on these world travels!

Lamar ✌️👽

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DEAR ENVIRONMENTAL NUTRITIONISTS

Are Super Spaces the New Super Foods?

We have physicians to help us ensure a healthy relationship with our bodies. Psychologists to help us cultivate a healthy relationship with our minds. But who do we have to help us build a healthy relationship with our environments?

We know that spaces can offer a healthy dose of psychological benefits. So, what if there were space specialist doctors? Where instead of prescribing pharmaceuticals, they’d prescribe places.

I learned recently that doctors in British Columbia can prescribe year long passes to Canada's National Parks and this idea of prescribing nature to patients is catching on.

Named one of the top 8 global wellness trends in 2019, park prescription programs are quickly becoming a recurring doctor recommended solution. With benefits ranging from increased life expectancy, better immune functioning, reduced risk of heart disease, depression, and anxiety, doctors are recognizing and taking advantage of the health benefits of being in nature.

The more I learn about the subliminal influences of our spaces and about the mental health benefits of things like park prescription programs and schnozelen rooms, I wonder if there will be an increase in environmental medical interventions — place prescription programs.

Should a holistic approach to medicine involve doctors handing out prescriptions for bouldering passes or referrals to social clubs? What could the future of place prescriptions look like? What new immersive environments will be built for this purpose?

I’ve listened to some podcasts about nutrition recently and one piece of advice I’ve heard come up a few times is that we should strive to consume at least 30 different natural foods per week. (Side note, this seems like a daunting task, but “natural foods” includes all spices, plants, grains, etc. So it’s surprisingly a lot more achievable than it seems.)

That advice got me wondering:

What if there were environmental nutritionists?

Since we know that some places have health benefits, then what might an environmental nutrition plan look like?

Imagine going to an environmental nutritionist (EN).

We’d explain our current lifestyle, our goals, and our ailments. We’d tell them about the rhythm of our energy levels and about how they naturally fluctuate throughout each day.

“My mind seems to be super active in the morning.”

“I start to lose energy after I eat in the afternoon.”

“Social events tend to tire me out.”

“My mood tends to dip before bedtime.”

Our EN would be an expert in all things environmental psychology. As if every environment had its own nutritional makeup, they’d be well versed in how specific spaces would be likely to influence us.

Based on our lifestyle analysis, they’d suggest space-related upgrades.

Like:

Since our mind is most active before we eat breakfast, that’s when we should do all of our thinking tasks.

And maybe we should integrate our social life into our idea of healthy sleep hygiene. Since it naturally tires us out, we should aim to engage in social activities in the later parts of our day.

Another use case would be when we’re working to optimize our environmental health and we want the environment version of a green smoothie. They’d be able to recommend recipes in the form of a customized dosage of environmental macros: fresh air, light, nature, novelty, etc.

Maybe we’re looking to solve a specific problem, like dealing with grief, or low energy levels, or severe wanderlust, or loneliness. They’d be well-prepared with a myriad of potential environmental prescriptions. Saunas, mineral springs, forest bathing, etc. Or even international healing spots, like the hot springs in Pamukkale, Denizli, Turkey.

Or the healing forests in Japan.

Perhaps they’d tell us that we need to diversify our environmental nutrition. That the spaces we’ve been spending time in are the equivalent of environmental junk food or binge eating.

What would your environmental nutritionist say about you? What places do you think you should be prescribed?

A little something worth digesting on.

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FEATURED PLACE: NINJA WARRIOR OBSTACLE COURSE

Ninja Warrior: How to Design an Obstacle Course

Think you’ll ever want to design an obstacle course?

Here's a breakdown of the psychology behind the design of a Ninja Warrior stage. Honestly, it’s so clever, it's borderline biblical 👀

It all starts with elevation and the 3 planes of progress. Each plane in a course is designed to affect an athlete’s emotions in a specific way.

Earth (middle plane) = determination, confidence, fear.

Hell (lowest plane) = shame, anger, disappointment.

Heaven (highest plane): pride, joy, euphoria.

Earth is where the journey takes place.

One foot in front of the other. Constant momentum. Eyes on the prize.

Those are its virtues and the course is designed to punish those who lose faith in their abilities.

Each obstacle crafted so that the longer an athlete hesitates, the more they struggle.

Hell is their rock bottom.

Water placed not just to cushion falls. But designed to intensify reactivity.

As punishment for their missteps, fallen athletes plunge into an ice bath.

Climbing out drenched, shaking, and shocked, they appear even more emotional about their fall.

Heaven is designed for feeling on top of the world.

It’s the uppermost part of the course where athletes finally get to hit the big red buzzer.

Sirens sing in celebration. They spread their wings in pride. And they get to look down on the kingdom they just conquered.

An entire obstacle course designed to subliminally influence psychology.

And it doesn’t stop there. Here’s how a Ninja Warrior course is designed to play with emotions.

Exposed Bars and Playfulness

Our inner child loves to climb things.

And with all those playful colours and exposed bars, the course looks like a jungle gym. Making the athletes and the crowd want to participate and play.

Crowds and Motivation

Studies show that performing in front of a crowd boosts our ability to skillfully perform a task we’re adept at. A process known as social facilitation.

The reverse effect occurs when we feel insecure about our ability to perform.

Lights and Stress

Lights and heights at night = major adrenaline rush.

Illuminated reflective materials like metal and water boosting its effect.

Triggering the flight or fight response, adrenaline increases blood circulation, breathing, and energy supplies. Heightening senses and increasing heart rate.

Helping athletes react more quickly and effectively.

Momentum and Faith

Constant momentum is often a key factor in the success of a ninja warrior obstacle.

The slightest hesitation can lead to missteps and muscle fatigue.

Only those who maintain faith in their abilities and instincts can succeed.

Ice Water and Shock

Water is there not just to cushion falls. It is designed to intensify reactivity.

Fallen athletes are condemned to plunge into an ice bath. Intensifying their shock and snapping them out of the flow state that they were in on the course.

Elevation and Elation

It's no coincidence the finish line is on the uppermost part of the course.

Designed for feeling on top of the world.

Winning athletes feel elated — literally in the highest spirits while at the highest point off the ground.

Ninja Warrior is one of the only sports that truly has the ability to get me pumped with enthusiasm.

And it’s no surprise that’s the case, since it’s an entire obstacle course designed to subliminally influence emotion.

RECOMMENDED WEBSITE: 🔗 TRAVEL REMOTELY

Travel the world from home

One of my favourite ways to travel is to play videos of people filming their walks through different cities around the world while I'm working. This is one of the latest apps I've found that makes it easy to travel the world from home.

RECOMMENDED VIDEO

Connect with me on Twitter @LamarElimbo for a lot more thoughts on how we can turn our visions for the worlds we crave to create into a reality!

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Mindfulness isn’t the only powerful psychological state.

There are so many discussions and studies on the benefits of mindfulness meditation. There’s little doubt that it’s a powerfully beneficial practice.

But its popularity has pushed it into one of my biggest pet peeves — one size fits all solutions.

Assuming that we all have unique goals, points of view, and baseline states of mind, then something like mindfulness meditation is going to have varying effects for each of us.

I want to see more people talking about how they’ve created practices and built environments around other beneficial psychological states.

Let’s expand our toolboxes and broaden the conversation to include practices and places that elicit joy, bliss, flow, wonder, comfort, nostalgia, pronoia, optimism…

There are so many powerful emotions and states of mind. And with a little creativity and intention we can design environments to conjure them.

What are the feelings you’re optimizing for in your life?

Sending my favourite feeling of wonder your way,

Lamar ✌️👽

Mind Your Step is the weekly newsletter to read if you want to empower your inner world builder. At the intersection of environmental psychology, creative design, and imaginative ideation, it’s the go-to source for learning how to design spaces that influence the way people think.

Subscribe now

DEAR VOYEURS

The Curiosity Gap: Spaces Designed to Lure our Gaze

Are you allured by the obscured?

Blurred out tinder pics?

Articles under paywalls?

Partially open curtains offering a glimpse into a home?

Where does the curiosity gap hit you the hardest?

The curiosity gap is the distance between what we know and what we want to know.

Remember when the world fell into a frenzy when Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory announced it was opening up its doors to a select few. It’s because of the curiosity gap why everybody wanted in. They bought bundles, and boxes, and buses chalk full of chocolate just for the chance of chipping away at its exclusive veneer.

Obscurity is seductive. And exclusivity is the lingerie of a seductive space.

Places just out of reach are often the ones that pique our urge to sneak a peek behind the scenes.

And it hits some of us harder than others.

Spaces where we’re not supposed to be,

where few have ever been before,

and where only the elite have access.

Those are the ones that get us undressing their exteriors in our minds, trying to imagine what it’s like inside.

It’s not easy to escape the siren song of a space specifically designed to trigger our curiosity gap.

And there’s a barrage of bizarrchitecture out there with that goal in mind.

Weird doors. Unorthodox entrances. Intimidating gatekeepers. All deliberately placed for the purpose of encouraging an atmosphere of allure.

Consider the Upside Down House in Zakopane, Poland.

Or the doorway to any ingenious speakeasy. Like the secret entrance to the Blue Room in Los Angeles.

Or the Krzywy Domek shopping centre in Sopot, Poland.

How hard would the curiosity gap hit you if you passed in front of any of them?

Would you double and then triple and then quadruple take — feeling compelled to take a look inside?

Which windows would you want to stalk if you could snoop behind any curtain in the world?

FEATURED PLACE: THE 13TH FLOOR

Sensing Psychopathy & the Anatomy of Creepy Places

“Please. Don’t do this.”

The manager’s final plea before Mike Enslin entered 1408.

Arguably my favourite horror movie, 1408 feeds into both my love for horror and my obsession with how spaces can mess with our mind.

In last week’s issue, I brushed upon the difference between scary and creepy.

Where some places make us feel afraid, there are others that make us feel uneasy — the "something’s not quite right here" feeling.

Creepiness lingers. It makes our skin crawl.

It got me thinking about the anatomy of a creepy place — what exactly is it in an environment that can give us the heebie jeebies?

I refuse to believe that horror movie characters are inherently as dumb as they act. We try to warn them not to open that closet, and to go somewhere more public, and to believe their friend who clearly has superior instincts. But they rarely listen.

And as much as we like to believe that we’re smarter, our spidey sense isn’t always reliable.

You ever wonder if after we die we’ll get to pan away from our 1st person perspective & rewatch our life on the big screen?

We'd get to observe all the times when we went to a catastrophic event.

We’d watch ourselves open the door to that crappy motel we stayed at that one time in order to save some cash.

We’d shout at ourselves on the screen, “don’t go in there, you idiot. What are you thinking”.

“I would rather trust a woman's instinct than a man's reason.”

― Stanley Baldwin

One of my least favourite tropes in horror movies is the thinker vs the feeler protagonists — where evolution has awarded the feeler with a well honed survival instinct, the clueless thinker looks at them with contempt and always manages to persuade them that they’re irrational.

It’s known as the Cassandra Truth trope.

In Greek mythology, Cassandra was gifted psychic powers by a god who wanted sexual favours in return. But after seeing his dark future, she reneged on their deal. Offended and infuriated, the god then cursed her to live a life full of honest visions that no one would believe.

Just like Cassandra, our gut instincts often fall victim to our curse of logic.

We walk into a place. We feel that something’s off. But because we can’t put our finger on it, we proceed to enter into a den of danger.

Dissecting the anatomy of what makes a place creepy is our way of understanding why we’re likely catching a bad vibe.

Here are 10 elements that make an environment feel creepy.

1. Temperature drops. A common symptom of exposure to creepiness is getting goosebumps and the chills. In a study conducted in 2012, researchers from the University of Groningen in the Netherlands learned that participants who felt creeped out also tended to feel colder and to believe that the temperature in the room had actually dropped. 🔗 / link / So spaces that can simulate those physical reactions (like those with infrequent temperature fluctuations) might be more likely to give us the creeps.

2. Sketchy pasts. In 2013, Frank McAndrew, professor of psychology at Knox College in Illinois, and graduate student Sara Koehnke conducted a survey asking more than 1,300 people "what is creepy?" They found that one of the biggest predictors of creepiness was a feeling of unpredictability. There’s a reason realtors are rarely eager to divulge the unnatural deaths that have occurred in a home.

3. Representations of death. Similar to avoiding conversions around homicide homes, other representations of death tend to creep people out too. Occupations like taxidermists and funeral directors were listed among the creepiest professions in McAndrew and Koehnke’s survey. So spaces with taxidermy aren’t likely to create comforting atmospheres.

4. Clowns. One profession which usurped taxidermists’ and funeral directors’ creepy crown was clowns. So spaces with clown paraphernalia aren’t likely to be big crowd pleasers either.

5. Superstition taunts. The Otis Elevator Company reported that 80 to 90% of the elevators they installed in skyscrapers and large hotels omitted the 13th-floor button. If we dig deep we’ll find a bunch of superstitious architecture accommodations for superstitious tenants. So staying in a suite located on the 13th floor or, even worse, in suite 1408 could trigger our dystopian magical thinking.

6. Non-place loneliness. A common theme found in the creepy genre is a separation from others while they’re still in view. In shows like Courage the Cowardly Dog and movies like 1408, the main characters often find themselves in scenarios where salvation seems just out of reach. They’re on a deserted island with a view of the bustling world around them.

7. Uncanny familiarity. Some spaces give us that “something is not quite right here” feeling. It’s a similar feeling to what I described in my last issue on The Paradox of Non-Places. “They are the airports, the hospitals, and the malls where we would feel lonely and creeped out if we weren’t surrounded by other people.” They feel familiar, but the something in its context is out of place.

8. Distant / inaccessible escape. When the exit is all the way across an unfamiliar dark hallway most of us would have to hype ourselves up to find the confidence to start walking.

9. Surveillance. It’s easy to feel on edge when we’re either being watched or we just think we’re being watched. An old portrait painting whose eyes seem to track us across a room is a sure-fire way to get some goosebumps.

10. Men. Finally, McAndrew and Koehnke’s survey found that both men and women believed that men were far more likely to be creepy than women. So according to the general population, stick a man in a room and you’ve just upped its chance of feeling creepy 🤷🏽‍♂️

FEATURED THEORY: ENERGY AURAS

Objectifying Vampires: Finding Motivation by Identifying our Energy Assets & Liabilities

What if we could see our energy levels as aura?

We’d be able to look down at our hands enveloped in their colourful steam and inspect how much energy we have at our disposal.

Now imagine that we could see the energy auras of all the people, objects, and places around us.

We’d start to notice how all of these energies interact with one another.

At any social gathering we’d see the aura seep and deplete from all the introverts. We’d observe our energy spill into our comfy couches. Fading our aura into transparent nothingness until we fall asleep. And feeding our sofa’s energy aura until it matches our body heat.

Some items fuel us. Those are our energetic assets: cute mugs, fun deco…

Others suck our life right out of us. Our lethargic liabilities: dirty laundry, unfinished books…

Which object vampires have you accidentally invited into your space?

RECOMMENDED VIDEO

“With AR, now the entire world is a theme park. I experience this when my son and I play Pokemon GO. Our reality has expanded to accommodate an entire world filled with Pokemon. And for us, that's not fantasy, it's just an expansion of our reality.

So picture a scenario where everyone had something in their life, like Pokemon GO. You could live in the Pokemon or the Harry Potter wizarding world, Marvel or the DC Universe or it could be Victorian or '50s Americana or Western. Your entire fantasy world connected by AR, VR, movies, television, theme parks…”

CHALLENGE WORTH TRYING

Project Place Personification

Simple hack for making a house feel like a home: Name it.

Silicon Valley evokes innovation.

Sailers name their ships.

Motorheads name their cars.

Research suggests we value & appreciate objects more when we name them.

Names are our tool for encapsulating value into our spaces.

ENJOYED THIS ISSUE?

Research shows that people who click the ❤️ button are the least creepy people in the world 👀

Are you aware of just how awesome you are?

Because, you’re literally the absolute best.

I’ve seen your future and there’s a 100% chance you’re going to conquer your dreams.

There is nothing you can’t do 👏

When was the last time you gave yourself permission to deep dive into delusions of grandeur?

I started a new reflection practice, which I’m calling bombastic branching. It’s where I visualize the most audacious and impressive best-case potential branches in my future.

I noticed recently how all of my reflection practices focus on my most immediate timeline.

How did my last day/week/month go?

What can I do today to contribute to my next level?

What goals do I want to accomplish this coming month?

But I hadn’t been giving myself any space to daydream about the big picture — what my most ideal future branches might look like.

What if I were to become some sort of world-renowned environmental mentalist with unparalleled ability to elicit any emotion, thought, or behaviour through the spaces I’ve conceptualized.

What if I lived in a world where I’d help build the virtual reality ecosystem that gave people the ability to live out their most fantastical and surreal daydreams.

What if I could not just have a hand in improving the world, but help to improve someone’s entire perspective on the world — thus altering the course of their life — which snowballs into a never-ending sequence of positive butterfly effects.

Honestly, I’ve been feeling next-level motivated since I’ve started.

Here’s to thinking outrageous thoughts and to pushing our dreams and aspirations to the brink of reality. Because, that’s what world building is all about.

Your fellow daydreamer,

Lamar ✌️👽

DEAR MIND WANDERERS

Reminders of Resolve: A Quick Fix for Focus

How’s your focus been lately? Do things in your environment distract you from your work?

If yes, then have I got the product for you!

Say goodbye to noise cancelling headphones and 1000x your focus with this bad boy instead 💁🏽‍♂️

The Isolator, a concentration helmet developed by Hugo Gernsback in 1925.

Though it takes a brutalist aesthetic to productivity hacking, it could be argued that it’s not too far off from the concentration tactics that we use today.

Strategies for designing an environment for focus generally fall under one of two categories:

• Removing distractions, like leaving your phone in a drawer somewhere or locking yourself away in a quiet room,

• And blocking out distractions, like listening to music or putting on soundproof headphones.

But perhaps my favourite strategy for designing concentration into our spaces is to add reminders of resolve.

Reminders of resolve are emotional triggers that tap into the heart of our pursuits.

Last week, I shared a discussion I found on Twitter. It asked people what physical reminders they have in their spaces to keep them centred on their goals and values — how they designed reminders of resolve into their spaces. Here are my favourites:

We’re all mind wanderers.

We have visions in our mind of the world we want to live in. And whether we have the resolve or not, we want to be the version of ourself who works toward being the best version of ourself.

Maybe it’s time to reconnect with your north star.

Bring that dream destination of yours into reality. Think about what creative compasses you can add to your space. Make it easy for yourself to remember what it feels like to yearn.

FEATURED PLACE: NON-PLACES

The Paradox of Non-Places: A Cure for Culture Shock

Limbo gets a bad rap for being eerily liminal. To most who are just passing through, it’s a non-place. But for me it was home.

Non-places are the limbo-like locations we pass through in life.

They are the airports, the hospitals, and the malls where we would feel lonely and creeped out if we weren’t surrounded by other people. They are the places where we blend into the background in anonymity and would feel overly exposed if isolated.

Now that I’m stuck here in the land of the living, I find comfort in immersing myself in places that remind me of home.

And I’m not alone.

The paradox of non-places is that they’re so universal that when we feel homesick while travelling, they’re also the places where we can most feel at home.

FEATURED THEORY: ENVIRONMENTAL LEGACIES

Land of Legacies: Where to Preserve Your Soul

There’s a reason why ghosts are see through.

The Harry Potter franchise was onto something when it introduced the concept of horcruxes — objects that serve as containers where a person can preserve pieces of their soul in order to survive after the death of their body.

In reality, we call horcruxes by another name — legacies.

Our:

• inventions

• artful masterpieces

• bags of money

• brands

• music

• memories

• children

• …

Before we die, we leave behind a medley of mementos. And the more we break off pieces of our soul to store in legacies, the more transparent we’ll be as ghosts.

The most transparent ghosts I used to escort through Limbo were the ones who left behind an environmental legacy. The ones whose spirits can still be felt by their loved ones in the room they used to occupy, the park they used to frequent, and the neighbourhood they once lived in.

When you conjure up an image in your mind of a loved one you’ve lost, where are they?

For the people close to us, it’s often the spaces they used to live in and frequent where we home their spirits in our memories.

When I think about the people I’ve lost, I can close my eyes and imagine meeting them at their front door, walking through their halls, and sitting on their sofa. Their chosen spaces are so strongly linked to them that they become the most memorable environmental legacies that they leave behind.

Are the spaces that you frequent worthy of enshrining your soul?

Our homes and our hangouts aren’t just the places where we live. They’re they places where we’ll likely die. And the places where we’ll live on after death.

What would it look like if you were to design your ideal environmental legacy from scratch? Where do you want your loved ones to remember and feel you?

RECOMMENDED WEBSITE: Shade Map →

Shade map

Attention adrenaline junkie vampires. I’ve got a fun challenge for you!

Here's an app that shows where & when the sun falls: https://shademap.app/

Your mission: Survive shadow surfing through your town without getting burnt ☀️

And to you humans out there. Maybe you can use that app to challenge yourself into chasing down a good tan or to find the best spots to hide your car in the shade 🤷🏽‍♂️

RECOMMENDED VIDEO

Rewatching these clips from Courage the Cowardly Dog makes me realize that there’s a difference between scary and creepy.

Where some places make us feel afraid, there are others that make us feel uneasy — the "something’s not quite right here" feeling.

Creepiness lingers. It makes our skin crawl.

Creepiness is to horror, what cringe is to humour.

CHALLENGES WORTH TRYING

Part 1: Project Place with a Face

If you watched the 2020 psychological horror The Night House, then you’re probably familiar with the concept of face pareidolia.

It’s our ability to see faces in everyday objects.

And once you start noticing it, you’ll see it everywhere.

Part 2: Operation Googly Eyes

The movie Everything Everywhere All At Once revived the long forgotten power of googly eyes.

These little cuties are a super easy hack for almost literally adding life to any space.

REMINDER: DARE TO DAYDREAM ABOUT DISTANT DIMENSIONS

The worlds we dream of may seem audacious in this reality.

Most of my daydreams teleport me into realities where superpowers exist. And I’m envious of that version of me who gets to live his life with the abilities I crave.

But then I remind myself how there’s a space in this reality for any dream we can come up with.

We can translate our worlds into books, and music, and comics, and art.

We can create games, and virtual realities, and videos.

Anything we imagine can be real ✨

FEATURED WORLD BUILDER: DEMI LOVATO • YouTube Short →

I've never gotten high.

But sometimes I'll vibe so well with a kaleidoscopically psychedelic song that it's what I'd imagine a good trip would be like.

I’m obsessed with the idea that spaces can be designed to manipulate minds. And Demi Lovato's shroom room is a non-drug drug I'd love to try 😵‍💫

GET FEATURED

Want a chance to be featured as world builder of the week?

Connect with me on Twitter @LamarElimbo and tell me about your vision for the world that you’re craving to create. I’m pretty much a space travelling alien at this point, so I’d love to be invited as a guest in your world!

ENJOYED THIS ISSUE?

Research shows that people who click the ❤️ button are 20,000 times less likely to slip on a banana peel in their lifetime. I’d personally recommend being extra cautious 🚧

This is a special one for me.

I’ve been looking for direction lately.

When I started writing, I knew I wanted to focus my content on two things: practical applications for environmental psychology and imaginative ideation. I’d even prepared a list of over 150 topics I was eager to explore.

I was ready to immerse myself in the ocean of my favourite subject and to set sail and explore its seas.

If you read my last piece you’ll know that I’ve built a world in my mind. A world where I was once the ruler of Limbo — Prince of Purgatory — God of the ghosts. And yet, in this reality, I was preparing to adventure on a little raft going nowhere in particular.

My inner demon finally spoke up and challenged me to think grander thoughts. He’s a glutton for world domination, so I knew I had to think bigger than blindly sailing the ocean.

I realized that deep down, I want to be the ocean.

I want to make the waves. I want to have the depth. I want to create the space where others feel immersed in my underwater world.

This epiphany gave me a major jolt of motivation. I found the compass I was looking for — a world to build.

It reminded me just how much power there is in building worlds. It was an obvious sentiment when we were children who could create an entire universe with nothing more than a cardboard box or a homemade fort. And at its core, I think that the empowering feeling that comes from shaping the world around us is what draws me to environmental psychology.

I want to double down on the concept of world building. And I’m officially dedicating this newsletter to empowering future world builders.

Here’s to unleashing yours!

Your fellow architect,

Lamar ✌️👽

DEAR WORLD BUILDERS

Shoutout to all you world builders out there

How cool is it that we share Earth and yet we all live in our own worlds?!

Some designing their realms into books and stories. Others projecting them onto screens and canvases.

Some of us erect elaborate cities in our imagination, while others construct the cities we live in.

All of us working toward the same goals:

To reshape reality into the vision we have in our heads.

To invite others into our worlds.

And to immerse our visitors into our creations.

But how can we make sure our world doesn’t end up uninhabited? What can we do to attract a long lineup of people eager for entry?

The most influential world builders out there (the Walt Disneys, the Hayao Miyazakis, the parents creating a home where their children can thrive) — they all have one thing in common:

They know that the key to designing immersive environments is to understand the subliminal influence of our surroundings.

They know that true immersion means making people feel something, think differently, and leave impacted and reformed.

If you’re a world builder who wants to design spaces like that — spaces that influence the way people think and act, then let’s explore together.

Let’s tour the spaces designed to influence people. Let’s deep dive into the mindsets and strategies of effective world builders. And lets chat about the worlds that you dream of building.

Let’s join worlds and create a universe worth visiting 🪐

FEATURED PLACE: PANOPTICONS

Panopticons: The Prisons Designed to Imprison Prisoners in their Mind

You know how Santa sees you when you’re sleeping and knows when you’re awake. And yet, you never ever get to see him. That’s because he was once a guard in a panopticon prison.

Jail cells lined along a circular perimeter.

Guards posted in a watchtower in the centre of the ring.

A 360 degree vantage point with a clear view into each and every cell.

The interior of the watchtower, however, is veiled. And prisoners are unable to see the guards inside.

The (potentially) watchful eye of a panopticon prison is designed to shackle both the body and the mind. Prisoners know they could be being watched at any given moment, but they can never know when.

Santa likely knew when they were being bad or good, so they were more likely to be consistently good. Not for goodness’ sake. But for the sake of a paranoid sense of internalized authority — the fear of being watched by the disapproving eyes of someone in power.

Jeremy Bentham, the social theorist and philosopher who invented the concept of the panopticon prison believed that power should be visible and unverifiable.

Just like our almighty Santa Claus.

FEATURED THEORY: DESIRE PATHS

Desire Path Trailblazing

You ever notice how much of our movement is governed by invisible forcefields?

Go for a walk and notice all of the magnetic forces pushing you away from things.

Away from the inside of a lawn.

Away from the red light across the street.

Away from the 🐶💩 on the sidewalk.

These forcefields come together to build the walls of our maze. And whether we recognize it or not, most of us are just rats focused on getting to our destination of cheese.

Some of us, however, are a special kind of rat. A rebellious kind of rat. A mole rat.

Forcefields are a mere suggestion to the mole rats. If they know that their cheese is behind a wall, they don’t waste time walking around the wall. They ask, “who the heck put a wall here” and then they burrow right through it.

In the urban planning world, these burrowed holes are known as desire paths.

Desire paths are people’s preferred routes across a city. They’re the physical signs of shortcuts off the beaten path. The long dirt lines of foot traffic through what was once perfectly pristine patches of greenery.

But for every DIYed dirt road there was the first mole rat to step on the grass and blaze the trail of footprints for its fellow rats to follow.

So the question is, are you carving out your own paths or are you content within the walls of the maze? How susceptible are you to the world’s invisible force fields?

P.S. Don’t fret if you are a maze rat. Trailblazers can be aspirational. But jaywalking to get to the cheese faster can be risky business. I just think it’s interesting how our behaviour around forcefields can be a potential indicator of a person’s personality. How risk averse are they? Do they tend to follow the crowd? Are they spontaneous? Are they patient? Some fun assumptions to make during our next people watching session.

RECOMMENDED READ: The Herald Article →

The dawn of transhumanism - conversations with Dr David Eagleman, the scientist creating a world of real superhumans in his laboratory

“Dr David Eagleman is the world’s leading neuroscientist. He’s unlocked how to create new senses for humans – from bat-like echolocation and ‘seeing’ heat to electromagnetism. As his new book shakes up the world of science, he talks to Neil Mackay about how the coming biological revolution will change the nature of humanity forever.”

Dr. David Eagleman is someone who epitomizes the type of world builder I want to become.

He's optimistic and imaginative about the future.

He rejects the apparent limitations that reality has presented us.

And he's actively improving our potential to interact with the world in more immersive and creative ways ✨

RECOMMENDED WEBSITE: Wonders of Street Views →

Wonders of Street Views

Travel the world by flipping through a collection of interesting corners in Google Street View.

Ice caves, Tibetan monasteries, ufo invasions… This website is like a crystal ball into the mini worlds dispersed throughout Earth 🔮

RECOMMENDED DISCUSSION

The comments to this tweet are an absolute goldmine of strategies for anyone interested in designing spaces that spark motivation 💪

RECOMMENDED VIDEO

It's fascinating how much of our world exists between the realms of reality and fantasy.

The way this video showcases how Pixar integrates reality into its animation has got me thinking about where we work to integrate fantasy into the design of our reality.

CHALLENGE WORTH TRYING

Operation Vantage Point

What would a heat map of the movement inside your home look like?

Is there a corner you’ve never stood in?

A wall you've never leaned against?

Every new vantage point offers a shift in perspective and new ways of looking at our problems.

REMINDER: BECOMING A WORLD BUILDER IS YOUR CHOICE

If studying environmental psychology teaches us anything, it’s that the way we interpret reality can be easily influenced by how we design the world around us.

True world builders choose to reject the reality they’ve been given.

They’re the ones reshaping the world into the vision they have in their heads.

Your surroundings are clay. Be their sculptor.

FEATURED WORLD BUILDER: Instagram account →

Anastasia Parmson

“How do you like your art?

I like art that is big and shiny. That catches your eye but also tells a story more profound than meets the eye at first glance.

I like art that is displayed in unexpected, derelict or historic places. In places where you might miss it if you’re not paying attention.

But I also love seeing art within the walls of large contemporary art museums. Inside architecturally impressive buildings, with refined design details and well stocked gallery shops.

I like eclectic art on people’s walls when I go visit. Not art that matches their interior but art collected with love and curiosity.”

What inspires me about Anastasia’s perspective is how art exists within the context of its environment.

She doesn’t simply admire the art within its frame. She admires the walls on which it’s framed.

Perhaps to positively connect with our spaces, we should label more things as art.

GET FEATURED

Want a chance to be featured as world builder of the week?

Connect with me on Twitter @LamarElimbo and tell me about your vision for the world that you’re craving to create. I’m pretty much a space travelling alien at this point, so I’d love to be invited as a guest in your world!

ENJOYED THIS ISSUE?

Research shows that people who click the ❤️ button are 1000% more likely to uncover serendipity within the following 10 minutes. It could be worth the try 😉

Backstory

My love life went downhill the day I met Cupid.

It's not something I talk about much, but it's no coincidence that my name is Lamar Elimbo.

It's an homage to my past life of ruling over Purgatory. In Italian, my name pretty much translates to Lamar is Limbo.

Anyway, one day I bumped into Cupid as he was escorting a couple who had just drowned in a bubble bath together.

I invited him over for tea and we got to talking about all things love and death. I joked about what a pitiful way it was for that couple to die. He disagreed and shared how beautiful he thought it was to die for love.

His response piqued my cynical nature, so I decided to put his romantic idealism to the test… by pulling a bit of an extremely sadistic prank 😅

I switched out a few of his love arrows with real ones.

He was understandably distraught when his first target’s heart ended up bleeding out on a nearby wall. And ever since that day, he’s been avoiding me at all costs.

I didn’t mind the lack of love when I was luxuriating in power in the afterlife. But now that I’m here schlepping it in the mortal plane, I’m single and ready to mingle. I’ve tried over the years to invite love into my life, but it turns out that Cupid is always as busy as he is because finding love without his help is no easy feat.

I was officially tired of being ignored. So I decided that instead of wasting anymore time hunting for love, I would go on a hunt for Cupid. That little wanker had evaded me and left me loveless for decades. But no more! I was committed to tracking his baby butt down, stealing his arrows, and using his love luck on myself.

I had to be smart about my search. Cupid is a sneaky kid who loves to play hide and seek. But there are a few consistent corner’s of the world where love is often found, so I had a good feeling I’d find him in one of those.

The hunt for Cupid’s corners of the world began!

Defining Cupid’s Corners

Cupid’s corners are the places where people tend to have the most luck with fulfilling their heart’s desires. And I’m no expert, but I can think of 7 desires people lust after when it comes to love. People want to:

1. find love,

2. spark love,

3. sustain love,

4. endure love,

5. end love,

6. cope with love loss, and

7. cope with being love-less.

I knew if I played my cards right, I’d find Cupid doling out love in spaces he’d specifically designed to satisfy those desires.

Spaces Designed to Find Love

My first stop: The Third Places.

A term coined by sociologist Ray Oldenburg in the 1980s that refers to places outside of work or home. Where there’s little to no financial barrier to entry. And where conversation is the primary activity.

They’re spaces where Serendipity takes to the stage and where Cupid goes to see her shows.

In my opinion, the most effective third places for finding love are the ones which also have a third thing.

The Third Thing is a poem by Donald Hall that describes a site of joint rapture, where gazes come together in double attention.

Finding third places with third things makes sparking conversations easier. Commenting on the thing that’s already captured their shared attention eases the opening lines of a conversation between future lovers.

So, I went to as many public lectures, art galleries, community clubs, and meetups as I could. But I guess Cupid was smart enough not to be found hiding in the first place I’d look.

Spaces Designed to Spark Love

My second stop: amusement parks.

My general strategy for picking out good date ideas is to figure out whether I want to optimize for talk, touch, or task.

Talk optimized dates, like going ice skating or out to eat, are for when we want to brain bond. Touch optimized dates, like home movies and couple’s yoga, are for when we want to body bond. And task optimized dates, like concerts and game cafes, are for when we want to bio bond (build a bond over shared biographical memories).

Most date ideas are some combination of talk, touch, and task. But Cupid appreciates grandiosity. So I knew he would most likely be found in a date spot that optimized for all three.

There’s something scientifically unique about amusement parks that can benefit hopeful couples. And that’s the misattribution of arousal.

You know how if you're nervous for a presentation you'll have someone suggest that you try to convince yourself that your not nervous, but excited. That's misattribution of arousal. It describes how people can easily mistake the true cause of their arousal because the physiological symptoms between fear, ecstasy, and excitement are so similar. Increased blood pressure, shortness of breath, heart pounding, butterflies in stomach…

I scoured every amusement park out there and I endeavoured the scariest rollercoasters on repeat. But all to no avail. Cupid was nowhere to be found.

Spaces Designed to Sustain Love

Spot number 3: escape rooms.

Building strength into a relationship is a process that requires vulnerability and trust. Trust that our relationship is not just resilient to internal conflict, but anti-fragile to it.

Relationships can fall into one of three categories: fragile, resilient, or anti-fragile. Fragile relationships crumble under stress. Resilient relationships can cope with and bounce back from obstacles. And anti-fragile relationships not only can cope with stress, but they grow and get stronger in the face of adversity.

Anti-fragile couples share a growth mindset. They are the ones who test the strength of their bond outside of their honeymoon phase.

In order to track down Cupid, I needed to find a place where couples could go to build a sustainable bond in spite of obstacles.

Ever since I tried my first escape room, I’ve believed that it would make for a great field experiment for assessing how well suited people are for working together under pressure.

Dr. John Gottam, a clinical relationship psychologist, observed that there were four precursors to a doomed relationship. He deemed them the four horsemen of a relationship apocalypse. They are contempt, stonewalling, criticism, and defensiveness.

Throw a couple in an escape room for an hour and no doubt their true colours will eventually show.

I went. I solved as many clues as I could bear. I looked under every stone and unlocked every door. Yet still Cupid was totally MIA.

Spaces Designed to Endure Love

My fourth destination: The Grand Canyon.

On the other end of wanting to sustain and strengthen a relationship, some couples desire to bounce back from an already existing problem.

I felt pretty confident that I would find Cupid this time. He’s such a sucker for watching love succeed, he’d no doubt be trying to throw a lifeline to a drowning duo. But where would I find an un-obvious place where a couple would go to kintsugi a cracked connection? The Grand Canyon!

The Grand Canyon may seem like a random make up spot, but hear me out.

On one hand, if a couple has truly had enough of each other, then what better place for your partner to totally accidentally slip to their demise into a deadly ditch. But even more notable to Cupid, would be its awe-inspiring nature.

Awe has been shown to have self-minimizing effects, guiding us to shift our perspective away from ourselves and onto the grandiosity of the world. It’s even been shown to motivate prosocial behaviour. When we’re immersed within wonder, it becomes clearer to us how small our problems actually are.

So I trekked over to the rocky monument, singing “baby, there ain't no mountain high enough, ain't no valley low enough, ain't no river wide enough to keep me from getting to you”. But I still couldn’t find him anywhere.

Spaces Designed to End Love

My fifth destination: malls.

When couples desire their relationship to end, and they don’t want to take the Canyon killing route, they look to find a better venue to break the news of their breakup.

Nothing pains Cupid more than witnessing the end of a relationship. So I didn’t hold my breath for finding him hanging out in breakup spots, but I figured it was worth a try.

Research into memory suggests that we remember things that are novel. In Cupid’s best case scenario, a breakup would be swift, painless, and forgettable. The generally minimalist design of malls lacks novel anchors for our memory to latch onto.

So I visited every mall in existence and, no surprise, I still couldn’t find him.

Spaces Designed to Cope with Love Loss

Location number 6: planes, trains, and automobiles.

Something I know all too well from my time ruling over Limbo is the profound sadness that couples experience following the loss of love.

The desire to end that pain runs deep. But something I noticed from escorting the souls of the recently departed to their final destination was the healing ability of that little bit of travel.

You know how people say things like: “I feel like I’m still in my 20s” and “I can remember high school like it was just yesterday.” The most accepted theory on why some people feel this way is because they create less unique memories in adulthood compared to their childhood.

So when it comes to using our surroundings as a tool to distance ourselves from the past, it makes sense that we should immerse ourselves in as many new memories as possible.

Travelling to new places has been suggested as a solid way to process grief. Each new experience on a trip causes our minds to perceive that more time has elapsed since the cause of our sadness.

Yet, even on every train, plane, and automobile Cupid was nowhere in sight.

Spaces Designed to Cope with Being Love Less

With only one love desire left, my search was getting desperate. If I didn’t find Cupid in a place where people go to cope with being love-less, then I’d be at a total loss.

My final stop: rainy windows.

You’ve seen the trope. A person lost in thought. Staring out of a window on a rainy day. There’s actually a neurological reason why this scenario is so popular.

There’s a part of our brain that activates when we’re looking at beautiful things. The default mode network. These are the regions of the brain that work together when we are in a resting state of self-reflection, remembering, and daydreaming.

And daydreaming about a hopeful future filled with love is one of the best strategies to maintain motivation on the search for it.

So I tuned into all of the weather networks and tracked down every lonely person in every rainy city. This was my last chance to find him. And luck was finally on my side!

He was whispering affirmations in the ear of a reclusive radiologist. I took my chance while his back was turned. I crept as quietly as I could toward his collection of arrows. But my stealth skills have degraded since I was king of the ghosts. And he sensed my presence.

Before I knew it, he was bolting.

Conclusion

I tried to catch up with him, but his wings were giving him a healthy boost. I couldn’t let him get away, so I shouted “I’m sorry”. He stopped for a moment to look at me.

I told him I was sorry for making him kill that guy. He called me a liar. But, before he could turn to flee again I professed “I found him a match”. He paused full stop.

I explained how I felt badly for my prank. So I searched high and low through purgatory for a suitable playmate for the man who was shot. I noted how they’d been together for nearly a century and how happy they were together.

I asked Cupid if he could forgive me. He admitted that he was impressed at my attempt at compassion and said that love is nothing without forgiveness.

I asked him if he could shoot me with one of his arrows. He instead proposed a game of Russian Roulette. He offered to mix a single love arrow among 4 regular ones and then take his shot with whichever one he’d first pick at random. I politely declined.

He did say that he’d see me again soon, so I’m holding out hope.

I hope you’re holding onto hope in your life too.

Sending love your way,

Lamar Elimbo ✌️😁

In my last post we chatted about what the mind’s eye is and how it might differ from person to person. And we explored 6 mental imagery superpowers that we all possess to different degrees.

There was conjuring: the ability to generate accurate mental images.

Transmutation: the ability to manipulate traits.

Orientation: the ability to manipulate space.

Astral projection: the ability to detach our mind from our body.

Playback: the ability to reproduce and manipulate mental recordings.

And double vision: the ability to use our mind’s eye and our body’s eyes at the same time.

Games

These 6 abilities enable us to bend our reality. And because each of our brains have their own unique wiring, we can each use these powers to varying degrees. Some of us, in extraordinary and uncommon ways.

So let’s put our mind’s eye to the test!

I’ve always considered myself to be a dedicated daydreamer. My imagination has always been my favourite playground. So I thought it would be fun to compile a list of my 13 favourite mind’s eye games that I’ve played with over the years.

Let’s get started!

Game 1: DALL·E | Conjuring

Daydreaming tends to be a solitary activity, but for this first game I’ve got a friend for us to play with. Meet DALL·E, an artificial intelligence that can create realistic images and art from any description given to it.

The goal of this game is to test our conjuring abilities.

On DALL·E’s Instagram account, you’ll find a bunch of fun and challenging prompts to inspire your imagination.

Ever wondered what the portrait of a blue alien singing opera, might look like? Because this is what DALL·E was able to visualize.

How about a 3D rendering of a bouldering wall made of Swiss cheese?

Or a pig in sunglasses wearing an Aloha shirt blowing in the wind while driving a motorcycle through the desert?

With over 300 posts and prompts to date, you’ll be sure to find some fun ideas to try to conjure up in your imagination.

Game 2: Augmented Reality Tooning | Transmutation + Double Vision

I once had a theory that I could get better at recalling details of scenes if I drew them up as cartoons in my head. The way I figured it, the act of cartoonizing something forces us to pay attention to the important details.

The goal of this game is to practice our transmutation and double vision abilities. And it’s pretty simple. Just look around you and try to imagine things and people as cartoon versions of themselves.

Game 3: Invisibility Cloak | Transmutation + Double Vision

This game, for me, is a level harder than the last one.

Its goal is also to train our transmutation and double vision skills. But unlike the last one, where we were editing things in our environment, this time we’re editing things out of our environment. So this time, look around and try turning things invisible.

Game 4: Dissection | Conjuring + Orientation

Like every engineering savant on tv, this game is going to have you targeting your conjuring and orientation powers. All you’ve gotta do is visualize breaking objects down into their individual components.

Game 5: Honey, I Shrunk Myself | Astral Projection

Astral projection is probably my favourite power to play with. In this game our job is to pick a spot in our environment, imagine that we’ve shrunk down into the size of an ant, and enjoy the view.

Game 6: Mirror, Mirror | Astral Projection

You know that game in acting classes, where you pair up with a partner and mirror each others movements? In this game you’re your own partner.

Imagine yourself looking at your reflection in a mirror, now teleport your perspective to your reflection and look at yourself through your reflection’s eyes.

Game 7: Distant Directions | Astral Projection

This game might be particularly challenging for those of us who are a little bit more directionally challenged than the rest.

The goal: try to figure out what you would be looking at in another location if you were facing the same direction. So if for example you’re looking perfectly north-east right now, imagine what would you be looking at if you were pointed exactly north-east in your parent’s place.

Game 8: Art inner-teleportation | Astral Projection

Totally inspired by Blue’s Clues, this is one of my favourite meditative games for playing with astral projection.

The goal is simple. Find a scenic picture you like and imagine teleporting into it.

Game 9: Memory Palace | Astral Projection + Conjuring

In my last post, I mentioned the method of loci strategy that memory athletes use to store information. The memory palace is another name for it and I had to include it, because it’s such a powerful tool. And the foundation of it is simple, imagine walking around a place you’re familiar with and take note of the items and features of that environment.

Game 10: Spy Cam | Astral Projection + Playback

Be careful with this one if you haven’t had a productive day, because it might serve as a bit of a rude awakening. Imagine you’ve got a surveillance cam that’s been watching over you for the past day. Now imagine clicking rewind to when you got out of bed this morning and now click play. Increase its playback speed to 2x and watch your day unfold from a bird’s eye view in double the speed.

Game 11: Rerun | Playback

You remember that fantastic pivot scene from Friends? If yes, then great! You just played Rerun! All you’ve gotta do is watch reruns of scenes from your favourite shows and movies in your head.

Game 12: Order of Operations | Astral Projection + Playback

This one is probably the most practical of all the games I have. I use this exercise anytime I have a list of todos and want to figure out the most efficient order to carry them out. I essentially use astral projection to conjure up a clone of myself. Then I’d imagine him going through the tasks in different orders until I find one that I think works the best.

Game 13: TV/Movie inner-teleportation (World Building) | Conjuring + Astral Projection + Playback

Finally, my favourite game of them all! TV and movie inner teleportation.

For this daydreamy challenge you’re going to need to rely on all of the powers that we’ve been using. Pick your favourite show and movie and inject yourself into it as a new character. This game is daydreaming at its finest and essentially has you creating and visualizing your own scenes and storylines in your head.

There you have it! 13 games to test your mind’s eye powers. Which ones did you find easiest? And more importantly, did any of them manage to give you insight on which powers and power combinations you thrive at?

Practical Applications

Simulation Theory of Cognition

Everything we can imagine is real.

Have you ever heard of the simulation theory of cognition? It’s a neat concept you’ve surely experienced first-hand.

It proposes that when we imagine doing something, the sensory and motor areas in our brain activate in the same way as if we were actually doing that thing.

So these mind games might serve as more than a way to test and play with our powers. Perhaps they can also serve as a tool.

Tool for Comfort

A tool for comfort, for example.

Just imagine giving your parent a hug and the benefits should be immediate. Your brain is hugging your virtual parent, who is in turn virtually hugging you back.

Tool for Dream Productivity

Perhaps, a tool for dream productivity.

Some people with aphantasia are able to have vivid dreams. So, there might be a distinction between the mind’s eye we use for intentional imagination versus subconscious imagination.

And since imagination can activate our motor cortex, maybe harnessing our mind’s eye powers in combination with lucid dreaming could allow us to practice and improve at activities while we’re sleeping.

Final Foods for Thought

Researching the mind’s eye for these last couple posts has sparked a bunch of interesting thoughts. So I’m going to finish off with a bit of a rapid fire of 10 of the top lingering thoughts that this topic inspired.

1 | Personalized Education Advocation

The more we learn about individual differences in how our brains work, I wonder how we can do more to take a personalized approach to education?

One where the emphasis is placed less on adapting our minds to the content and more on adapting the content to our individual minds.

“This semester you’re all going to read these 5 books. And, even though half of you aren’t going to resonate with them at all, you’re all going to leave this course with the knowledge that you can find its summary somewhere online.” → “This semester you’re all going to figure out your favourite literary genres and you'll work toward better understanding why they resonate with your individual tastes the most”.

2 | Reading Differences

I also wonder how our place on the mind’s eye spectrum influences the way we read.

Do people higher on the scale read at a slower pace because they spend more time conjuring visualizations of the scenes?

Do those mental visualizations increase enjoyment?

How does having a mind’s eye affect the genres that we gravitate to?

I, for example, sometimes have a hard time reading scifi, because I struggle to picture the futuristic settings. I do however enjoy reading horror stories. Perhaps because oftentimes a descriptive setting is integral to the ambiance and plot itself.

3 | Nature vs Nurture

In this post, I played with the idea that the mind’s eye can be a skill we can improve. It's got me questioning whether there’s a nature vs nurture angle to be explored.

Perhaps, it’s like language, where for a lot of people, it would be most easily learned in childhood?

Does playing with mental imagery as a child increase how much we use it as an adult?

Perhaps, kids who read more were forced to develop their own mental images? Or, perhaps kids who watched a lot of tv, spent time revisiting episodes in their mind and thus exercising their mind’s eye?

4 | Inducing Visualisations

For those who don’t experience much mental imagery, what are the ways it can be simulated or stimulated for them. There are reports of aphants being able to experience a mind’s eye using psilocybin therapy, for example.

5 | Ethics from an Aphant’s Perspective

If I were to put myself in the mind of an aphant, I’d question the ethics of imagery.

If there are people who can relive and re-view images in their mind, is it ethical to show people disturbing images. Wouldn’t we be embedding a new memory into their minds which might continue to haunt them afterward?

This argument could become particularly relevant for showing graphic evidence to juries or presenting graphic documentaries to unsuspecting watchers.

6 | Mind’s Eye through Time

I wonder how our mind’s eye has changed through time. Especially now that we have so much vivid media. Has the creativity of our imaginations been augmented with visual media?

7 | Escapism

For those with an active mind’s eye, I wonder if they adapt to boredom more easily.

I see people quiver at the thought of being locked away in an empty room on their own for hours or days, and I think I’d probably just see it as a good excuse to replay movies or episodes of shows in my head.

8 | Aphantasia as a Super Power

I wonder about the advantages that might come with aphantasia.

I’d imagine, for example, that aphants would be less susceptible to false memories. There’ve been many times in my life, for example, where I wasn’t sure if I was remembering a scene from my own life or from the life of a character I saw on tv.

I could also imagine that people with vivid mind’s eyes could be more susceptible to something like post traumatic stress disorder, since they’d have the ability to relive the visuals of their memories.

9 | Language Interpretation

I wonder if aphants might be quicker to default to interpreting something as a metaphor.

I’ve read aphants detail the first time they heard people suggest they count sheep to help them fall asleep. They assumed it was some sort of metaphor.

The fact that communication doesn’t guarantee shared understanding, makes me wonder what I interpret as figurative, which is actually meant literally, or vice versa.

For example, when the villain in a show says to their opponent, “I can smell the fear on you”, is that real? Are there synesthetes who interpret emotions through their sense of smell?

10 | Other Mind Senses

While exploring this topic, I was introduced to concepts of tactile imagery, the mind’s ear, and other ways people experience sensation within their minds.

How much more interesting can this conversation get if we consider our minds’ version of the other senses that exist (like temperature, comfort, movement, taste, etc).

So what do you think? Does this conversation about the mind’s eye spark any interesting thoughts for you? What was your favourite takeaway from all of this?

For me, I’d say my favourite takeaway is how all of our inner worlds are so unique and varied. And that even if the mind’s eye isn’t your forte, there are so many other powers and perspectives and abilities that only your mind is uniquely capable of taking advantage of.

So keep your mind’s eye open and on the lookout for the things that make your mind special.

Because, your mind really is special.

Peace,

Lamar

Hey super humans!

How vast and vivid is your inner world? Because if you have a mind’s eye, then this post might let you in on some unique abilities you didn’t even know you had.

Differences in our ability to visualize images in our mind have been known for a while, but it was only in 2015, when the word aphantasia made its way into existence and went mainstream. Dividing the world into those with a mind’s eye, who have the ability to think in images and those with a mind’s eye patch, who’s imaginations become dark once their eyes are closed.

For centuries we lived in blissful ignorance of each other’s realities. But now that our differences have been exposed, a lot of us have a growing curiosity about what everyone else’s minds are capable of. And some of us are even starting to wonder, “what is it that my mind is uniquely capable of?”

Defining Mind’s Eye

Mind’s Eye Scale

Assuming that the mind’s eye isn’t binary, where you either have it or you don’t, then there’s likely a spectrum of mind’s eye ability, where some people’s are stronger than others. Any idea where you’d land on the scale?

Based on surveys today, there are an estimated 0.7% of people who would be classified as aphants — the ones whose mind’s eyes are completely blind. Then as you move down the spectrum you have people who’s mental visualizations become more and more powerful. Until we finally hit the other end, where there’s an estimated 2.6% of people who’s mind’s eyes are so powerful that they would be classified as having hyperphantasia.

Mind’s Eye Definition Difficulty

So what exactly is a mind’s eye? It may seem like an obvious question to those of us who can visualize easily, but I’d imagine that people with blurrier visualizations might start to question “am I really experiencing the same mind’s eye that everyone else is talking about?” Because, barring any of you mind reading mutants out there, no one can know exactly what goes on inside of another person’s imagination. We can’t know for certain that my experience with my mind’s eye is the exact same as yours. But, while we can’t know another person’s experience, we can, through conversation, discover how it differs from our own.

It’s my understanding that many people with a mind’s eye patch are still able to experience vivid dreams. So, generally speaking, if we were to try to explain the experience of a mind’s eye in a way for most people to understand, maybe we could describe it as a lucid daydream.

Mind’s Eye Features

But if we were to dig a little deeper, the 4 features which help to clarify its meaning for me are that:

1. it is not rationalization,

2. it is not memory,

3. it is an emotional amplifier,

4. and, most importantly, its power extends far beyond a single spectrum of image clarity.

Rationalization vs Instinct

Can you solve this spatial orientation puzzle?

How’d you do it? If you’re like me, then you probably used your mind’s eye to actively visualize the object rotating. And to my surprise, as someone who relies on his mind’s eye a lot, there are aphants who can totally thrive at puzzles like this and other mental-based spatial tasks. They simply use other methods to conceptualize and rationalize their way to a solution.

It seems to me that depending on where you land on the scale, there is a balance between instinct and rationalization. Learning that helped me realize the struggle that some people on the mind’s eye patch side of the scale might experience when trying to figure out if they have a minds eye. “I can kinda see something, but maybe I’m actually just rationalizing and deceiving myself into believing that I’m seeing something.”

Other Senses Example

Perhaps you can relate to that confusion if you consider the other mind senses that exist. In my case, I feel like I have a really vivid mind’s eye and mind’s ear, but if you were to ask me to imagine the taste or the smell of popcorn for example, my natural instinct is to picture myself holding a bag of it and taking a whiff. The smell feels almost accessible, but also just out of reach. I can rationalize that it’s buttery and salty, but because those mind senses are nowhere as close to as potent as my mind’s eye or ear, I can tell that I’m relying on a rational process to fill in the blanks. I think that attempting to distinguish between these two processes could be a helpful way to figure out where we as individuals might land on these different mind sensory scales.

Memory vs Mind’s Eye

If you’re trying to figure out where you might land on the scale, I think that another important consideration would be to recognize that memory and the mind’s eye are two separate abilities. There is evidence that these two processes are connected (people with stronger mind’s eyes have been shown to have an easier time with episodic memory and recalling events from their life, for example). But while these processes go hand-in-hand, they are not one in the same.

Box of Objects Example

If I was to ask you to take a look at a box of objects, close your eyes, and then describe to me each of the items. You might have a hard time coming up with a clear picture and start to question the capability of your mind’s eye. But if I was to instead ask you to close your eyes, imagine a random box with a few items in it, and then describe that to me. You might not struggle as much. Our memory is only as good as how much attention we pay. So if you struggle to conjure up a detailed mental image of a saxophone, then perhaps that is more evident of the fact that you never paid much attention to saxophones, rather than the strength of your mind’s eye.

Mental Imagery Types

I think it’s also important to acknowledge that not all mental imagery comes equally to all of us. Some people, for example, claim to be able to conjure words more easily than images. In my case, I’m not sure why, but I have a hard time imagining the faces and voices of people close to me. But if you were to ask me to visualize the face of any actor I’ve seen in a tv show, I’d have no problem.

Emotional Amplification

Studies suggest that the mind’s eye can act as an emotional amplifier, so perhaps another way to assess the strength of our mind’s eye could be to question how visual imagery in books and writings affects us.

I remember the time that I was reading Gerald’s Game by Stephen King. I was sitting alone on a bus coming home from university; nose deep in my book. The plot was getting intense and I was gripping the pages roughly in eager anticipation. That was until my body went limp. I felt the blood drain from my extremities and rush to my head. My hands could no longer form a fist and my book fell to my lap. And why? Because the story did too well of a job painting the picture of a gory scene in my mind and seeing all of its bloody details made me feel faint. To me, that feels like an experience that I couldn’t have had without mental imagery, but I do wonder if it would be possible for someone to rationalize their way to a similar state.

Mind’s Eye Powers

Finally, I would argue that our mind’s eye is much more than a single spectrum of clarity. That clarity is just one of several powers that we all have to different degrees. And that you or I might even be hyperphants — people with superior control of one of these other spectrums. So which of the following powers that I’m about to describe are you a natural at?

Based on what I’ve been able to devise from my own mind’s eye abilities, I’d say we have 6 core mental imagery powers: conjuring, transmutation, orientation, astral projection, playback, and double vision.

Conjuring | Image Generation

Conjuring is the ability to generate images in our mind with accuracy. It’s what I’d imagine most people think of when they hear mind’s eye. What happens if I ask you to close your eyes and imagine this green balloon floating in front of you?

Can you see it? People with powerful conjuring abilities would probably describe their imaginations as vivid and would have little to no problem replicating that green balloon in their minds.

And, based off of self-reported limitations that I’ve heard people describe about their own experiences, perhaps there’s an element of duration that can be included in this power, where the ability to maintain that image for as long as we want is an offshoot of this power that we all have to varying degrees.

Transmutation | Trait Manipulation

Transmutation is the ability to manipulate traits. I like to think of it as the augmented reality of a mind’s eye, where we have the ability to look at the world through a lens or a filter of our choosing. For example, people with powerful transmutation abilities probably wouldn’t have much of a problem taking that green balloon and imagining it red.

Orientation | Space manipulation

Orientation is the ability to manipulate space. It’s the telekinesis of our mind’s eye that allows us to move objects within our imagination. People with powerful orientation powers would be great at spatial orientation puzzles like these:

They also likely wouldn’t have any difficulty shifting their perspective upward while imagining that red balloon floating into the air above them.

Astral Projection | Mind-Body Detachment

Astral projection is the ability to detach our mind from our body. It’s kinda like being able to teleport our perspective. If I were to ask you to imagine yourself inside of that red balloon, could you do it? Powerful astral projection skills would allow a person to imagine seeing the world from any vantage point.

Playback | Recording Reproduction

Playback is the ability to reproduce and manipulate mental recordings. It serves as the video controller of our imagination. People with powerful playback abilities can push play on their imagination and create active scenes. They likely have an easy time replaying memories from their past and might even be able to rerun their favourite scenes from movies and shows.

Double Vision | Eyes Open

And finally, double vision is the ability to use our mind’s eye while our body’s eyes are open. Along with conjuring, It would be the active power if I were to ask you to imagine the room you’re sitting in filled with balloons.

Conclusion

On their own, each of these 6 abilities enable us to bend reality to our will. And a lot of clever people have learned to harness and even combine these powers in order to perform impressive feats.

Can you conjure up an image of the home you grew up in as a kid? Can you astral project yourself into your old bedroom and walk to your bathroom? If you can, then you might have what it takes to become a memory champion.

Memory athletes often use astral projection alongside conjuring in order to perform the method of loci — a strategy used to teleport their perspective into an imagined recreation of a place from their past. A place that they can use to store and organize information, that would otherwise have been floating around inaccessibly in the abyss of their mind space.

The top memory athletes in the world have been able to recall the order of over 2000 shuffled playing cards. And most, if not all of them, were able to accomplish that by training these 6 powers in order to enhance their mind’s eye. And with a little bit of creative thinking, maybe we can train and hone our powers as well.

So what do you think? Do you agree with my superpowers? Which powers do you have that I didn’t consider. In my next post I’m going to put our visual imaginations to the test with 13 games that’ll test the limits of our mind’s eye.

P.S.

The answer to Puzzle 1 is B.

And the answers to the bottom row of Puzzle 2 are C, D, B, A.

Hey fellow demons,

As much as I delight in the joy brought on by polkadots and rainbows, what really makes me feel giddy is the seductive moan of a mummy struggling to climb out of his coffin. Oh and the spine-tingling allure of an eerie haunted mansion. And of course the blood curdling screams of hopeless victims in horror movies 😌

Recently I read Joyful: The Surprising Power of Ordinary Things to Create Extraordinary Happiness by Ingrid Fetell Lee.

It was a refreshing reminder about how aesthetics have the ability to not just please the eye, but impact the body and mind — how immersion in joyful spaces can augment our health, memory, goodwill toward others, and so much more.

Through a cheery pair of rose-tinted glasses, the author explored 10 types of joy-inducing aesthetics. But still coming off of my Halloween high in mid-January, I wonder how people with macabre tastes might enjoy the same benefits of joy aesthetics. Are the perks of joyful places limited to perky people who prefer pink? Or, can we demons reap the same rewards by finding the joy in darkness?

What would dark joy aesthetics look like, and how can we integrate them into our spaces and lives?

Scope of This Post

Question

What would dark joy aesthetics look like, and how might people with macabre tastes benefit from them?

Defining joy

“Broadly speaking, when psychologists use the word ‘joy,’ they mean an intense, momentary experience of positive emotion, one that can be recognized by certain telltale signs: smiling, laughing, and a feeling of wanting to jump up and down. While contentment is curled up on the sofa, and bliss is lost in tranquil meditation, joy is skipping, jiving, twirling, giggling. It is a uniquely exuberant emotion, a high-energy form of happiness.” 🔗 / Joyful /

Defining “dark joy aesthetics”

Joyful spaces are environments that elicit an intense, momentary experience of positive emotion by taking advantage of at least one of the joy inducing aesthetics explored in the book.

Dark joy aesthetics are the angsty siblings. They still provide all the feelings of joy, but they are more likely to appeal to the Addams Family than the Brady Bunch.

Types of joy inducing aesthetics explored in the book:

• Energy: the joy we find in elements that are vibrant and that make spaces feel alive.

• Abundance: the joy we find in quantity and variety of sensory stimulation.

• Freedom: the joy we find in open or natural spaces.

• Harmony: the joy we find in balance and rhythm.

• Play: the joy we find in elements that motivate our inner child.

• Surprise: the joy we find in novelty.

• Transcendence: the joy we find in experiences of lightness and elevation.

• Magic: the joy we find in elements that inspire our sense of wonder.

• Celebration: the joy we find in communal delight.

• Renewal: the joy we find in anticipation and cyclical impermanence.

Defining “macabre tastes”

In works of art, the adjective macabre means having the quality of a grim or ghastly atmosphere.

Defining “benefit”

Improvements to our health, mental health, and wellbeing.

1. The Energy Aesthetic

Definition

Author’s Definition

“Joy is high-energy happiness, and the energy aesthetic is the visual manifestation of this energy in our lives: bright colour and warm, sunny light. As the German painter Johannes Itten once said, “Color is life; for a world without colours appears to us as dead.” Pops of colour and light can be like caffeine for the eyes. Turn to this aesthetic when you want to revitalize dull spaces and energize the people in them.” 🔗 / Joyful /

Macabre Modification

In a world rife with life, we can take advantage of the dark side of the energy aesthetic by appreciating the vibrancy in death. With a little necromancy we can revive a lifeless location by inviting dead elements inside. Vampires, welcome!

Designing for Dark Energy

Reminders of Mortality

The energy aesthetic breathes life into spaces. And death is just another part of life. Momento mori are symbolic reminders of the inevitability of death. Oftentimes, these come in the form of skull visuals. Reminders of death may seem morbid and dark to most, but to others, they serve as fuel for life. Incorporating symbols of the reaper motivate us to enjoy life while we have it.

Dried Plants

Greenery can give our spaces a generous burst of energy. But, like the Devil himself, they love a contract. If we don’t agree to feed them water, sun, soil, and the occasional fresh pot, then our contract contingencies kick in. They suck the energy from our spaces as payment for our broken contract. They wilt and brown and litter their leaves. They become an eye sore and a constant reminder of how we’ve failed them. Dried plants, however, have no such contract. They can offer us the same natural vibrancy without any threat of retribution for neglect.

Benefits of Incorporating Energy into Spaces

Edi Rama (Then mayor of Tirana, now prime minister of Albania)

“An artist by training, Rama sketched the first designs himself, choosing vibrant hues and gaudy patterns that disrupted the bleakness of the urban landscape. The orange building was joined by others as Rama’s project quickly spread throughout the city, enveloping public and private buildings alike. At first, the reactions were mixed: some citizens were horrified, others curious, a few delighted. But soon after, strange things began to happen. People stopped littering in the streets. They started to pay their taxes. Shopkeepers removed the metal grates from their windows. They claimed the streets felt safer, even though there were no more police than before. People began to gather in cafés again and talk of raising their children in a new kind of city. Nothing had changed, except on the surface. A few patches of red and yellow, turquoise and violet. And yet everything had changed. The city was alive, ebullient. Joyful.” 🔗 / Joyful /

Publicolor

Publicolor’s Paint Club is an after school youth development program, where students get to breathe life into their schools by painting its spaces fun vibrant colours. After Publicolor interventions, schools notice a near complete disappearance in graffiti and an improvement in student attendance. Both students and teachers consistently report that they feel safer in their schools after these colourful upgrades.

2. The Abundance Aesthetic

Definition

Author’s Definition

“The aesthetic of abundance is the ‘kid in a candy store’ feeling, and it stems from the joy we find in quantity and variety. But abundance doesn’t necessarily have to mean material abundance and the accumulation of stuff. Just as powerful is sensorial abundance, achieved through repeating patterns like polka dots and stripes, the layering of textures, and the use of multicolor palettes. Using these aesthetics can help create a space that reveals the truth of Mae West’s famous maxim: ‘Too much of a good thing can be wonderful.’” 🔗 / Joyful /

Macabre Modification

Our eyes are often inundated with sensory stimulation. The dark side of the abundance aesthetic saves us from vision fatigue by looking to where we can find abundance in darkness.

Designing for Dark Abundance

Turn off the Lights

For some, a capacity for the sensorial abundance of one sense can be heightened by depriving input to another. For example, there are restaurants around the globe that aim to give customers a better understanding of what it’s like to be blind.

“It’s a sensual dining experience like no other!” states O.NOIR founder and former owner Moe Alameddine, “[w]hen you eat food in the dark, your remaining senses are heightened to savour the smell and taste of food. Even everyday dishes like potatoes and yogurt take on a culinary flare.” 🔗 / O.NOIR /

With wait staffs often consisting of visually impaired people, these restaurants provide a dining atmosphere completely immersed in the darkness, giving us the opportunity to switch our enjoyment from visual abundance to gustatory abundance.

Turn off the Input

Depriving a single sense has the ability to bolster the capacity for joy of another. But where does this capacity for joy go when all senses are being deprived? Sensory deprivation tanks are odourless, quiet tubs immersed in darkness & filled with water fully saturated with enough salt that it becomes impossible to sink. Some people who meditate in these tanks report experiencing hallucinations. It seems like sensory deprivation might, under some circumstances, unlock a more abundant sensory world separate from physical sensation.

Benefits of Incorporating Abundance into Spaces

Mice

Studies of mice show that mice who spend more time in sensorially enriched environments perform far better on tests of learning and memory, compared to their peers who were raised in sterile environments or ordinary cages.

Snoezelen Therapy

"A therapy called Snoezelen is used to treat developmental disabilities, brain injury, and dementia. Snoezelen, a portmanteau of two charmingly onomatopoeic Dutch words, snuffelen (to sniff) and doezelen (to doze), is a practice of creating multisensory environments and letting patients gravitate to sensations that feel good to them. Snoezelen rooms look a little bit like psychedelic lounges from the 1970s, complete with cushy furniture, swirly holograms, moving light displays, and colorful bubbling tubes of water that resemble Lava lamps. Many include aromas, like orange or strawberry, and music as well. Trippy as they seem, the intensely pleasurable sensations they offer can have a real influence on mood and behavior, without the side effects that come with medication. Caregivers report that the sensations bring dementia patients out of a withdrawn state. Their eyes snap open; they reach for things; they laugh. Research on Snoezelen therapy is still in its early stages, but studies show that adding sessions of Snoezelen therapy to standard psychiatric care reduces apathy and agitation among elderly dementia patients, and it alters neurological activity of brain-injured patients in ways similar to meditation. In Canada, some long-term-care facilities have found Snoezelen helpful in reducing their need to control problem behaviours with antipsychotic drugs.” 🔗 / Joyful /

3. The Freedom Aesthetic

Definition

Author’s Definition

“Some of the most joyful moments in life are the ones in which we gain a kind of freedom. Think of the ecstatic opening of the school doors on the last day before summer break or the buzz in the office when the clock strikes five on a Friday. Joy thrives on the alleviation of constraints. The delicious stretch you feel in your legs on stepping out of the car at a rest stop after many hours of driving is a joyful freedom. So is sleeping under the stars, riding in a convertible, and skinny-dipping, feeling cool water against bare skin.” 🔗 / Joyful /

Macabre Modification

Risk is the dark sibling to freedom. It comes with all of the joyful exhilaration, plus an adrenaline rush of uncertain trust.

Designing for Dark Freedom

Dark Naturalism

There’s a sort of freedom that comes from being immersed in such darkness that you can’t see in front of you. It’s an almost expansive dread that normal people might experience in deep oceans, outer space, and blindingly thick mist. But for some, the freedom of falling or navigating through a potentially infinite dark space is a frightfully joyful prospect.

Bondage

In some circumstances, there’s nothing that feels more joyfully liberating than being tied down. For some, this joy aesthetic is expressed in their bedroom (or dungeon). But for most others, this is the type of joy we feel on rollercoasters or rock climbing. In either case, once the harness comes on we know we’re in for a wild ride.

Benefits of Incorporating Freedom into Spaces

Violence

Frances Kuo and William Sullivan, the founders of the Landscape and Human Health Lab at the University of Illinois, have found significant correlations between a lack of green space and violence among residents in large housing projects in Chicago. In a notable study, they examined police crime reports for ninety-eight buildings in the Ida B. Wells housing project, finding that buildings with more surrounding vegetation had 50 percent fewer crimes than those with minimal greenery. 🔗 / Joyful /

Prisons

A similar effect has been seen in prisons. Inmates have been shown to display fewer aggressive traits after watching nature videos.

4. The Harmony Aesthetic

Definition

Author’s Definition

“Underneath the joy we find in a well-organized closet or a perfectly symmetrical seashell lie powerful principles of balance and rhythm, which together create a feeling of joyful harmony. The symmetrical shapes and geometric patterns of the harmony aesthetic combat a sense of disorder or chaos in the outer world, and enables the smooth flow of daily life, both physically and mentally.” 🔗 / Joyful /

Macabre Modification

Chaos is in the eye of the beholder. What looks like pandemonium to one, is a harmonious arrangement of elements into a cohesive whole to another. The dark side of the harmony aesthetic is ordered chaos.

Designing for Dark Harmony

Chain Reactions

The practice of appreciating and building complex systems is a joyful art form for many. Watchmakers, Rube Goldberg machine builders, and domino effect initiators experience the harmony aesthetic by introducing as much chaos into their systems as possible. And it all comes together in a joyfully harmonious way.

Kintsugi

A harmonious system works seamlessly. But, one crack in that system can disrupt what was once a well-balanced rhythm. The dark side of the harmony aesthetic takes advantage of the disruption and highlights the cracks in a joyful way. Kintsugi is the Japanese art of repairing shattered pottery by gluing the pieces back together with gold lacquer.

Benefits of Incorporating Harmony into Spaces

Crime Reduction

Broken windows theory asserts that the presence of disorderly signals, like graffiti and litter, increase the likelihood of more serious crimes. The harmony aesthetic adds order to the disorder.

Ethical Behaviour

Researchers at the University of Chicago showed 200 people pictures of disordered spaces — ones with asymmetrical and uneven lines. Another group were shown images of orderly environments. Each group had taken a math test upon arriving at the lab. After looking through the photos, they were asked to grade themselves on their previous test, using the honour system. Those who had been exposed to the disorderly environments were more likely to cheat, and to cheat by bigger amounts, than those who had viewed the more harmonious scenes.

5. The Play Aesthetic

Definition

Author’s Definition

“We all have an innate drive to play, and this impulse is one of our most natural and effortless sources of joy.” 🔗 / Joyful /

Macabre Modification

Our inner child has a dark side. They’re impulsive, morbidly curious, and unrestricted by our well-developed code of ethics. The dark side of the play aesthetic is one that allows our inner brat to delight in their selfish desires.

Designing for Dark Play

Dark Fanfare

Dark fanfare is the joy found in subverting the good-spirited energy of circuses and carnivals by dramatizing their creepier interpretations. It’s a distorted fun house mirror of the cheerful festivities that we’re used to. And it’s a great way for the dark side of our inner child to indulge in morbid curiosity.

Aggressive Games

Our inner child is driven by id. It’s innate desire is impulsive, aggressive, and savage. The dark side of the play aesthetic can be found in the aggressive games we’ve grown to enjoy. What once took the form of us cheering on the spectacle of gladiators fighting to death in the dome, has now evolved into our lust for boxing, fighting, shooting games, paintball, laser tag, and wrestling.

Benefits of Incorporating Play into Spaces

School Safety

Curved lines are a frequent characteristic in the play aesthetic (balls, skating rinks, hula hoops…).

New Haven–based architecture firm Svigals + Partners took to redesigning The Sandy Hook Elementary School after a devastating shooting in 2012. With security at the forefront of everyone’s mind, the updated playful architecture is curved, increasing the natural surveillance of the school. In addition to benefiting the physical safety of the school, the soft, playful, and welcoming updates benefited the psychological sense of safety as well.

Trace Drawing

“In a series of studies, people were asked to trace a drawing either with swooping lines that forced their arms to move in fluid curves or angular lines that produced herky-jerky movements. Then they were given a creative task. Participants who moved fluidly were able to generate more ideas for uses of a newspaper, and the ideas they came up with were more original. (For example, a typical use of a newspaper might be to cover the floor with it when training a puppy. An original idea might be to use it to transfer text onto wet nail polish.) Curvilinear movements seemed to unlock a more flexible thought pattern, which in turn heightened creativity.” 🔗 / Joyful /

6. The Surprise Aesthetic

Definition

Author’s Definition

“Surprise is a feeling distinct from joy, and yet they so often come together. We can be surprised by the pop of a firecracker, the stripes of a new shop’s awning in the neighbourhood, the particular size and shape of a ‘thank you’ note amongst the junk mail. Joyful surprises help to break the monotony of routines and can prompt us to reexamine preconceived notions and stereotypes. We use this aesthetic when we wrap presents, line our drawers with colourful paper, or play with norms around the scale and proportions of the objects in our surroundings.” 🔗 / Joyful /

Macabre Modification

The dark side of joyful surprise is joyful fear. Through the joy we find in novelty, it takes a more twisted approach to shocking us out of our usual routines.

Designing for Dark Surprise

Haunted Houses

Haunted houses are the epitome of joyful fear. By shaking up the homey comforts that we’ve grown accustomed to, they treat us to an array of unexpected surprises.

Scary Movies

A lot of us don’t have to look too far to find the dark surprise aesthetic. For those of us who love a good horror movie, we know that a jump scare can inspire a distorted emotion right at the crux of both joy and fear.

Benefits of Incorporating Surprise into Spaces

Fear temporarily boosts our immune system. 🔗 / Study /

In one study, participants were shown a horror flick. Their blood samples were taken before and after the viewing. The results showed that fear responses caused them to experience a lift in activated white blood cells, the type of cells that enable us to fight disease and which repair our body.

Fear socializes us and bonds us to other people.

Oxytocin is a hormone associated with prosocial behaviour. When we feel fear, we also experience a boost in oxytocin as our body’s way of heeding us to seek out the comfort of others.

7. The Transcendence Aesthetic

Definition

Author’s Definition

“It sometimes seems as if our emotions lie along a vertical spectrum. We feel uplifted, or lighter than air when joyful, down or heavy-hearted when sad. So it’s not surprising that experiences of lightness and elevation can evoke a transcendent feeling of joy. Watching a balloon drift or a butterfly flit, gazing up at the clouds or a cathedral’s vaulted ceiling, or peering out the window of a treehouse or airplane, we feel a shift in perspective that helps us zoom out from mundane concerns and infuse a sense of buoyancy into our daily lives.” 🔗 / Joyful /

Macabre Modification

The dark side of transcendence weighs more than its light counterpart. It gets its joy from manipulating our perception weight.

Designing for Dark Transcendence

Weighted Levity

A dark twist of the transcendence aesthetic occurs when levity meets weight. In instances of this we are able to find joy in things that we expect to be light, but are in fact heavy: water balloons and Koons sculptures are good examples.

Light Weight

Opposite to weighted levity, sometimes joy comes from the feeling of weightlessness that results from the weighted force of gravity. Skiing, hang gliding, drop zones…

Benefits of Incorporating Transcendence into Spaces

Overview effect

The overview effect is a more intense version of wonder that brings about a sense of the interconnectedness of life. It’s a common transcendent feeling reported by astronauts.

Pressure Therapy

A light cozy blanket can be all the comfort we need at the end of a long day. But wrapping ourselves up in a weighted blanket has been shown to alleviate stress and improve sleep quality. Deep pressure stimulation uses pressure to relax the nervous system. It simulates the feeling of being hugged. With weighted blankets, the pressure comes not from another person but from having the blanket wrapped around the body.

8. The Magic Aesthetic

Definition

Author’s Definition

“As children, the world of magic blends seamlessly with the real one, but as we get older, we feel pressure to leave magic behind. Still, human life is filled with natural mysteries — the Aurora Borealis, magnetism, fog, wind, and the pulsing of fireflies — that elicit a powerful sense of wonder that challenges our understanding of the world and opens us up to new discoveries.” 🔗 / Joyful /

Macabre Modification

The dark magic aesthetic inspires our sense of wonder at the intersection of terrifying and joyful elements.

Designing for Dark Magic

Fire

Acting as both one of the most mesmerizing and destructive natural forces, fire has no problem satisfying our dark sense of wonder. Roasting marshmallows over a campfire, fire breathing buskers, candles… As dangerous as it is, fire is also a diverse source of joy.

Abyss

Yayoi Kusama’s infinity mirror rooms have become an international sensation and such a pure source of wonder and joy. My personal favourite room, titled “The Aftermath of Obliteration of Eternity” is almost literally an infinite source of wonder.

Benefits of Incorporating Magic into Spaces

Ambiguous Spaces

Situations rich in ambiguity have a tendency to spur magical thinking. When we witness something mysterious, our sense of certainty about the world dissolves. Our eyes open wider and our curiosity becomes insatiable.

Unselfing

🔗 / HBR Article on Awe /

In a study, one group of participants were led to experience awe. Afterward, they were asked to draw pictures of themselves. Those who experienced awe literally drew themselves smaller in size. This effect has been termed “unselfing.”

"I didn't feel like a giant, I felt very very small." — Astronaut Niel Armstrong's reaction upon looking back at the earth from the moon.

Through feeling awe, we are drawn out of ourselves and toward others and we’re inspired toward pro-social behaviour like generosity and compassion.

9. The Celebration Aesthetic

Definition

Author’s Definition

“The word joy comes from the same root as the word rejoice, so celebration is inherent in the concept of joy. When we come together to share good news, the result is a kind of communal joy that is larger than the sum of its parts. Joy spreads infectiously through laughter, music, dance, and the upswept, open-armed gestures of merrymaking. We can harness this festive joy with aesthetic elements that amplify the effervescent, dynamic qualities of our natural expressions of joy: bursting shapes like those of fireworks and starbursts, sparkling lights and glittering materials that scatter light, and strong rhythms that unite a group in synchronized song or movement.”

Macabre Modification

The dark side of the celebration aesthetic is malicious joy. The darkest quality of communal joy lies in schadenfreude and in the celebration of other people’s misery.

Designing for Dark Celebration

Spectator Sports

The joy in celebrating other’s misery is a dark side of the celebration aesthetic. This spectator sport, in its most historically pathological form, would take form in public fights to the death. Today, fail videos and violent sports seem to suffice for the most part in sustaining this form of dark joy.

Piñatas

What better manifestation of malicious joy than people coming together to beat the hell out of something with a stick.

Benefits of Incorporating Celebration into Spaces

Brain Rewards 🔗 / Study /

In one study 19 volunteers were asked to read scenarios describing the successes and misfortunes of fictional characters. They were then asked to report their feelings about the characters, while their brains were being scanned. The researchers found that when the participants reported feeling envy, a brain region known for processing physical pain became active. The brains of participants who felt schadenfreude were activated in regions which process rewards. Essentially, showing that revelling in other people’s misery feels good.

Moral Compass 🔗 / Study /

Another study suggests that schadenfreude might be a part in the normal development of our moral compasses. Researchers put on a puppet play for a group of young participants. Among the puppets, there were sympathetic characters and a villain. The study demonstrated that 4-5 year-olds didn’t show any differentiated behaviour towards the two character types. The 6 year olds, on the other hand, were joyful when they saw villains suffering.

10. The Renewal Aesthetic

Definition

Author’s Definition

“Some of life’s greatest joys are fleeting, like the delight of watching the cherry blossoms flower in spring, the falling of snow, or the brief season of a favourite fruit. Joy isn’t a constant state, but one that ebbs and flows over time. Yet joy’s cyclical nature can sometimes get lost in the solidity and stasis of the manmade world. We can restore a dynamic quality to the built environment by incorporating aesthetics of renewal: blossoming shapes (flowers and flower-like forms), spirals, and S-curves that suggest expansion, potential, and growth.” 🔗 / Joyful /

Macabre Modification

The dark side of the renewal aesthetic is impermanent destruction. The act of destroying something knowing that it’s carnage will be temporary.

Designing for Dark Renewal

Sand Mandelas

The Tibetan Buddhist tradition involving the creation and destruction of mandalas made from coloured sand. Once complete, the sand mandala's ritualistic dismantling is accompanied by ceremonies and viewing to symbolize Buddhist doctrinal belief in the transitory nature of material life.

Rage Rooms

Few places in the world give us the permission to let our inner demon rampage. Havoc is generally taboo. Rage rooms are rare spaces where we are encouraged to vent our anger by destroying objects.

Benefits of Incorporating Renewal into Spaces

Anticipation

The hopes and dreams we aspire to in life are often under constant states of shatter, repair, and transformation. But our creation of detailed mental simulations is believed to be one of the reasons studies have found that periods of anticipation can drastically enhance the joy that we feel.

Pretend Permanence

“I like the stars. It's the illusion of permanence, I think. I mean, they're always flaring up and caving in and going out. But from here, I can pretend...I can pretend that things last. I can pretend that lives last longer than moments.” — Neil Gaiman

Conclusion

Thanks for reading fellow demons. I hope I was able to shine some light on the benefits that dark joy can offer and how we might consider incorporating its elements into our spaces.

Sending dark joyful vibes your way,

Lamar ✌️😈

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I left a loonie in an elevator the other day. (That’s $1 for you non-Canadians out there.)

I wanted to be the catalyst for someone else’s serendipity. I wanted to push the first domino that commenced an elaborate fortune-filled Rube Goldberg Machine. One where someone walks into an elevator naked and walks back out witnessing the world through a fresh pair of lucky lenses.

A dollar isn’t much, but who knows what that little bit of luck snowballed into.

Maybe that dollar was used to buy a winning lottery ticket. Maybe it led to a more lively “how was your day” conversation. Maybe it was a good omen for someone going on a date. And maybe because they were feeling lucky, they got lucky that night.

Believing that we are lucky is a proven life hack for successfully finding luck. Those times when we feel lucky are the ones when we are more likely to see luck when it’s near.

British psychology professor Richard Wiseman conducted a fascinating experiment about self-perception: He found people who identify as either "extremely lucky" or "extremely unlucky," and he tested how they perceive the world.

In one experiment, he selected two participants: Martin, who considers himself lucky, and Brenda, who considers herself unlucky. The research team asked both participants to walk down a street toward a coffee shop (separately from each other), go into the coffee shop, buy a cup of coffee, and sit down. Hidden cameras in the street leading up to the coffee shop as well as in the coffee shop itself filmed them. The researchers placed a five-pound note on the pavement directly outside the entrance to the coffee shop, so that the participants would need to step over it. They also rearranged the coffee shop to only have four large tables, placing one person at each of these four tables: Three of them were actors, and one of them a successful businessman. The successful businessman was sitting close to the coffee counter. The four individuals were briefed to interact the same way with both participants. Can you guess the outcome?

Martin, the lucky person, walked up the street, recognized the five-pound note, picked it up, and went inside. He ordered a coffee and sat down next to the businessman. He started a conversation and made friends with him. Unlucky Brenda, on the other hand, failed to spot the five-pound note. She, too, sat down next to the successful businessman, but remained silent until the end of the experiment.

When Wiseman's team asked the two later how their day had been, they received two very different responses: Martin described how it had been a great day, that he found a five-pound note and got into a great conversation with a successful businessman. Brenda, unsurprisingly, said it had been a completely uneventful morning.

Both participants were presented with exactly the same potential opportunities, but only one of them "saw" them.

🔗 / The Serendipity Mindset — Christian Busch

Aside from occasional lift loonies and cafe cash, the world around us is full of fortune waiting to be found. So, where else can we go to increase our surface area for serendipity?

Scope of This Post

Question: Where can we find spaces that supply luck?

Defining “supply”: Likely to give us more than we had before.

Defining “luck”: Good fortune; advantage or success, considered as the result of chance.

Step 1: Calibrate Our Compass

What makes you feel lucky?

The kind of luck that you and I seek is built into our individual values and goals. We feel fortunate if we attain something we value.

People who value money would feel lucky finding that loonie. Those of us who value novel mindsets would feel lucky discovering an interesting perspective.

The luck we appreciate the most are the ones that somehow benefit our current goals and values. So, defining those is our best first step in finding lucky spaces.

North Star Strategies

Not sure what your values or north stars are? Here are a few strategies I’ve used to uncover my own:

Reflect on why you enjoy your favourite content (blog posts, newsletters, YouTube videos, Instagram and Twitter feeds). What do they do for you? Can it reveal something deeper about what you currently value?

What do you currently regret? What will you regret in the future? These can often inform the core basis for our decisions and behaviours.

Who are your most and least favourite characters from movies, shows, games, stories, books, and real life? What are the specific qualities of their personality or life that you love and hate? Those characteristics tend to be particularly meaningful values and anti-values for us.

What are your favourite action-oriented quotes? Unlike the prototypical values (integrity, kindness, autonomy…), North stars don’t have to be confined to a single word. Mine are a short list of phrases which I consult regularly.

Each of those can then be summarized into single words, if I wanted to convert them into a list of my core values.

In addition to defining our north stars, another strategy we can use to figure out what luck we’re looking for is to consider the times we’ve felt lucky in the past.

Remembering Luck

When and where was the last time you got/felt lucky?

What were the last best things that happened to you and where did they spur from?

Going back through your north stars and values, when and where did you last feel lucky in relation to those?

What are your main life blocks (the categories you can divide your current life into)? Mine are my body, environment, finance, mind, recreation, and social blocks. When and where did you last feel luck in relation to those? Considering your social block, for example: where’d you meet your last date? And where’d you last make a new friend?

Once we have an idea of what’s important to us right now, we can start to envision what kind of luck we want to find. We can use our north stars to think deeper than “winning the lottery” as our answer to what a lucky day in our life would look like.

Anticipating Luck

What would luck look like for each of our values right now?

One helpful way of conceptualizing serendipity is by thinking about it in 3 types:

• Serendipitous Events: The fortune we find when we aren’t actively looking for luck.

• Serendipitous Paths: The fortune we find when we have a goal in mind and we have a plan on how to get there, but luck guides us to a better path to get there that we hadn’t even considered.

• Serendipitous Destinations: The fortune we find when we have a goal in mind, but luck leads us to an even better goal than we had before.

Seneca argued that luck is a matter of preparation meeting opportunity. But, sometimes anticipation and clear goals can blind us to the luck we can’t anticipate.

In one experiment participants interacted with a reading device. Some were given a specific task to find out some particular information. Others were given no task at all. The results were clear: While the first group often did find out the specific information they were seeking, the second group were much more exploratory in their interaction and tended to come away with all kinds of interesting information that was not previously sought.

🔗 / The Serendipity Mindset — Christian Busch

Finding a balance between knowing what we want and being open to what comes our way is the key to calibrating our compass.

Step 2: Don Our Luck Lenses

Luck is a mindset as much as it is a phenomenon. And looking at the world through a pair of luck lenses allows us to notice the fortune around us.

The Serendipity Mindset

The Serendipity Mindset is about recognizing that we can open ourselves to the unexpected. And it is about being prepared and free from the preconceptions that can stop us being the victims or beneficiaries of luck (bad or good). We can nurture it, shape it, and make it a tool for life. In the science of serendipity, luck can be taught, coached, and created.

🔗 / The Serendipity Mindset — Christian Busch

“Chance favours only the prepared mind.” — Louis Pasteur. So how can we prime ourselves to become more aware of potential prosperity.

If you think about it, you will realize that we all actually do look out for the unexpected every day, but generally only as a defence mechanism. When we use a pedestrian crossing on a busy road, we expect the cars to stop at a red light. But most of us do not take that entirely for granted. Even when the light turns red and we step out into the road, we turn half an eye to the traffic, because we also know that occasionally a driver will not stop at a red light. In a situation like this, our field of vision is broader than usual and we are looking out for the unexpected, because we know that missing it could be fatal. Imagine if we applied the same approach to the positive — keeping a broader field of vision and being alert to the unexpectedly good or useful things that might happen.

🔗 / The Serendipity Mindset — Christian Busch

Spaces of Gratitude

Some spaces provide luck, like my loonie elevator. And some spaces give us the space to reflect on how lucky we are — our gratitude journals, the comforting home of a loved one, spaces with an abundance of something we love, etc. Gratitude is essentially a reflection of how lucky we believe we are. And the more we reinforce being lucky as part of our identity, the more luck we’ll encounter.

We can approach having the right mindset from two sides: reinforcing luck into our identity and ousting the biases and preconceptions that can blind us to serendipity.

Egocentric bias

A lot of us have a tendency to take more credit than we might deserve. One study, for example, asked authors of multi-authored papers what percentage of the work they personally did. When they added up those percentages, the sum was on average 140%.

A similar study on the topic asked couples what percentage of the housework they do. The combined percentage almost always surpassed 100%.

Potential conclusion to takeaway: we experience and vividly remember all of what we do, but not all of what everyone else does. So naturally, we over estimate our own contributions and underestimate the contribution of others.

This egocentric bias not only makes us underestimate the contribution of others, but it influences to us underestimate the impact that luck has played in our success. If we ignore the role of serendipity in our past, then we could be blinding ourselves to it in the present.

Spaces We Know

We get so used to walking in the same paths everyday that we become habituated to our surroundings. We’ve got our muscle memory working for us, so we put our legs on auto pilot and divert our eyes from our environment and to our phones. Switching things up from the spaces we’ve become most familiar with could force us to reawaken our vigilance for luck.

Spaces that Deviate

Functional fixedness is a cognitive bias that refers to the way we get so use to using a tool in a familiar way that we end up lacking the creativity to consider using that same tool in novel ways.

Sometimes serendipity comes down to creative problem solving and seeing the world through an unexpected perspective. On a walk the other day, I passed by Poop Cafe, Toronto's Toilet Themed Dessert Bar. To be honest, I was grossed out by the concept, but on second thought, this might be the deviation that we all need in our lives 😬

Luck is sensitive to the self-fulfilling prophecy. If we truly internalize that we are lucky, we will be a lot more likely to proactively engage with the world in such a way that luck will be manifested. Once we’ve internalized that we’re lucky our lenses should be in a good position to actually serve as a luck radar. Of course things can still be outside of our radar’s field of vision, so we still have to find lucky landmarks and increase our surface area for random opportunity.

Step 3: Locate Our Lucky Landmarks

When I think of where luck might live I think about chasing rainbows — if we make it to the end of a rainbow, we’ll find a lucky Leprechaun, and if we catch them, they’ll give us their pot of gold.

I’m not much of a runner. Alas, that all seems much too impractical to me. So, where else can we go to locate luck?

Research “luckiest places in the world” on your favourite search engine and you’ll find all the lore.

Spaces Deemed Lucky

You’ll likely come across the stories of Point Zero — the centre of Paris where a myriad of good luck rituals are performed.

Or the lore of how good luck comes to those who rub the bronze booties of the Crazy Girls statue in Las Vegas.

Or how rubbing The Guardhouse Monkey’s head in Belgium with your left hand will gift you good luck for a year.

Spiritual serendipity hotspots are scattered from sea to sea, but luckily we’re not bound to supernatural intervention. We can take control of our own luck by taking advantage of the serendipitous settings close to home.

Spaces with Agents of Luck

When I left that dollar in the elevator, I was acting as an agent of luck. I created an environment where the next person to use that elevator was in the right place at the right time.

Think about how many other agents of luck are out there. The mutual friend who introduces future newlyweds to each other. The family member who knows a gal who knows a guy who can get you a job interview at your dream company. The meetup which hosts an event that will bond a group of strangers into a meaningful friendship.

What would be great to find are the places where agents of serendipity like to hangout.

Spaces with Interesting People

Our likelihood for serendipity increases in places where there is a higher concentration of people we’d find interesting. So using our north stars from step 1, we can try figuring out where others with similar ambitions and values might congregate.

Spaces Inside Our Head

Chance encounters don’t just happen in the external world. They happen in our minds as well.

These are the sparks of inspiration that we tend to only get when we’re in the shower.

Or the solutions to the problems that only come to us after a good night’s sleep in a cozy bed.

Figuring out where you are when you get your best ideas could be a lucky landmark quest worth tracking.

Spaces Online

Online spaces can be a powerful tool for serendipity.

Share what you love, and the people who love the same things will find you.

🔗 / Show Your Work — Austin Kleon

Spaces with Bad Luck

Chance is not always a welcome guest. The snags and backlashes of bad luck are everywhere.

🔗 / Chase, chance, and creativity : the lucky art of novelty — James Austin

If we go into a space expecting bad luck, but nothing bad happens, then we might be more likely to believe that we are lucky.

A research team presented people who consider themselves "lucky" and "unlucky" with the following scenario: Imagine you are in a bank when an armed robber enters and shoots you in the shoulder. You escape with a flesh wound.

People who self-identify as "unlucky" will frame this situation as something that tends to happen in their life. This would be one more bad experience in a line of them. "Lucky" people will frame it as a situation that could have been worse, such as "the bullet could have killed me," or "I could have been shot in the head."

What is happening here? Lucky people tend to frame counterfactuals along the lines of what could have been worse, while unlucky people frame them as what could have been better, or even more pronouncedly, as "the story of my life."

Lucky people also tend to compare themselves with others who have had less luck (that is, with the person who was killed during the robbery), while unlucky people tend to compare themselves with those who had more luck (the person who didn't get hurt at all).

🔗 / The Serendipity Mindset — Christian Busch

Going into places where we feel outside of our comfort zone and coming back out unscathed might give us the impression that we are lucky. It could also give us the confidence to continue venturing outside of our normal routines and patterns, thereby expanding our surface area for random opportunity.

Conclusion

I wonder how often we miss the presence of luck. How many opportunities, or soulmates, or loonies we’ve missed because we weren’t paying attention — or perhaps even worse, because we didn’t think that luck would be on our side.

What would you feel more comfortable doing if you knew that you had a 95%+ chance of success?

Thanks for reading! Sending lucky vibes your way,

Lamar ✌️😁

Our lives are immersed in a world riddled with temporal illusions.

We cast a final blink each night and awaken to find ourselves teleported 8 hours into the future. We wait what feels like an eternity for the bus scheduled to arrive in 2 minutes. We play a quick game to pass the time, only to look at the clock and realise an entire hour has snuck by unnoticed.

What if we could take control of our temporal perception? If we could fast forward through unpleasant experiences and elongate the moments of bliss which we crave to last a lifetime.

The spaces that surround us have the ability to bend the way we think about and experience time. By changing the elements within spaces or by changing spaces altogether we can speed up or elongate the subjective timelines we routinely construct.

Scope of This Post

Question

• How can we design spaces to influence our sense of time?

Defining “design spaces”

• Changing elements within a space.

• Changing from one space to another.

Defining “to influence”

• Speed up our perception of time.

• Elongate our perception of time.

Defining “sense of time”

• Past: how we remember time.

• Present: how we experience time.

• Future: how we anticipate time.

The Remembered Moment — Remembering Time

The goal when designing environments for the remembered moment is to preemptively architect how we’ll reflect on the duration of our current period of time in the future.

Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman draws a really interesting distinction between two lenses through which we view our lives: the experiencing self and the remembering self. Where our experiencing self is our fleeting consciousness at any given moment and our remembering self is our enduring storyteller.

By strategising ways to influence the way we remember moments we can edit our life stories. We can actively work to prevent the feeling that time has slipped through our fingers, and we might even be able to shrink the perceived timelines of the unpleasant periods in our lives.

Past: Speeding Up the Remembered Moment

How can we design and use spaces so that a period of time seems like a mere blip during the reflection of our timelines?

You know how the side-view mirrors on cars have that label, “objects in mirror are closer than they appear”?

Our perception of how long ago events occurred is the opposite of that. It seems that we have a natural bias toward thinking that events in our past occurred more recently than they actually did.

Telescoping

“The dating of events usually involves estimation. With the exception of important recurring events (such as birthdays and holidays) and extraordinary personal or historical events (e.g., the date the atom bomb was dropped on Hiroshima), the dates of events are rarely stored in memory. Survey research (e.g., Skogan, 1981) suggests that subjects often underestimate the age of an event, a bias termed telescoping.”

🔗 / Research Paper /

The theory is that we are more likely to have this bias when the time between now and the event in question has been pretty uneventful. If it’s one of the last vivid memories we created, then it will likely feel more recent.

Another theory suggests that we’re more likely to feel the effects of telescoping if we don’t have a temporal frame of reference for an event. If we know that an event occurred sometime right before our last birthday, we might be less vulnerable to a telescopic distortion.

Knowing these theories can be useful for building a more accurate inner chronometry (representation of timelines in our mind), but sometimes we might actually want to distance ourselves from a moment in time. So how can we use space as a tool to make a period of time feel shorter or make it feel further away in time than it actually was?

Spaces that Distance: Immersion in novel environments

There’s a common anecdotal observation that time seems to speed up as we age. People say things like: “I feel like I’m still in my 20s” and “I can remember high school like it was just yesterday.”

The most accepted theory on why some people feel this way is that they create less unique memories in adulthood compared to their childhood.

So when it comes to using our surroundings as a tool to distance ourselves from the past, it makes sense that we should try to make as many new memories as possible.

Travelling to new places, for example, might be a solid way to process grief. Each new experience on our trip could cause our minds to perceive that more time has elapsed since the cause of our grief. The idea behind this being that we’d make an event feel further away and ultimately shorter in retrospect by making the time in between now and then feel longer.

Spaces that Shrink: Make it as bland as possible

Creating forgettable moments isn’t usually a goal that we aspire to, but in some cases, maybe it could be a good strategy for cushioning anticipatory embarrassment.

Imagine, for example, that you’ve been invited at the last minute to fill in for someone who couldn’t make it to a webinar. You’re not in the right headspace for a talk, you’ve got the script, but you don’t really know or resonate with the material, and you don’t want people to remember how much you’re likely to fumble over the material. This might be one of those forgettable moments worth designing for.

Since we now know the role that novelty can play in memory formation, it seems that the goal here might be to try and ensure that neither you nor your audience have too much novelty to hold onto. If there’s nothing worth remembering in the present moment, then our minds are likely to not bother creating long-lasting memory for it.

So maybe the strategy here would be to design our space to be as bland as possible, by reducing the quality of our video, and removing bright and bold colours from screen view, for example.

Those were just a couple of examples for how we might be able to design and use spaces to speed up and shrink our reflections of our timelines. But it seems that getting creative with how we use novelty in our environments can be a tactic for planning which present moments we want to hold on to and which past moments we want to distance from.

Past: Elongating the Remembered Moment

How can we design and use spaces so that a moment seems to last a lifetime?

There’s that saying, “time flies when we’re having fun”. Some people have noticed, however, that not all fun translates to long-lasting memories. Think back to the last time you played one of your favourite video games or worked on one of your recurring hobbies. You likely enjoyed yourself in the moment, but you might notice that your memory of that event feels faded or distant. Whereas, if you were to think back to your last fun vacation, you might notice yourself being able to recall that time in greater detail.

Why might one fun experience have more influence on the remembered moment over another fun experience? Research suggests that this difference can likely be attributed to the number and novelty of new memories each provides to us.

Holiday Paradox

The Holiday Paradox is the contradictory feeling when a holiday feels like it’s flying by while we’re experiencing it in the moment, but overtime in retrospect, we perceive it as having lasted longer.

The way we think about past durations has a lot to do with how many memories we’ve created within those times in question. And with a little bit of creative thinking we might be able to use that logic to design spaces that can enhance our perception of longevity.

Spaces that Cupid Recommends

I’m calling it Cupid’s Illusion of Familiarity: the more novel experiences we make with someone, the more likely we are to feel familiar with that person, because the novelty makes us feel like we’ve spent more time with them. In other words, based on the logic that more novel memories can translate to longer perception of time, it seems that going on dates in various unique date spots could likely lead to feelings of increased closeness.

Spaces that Calibrate our Cognitive Timelines

We learned earlier about telescoping and how we have a natural bias toward fast-forwarding through our uneventful timelines. Which means that if we want to create more accurate depictions of our perception of our past timelines, then we’ll have to work to elongate those uneventful periods in our mind. So the question becomes, how can we set up our current environment to prevent telescoping?

Two of the main factors we mentioned which contribute to telescoping were temporal landmarks (particularly notable days: birthday, holiday, etc.) and the number of novel memories we’ve created between now and then. Taking advantage of these two conditions, perhaps we could bypass telescoping by making it a point to switch up our interior design on a more frequent basis. By decorating our place for Halloween or changing the colour of our curtains based on the season, maybe those could be enough to constitute a new temporal landmark in our minds.

Spaces that feel Like Home

What makes a house a home? For some it might be the feeling elicited by the memories they’ve made there. For others, it might be how its interior design and aesthetics make them feel. I think that in any case, the feeling of home has a temporal component to it. As cozy as a hotel room on vacation might be, it rarely ever feels like home. So how can we design our spaces to feel like we’ve developed an enduring connection with it?

Similar to the previous two sections, I wonder if adding novelty to our spaces more frequently would result in making it feel like we’ve been there longer. I’d assume that the more often we make unique switch ups, the more memories we create in relation to our place. And the more memories we create, the longer it feels like we’ve been living there.

Overall, when it comes to making our past experiences feel like they lasted longer than they actually did, creating new and rich memories appears to be the key. And getting creative with strategies for designing and using spaces to facilitate those memory formations seems to have a lot of practical implications.

The Present Moment — Experiencing Time

I’ve always hated presenting. I remember times in school when I knew my name was next up to be called, but it was so close to the end of class that whether I presented that day or the next completely depended on how quickly time moved and how slowly the person before me spoke. Every single time, in my state of panic, I remember desperately staring at the clock and frantically pleading with it to stop moving in slow motion.

There are several theories as to why and when time feels to us like its either dilating or contracting:

Empty vs Full Theory

Whether you feel time as being long lasting or short lasting depends on whether the activities we’re doing are empty or full:

Empty: when what we’re doing feels monotonous, not stimulating, and unimportant to us, time will seem to pass by slowly.

Full: when we’re doing something novel, full of sensations, challenging, or where there’s a lot of context changing, time will seem to pass by quickly.

Time Awareness Explanation

The belief that time feels like it’s going by quickly when an activity is full because we’re not preoccupied with thinking about time. If we’re not attending to it, because we’re busy with something else, then we won’t notice how much time has passed.

Neuroscience Observations

The more dopamine and norepinephrine in the brain, the more likely we are to feel like time is moving quickly.

Dopamine is the molecule of motivation, pursuit, and drive. Also, heightened states of arousal (either positive or negative arousal).

Contrary to the theories and observations above, I think that our mindset plays a bigger role than the activity we’re doing or our biology. My personal belief is that the main decider of whether time feels like it’s moving fast or slow is simply whether we want it to move fast or slow. If we want time to move fast, it’s gonna move slowly. And when we want time to move slowly, it’s gonna speed by.

The paradoxical problem with my theory is that, it’s tough to try to control how we feel about the speed of the time passing by, because in order to get the speed that we desire we need to want the opposite speed (if we want time to move faster, we have to want it to move more slowly). So those other theories come with the benefit of putting the onus of our time perception on mostly external variables which we have more control over.

Present: Speeding Up the Present Moment

How can we design and use spaces so that it feels as though we are fast forwarding through the current moment?

Side note: Whenever I get the urge to want to fast-forward through an unpleasant situation in my life, the movie Click pops into my mind and I worry that my internal remote is going to eventually malfunction and put me on auto-pilot while I start fast-forwarding through any similar situation I’d come across in the future. So this is a power I tend to use sparingly.

Spaces that Play Uptempo Music

”The present study investigated the effects of musical tempo and music presence on duration estimations and content recall of a video advertisement. Thirty male and thirty female participants took part in this study. They were divided into 2 groups and a control group. The first group saw the advertisement with fast-tempo music, the second saw the same advertisement with slow-tempo music. The control group saw the advertisement in silence. According to previous research and theories it was hypothesised that music tempo would have an effect on duration estimations and content recall. The findings revealed that participants in the high tempo condition gave shorter duration estimates than in other conditions.”

🔗 / Research /

In other words, this study showed that an advertisement with uptempo music influenced it’s participants to think that it was shorter than the same advertisement with slow-tempo music.

The potential practical application being that having uptempo music playing in our space might make time feel like it’s going by more quickly.

Spaces that Make Us Cold

Research shows that cold exposure can spike dopamine levels in our systems.

“Dopamine is a powerful molecule capable of elevating mood, enhancing focus, attention, goal-directed behaviour, etc. Even short bouts of cold exposure can cause a lasting increase in dopamine and sustained elevation of mood, energy, and focus.”

🔗 / Lab Findings /

As mentioned in the neuroscience section above, dopamine has a hand in making us believe more time has elapsed than the true reality. If I was to imagine hopping into an ice bath, I’d imagine that a minute felt like an hour too.

Spaces with Blue Lights

The video above conducts a mini experiment that shows how immersion in an environment lit up with blue light can make 49 seconds feel like a minute — the feeling that time is moving more quickly than reality.

I personally believe that the results could be related to how red vs blue light influences our circadian rhythms (our internal clock that estimates the timeline of a single day — circadian comes from the Latin “circa diem” which roughly translates to “approximately a day”). My understanding of the circadian system goes something like: when we wake up each day, we’re exposed to initial daylight (blue light) → that triggers our body to stop secreting melatonin → which tells our brain that it’s morning → our dopamine levels are particularly high in the morning → dopamine tends to make us perceive time as moving faster.

”Huberman explains that your circadian rhythm (i.e. your body clock) plays a huge role in your Dopamine levels and therefore your perception of time. In the morning, your brain is flooded with Dopamine, giving you that feeling of wakefulness and motivation that most people are familiar with after a good night's sleep."

🔗 / Article /

I personally think that the best strategies for influencing our sense of experienced time would somehow involve targeting our mindset. But, from what I can see, the main mindset tactic to make time feel like it’s going by quickly would be to convince ourselves that we actually want time to move slowly. Since, that seems to be a bit counter-intuitive, we at least have these few environmental factors that demonstrate an ability to speed up our perception of the present moment instead.

Present: Elongating the Present Moment

How can we design and use spaces so that the current moment seems to pass by in slow motion?

Sometimes we just want to bask in a bliss-filled moment — those borderline spiritual ones when we’re having such a great time we want to appreciate every single second and we want as many of those seconds as we can get.

Whenever I’m immersed in one of those moments I think about all those superhero movies with a character who has super speed or reflexes, like Spider Man.

When his spidey senses kick in, his reflexes move so quickly that everything around him appears to move in slow motion. Acknowledging the obvious fact that this is fiction, I can’t help but wonder if there’s any truth to the idea that we can train and enhance our cognition speed and reaction time, so that we might be able to slow things down too.

2x Speed Environment Immersion

I almost always watch YouTube videos in 2x speed. I notice that if I’m truly engaged with its content, listening intently to every word, and trying to actively think about its topic, the world around me seems to be moving in a slower motion after the video ends. Similarly, if I was to watch a 15 minute video at 2x speed and then return it back down to 1x on the 14 minute mark, then it would appear to me that the rest of the video is playing even more slowly than simply 1x speed.

It got me wondering, what if we were to spend a day wearing a virtual reality headset, tuned into an exact replica of our reality. One that was unfolding before our eyes at double or even triple times normal speed. Would a similar slow motion effect ensue after taking off the headset? Would we perceive true reality unfolding more slowly in front of us? If we made a habit of this practice, could we train our cognition to function at a faster pace?

Moving away from my sci-fi musings, there is evidence that our real-world spaces have the ability to slow down our perception of time as well.

Spaces Airing Scary Movies

”People shown extracts from films known to induce fear often overestimated the elapsed time of a subsequently presented visual stimulus, whereas people shown emotionally neutral clips (weather forecasts and stock market updates) or those known to evoke feelings of sadness showed no difference. It is argued that fear prompts a state of arousal in the amygdala, which increases the rate of a hypothesized "internal clock". This could be the result of an evolved defensive mechanism triggered by a threatening situation.[100] Individuals experiencing sudden or surprising events, real or imagined (e.g., witnessing a crime, or believing one is seeing a ghost), may overestimate the duration of the event.[87]”

🔗 / Wikipedia /

Spaces at the Front of the Train

We’ll sometimes hear baseball players claim that they’ve been playing the game for so long that now, when the ball is coming at them, it almost seems that time is moving in a slower motion.

Some research supports these self-reported experiences and they’ve dubbed this phenomenon the “time dilation effect”. It suggests that in moments when something is coming toward us, time can appear to slow down.

So if considering how we might use our spaces to take advantage of this effect, we might consider environments like the front car of a train where the world looks as though it’s coming toward us. It makes me wonder what it might feel like to choose this spot to meditate in, for example. Would a 5 minute meditation session in the front car of a train give us the impression that we’ve been meditating for 15 minutes instead?

Spaces that Scare Us

”Anxious people, or those in great fear, experience greater "time dilation" in response to the same threat stimuli due to higher levels of epinephrine, which increases brain activity (an adrenaline rush).[92] In such circumstances, an illusion of time dilation could assist an effective escape.[93][94]”

🔗 / Wikipedia /

Spaces that Stress Us Out

”A study in which people with arachnophobia were asked to look at spiders — the very object of their intense fear — for 45 seconds and they overestimated the elapsed time. The same pattern was observed in novice skydivers, who estimated the duration of their peers’ falls as short, whereas their own, from the same altitude, were deemed longer.”

🔗 / Article /

Unfortunately, it seems that a lot of the research out there suggests that in order to make the current moment appear to pass by in slow motion we need to experience some level of stress or fear. Luckily, not all stress or fear has to be bad or traumatic. First kisses, adrenaline rich activities, and expanding our comfort zones can all be healthy daunting experiences. So strategising how to incorporate a healthy level of stress into our environments might be the way to go if we want to elongate our present moments.

The Prospected Moment — Anticipating Time

“I just can’t for the life of me comprehend the disturbed psychology of oblivious slow walkers who impede the traffic of bustling city sidewalks.” — Every fast-walker ever.

Head downtown to sightsee in any major city and we’re bound to witness the inevitably contentious interaction between these two urban species: the slow vs the fast walkers. The ones who are in no rush and who appear to have an abundance of time at their disposal. Versus the ones who seem to be in a perpetual race and never able to find enough time. This is the essence of prospected time. How much time do we feel we have left and how much time do we think something will take.

Future: Speeding Up Prospected Time

How can we design and use spaces so that we feel the pressure of impending time constraints?

In one of my favourite movies, Last Holiday, Queen Latifa’s character is diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor and given a prognosis of only 3 weeks left to live.

What would you do if you only had three weeks left to live? If the vision you had for your entire future had been fast-forwarded to fit within the confines of the next few weeks?

Among the main benefits of speeding up prospected time are the intensified feeling of motivation and the revitalised desire to abandon any instinct we might have had to waste time.

Parkinson’s Law

“The amount of work expands to fill the time available for its completion. If you give yourself a week to complete a two-hour task, then (psychologically speaking) the task will increase in complexity and become more daunting so as to fill that week.”

🔗 / Post /

Parkinson’s Law suggests to me that if we think we don’t have much time left, then we can use that as a motivation booster and be more intentional about how we spend our time.

Spaces that Remind Us of Death

Memento mori (Latin for 'remember that you [have to] die') are symbols that serve as a reminder of the inevitability of our death.

Perhaps, decorating our spaces with a skull or two, or spending time in a graveyard could act as that reminder to appreciate the time constraint that death ensures.

Spaces that Make Us Feel Rushed

We’ve seen how to manipulating our perception of time can be a useful tool, but we might find benefit in using it to skew others’ perceptions of time as well. By designing spaces that make people feel rushed we might essentially be able to speed up their sense of prospected time.

I’m imagining, for example, that we have immutable plans with someone who gets carried away and talks too much. Perhaps, executing those plans in an environment that makes them feel rushed could be a good way to make them feel time-constrained.

So what would these environments look like? Well we know that people tend to feel rushed when they want more time and they’re highly aware of the clock. So brainstorming places and situations that accentuate those two features might be the way to go.

I think that incorporating some variation of clocks, countdowns, and calendars might be the key to designing and using spaces so that we feel the pressure of impending time constraints. It seems that speeding up our sense of prospected time might be a matter of becoming more aware of time itself.

Future: Elongating Prospected Time

How can we design and use spaces so that we feel as though we have an abundance of time at our disposal?

Considering we sleep on average 8 hours a night and there are 24 hours in a day, it’s safe to say that we spend nearly 1/3 of our lives sleeping. So, how would you feel if you were to wake up tomorrow morning in an alternate reality where humans evolved to not need any sleep? How would you design your schedule for the upcoming week? What would you add in? What would you do more of? What would you start doing?

Time Wealth

The feeling of being unconstrained by time pressures.

While speeding up prospected time can be a great tool for sparking motivation, it’s also a frequent sensation in a lot of our lives. We’ve got deadlines, prioritised lists of todos, and goals after goals. Elongating prospected time offers respite from those pressures and our spaces can serve as powerful tools for finding time wealth.

Spaces that Inspire Awe

”Research has suggested the feeling of awe has the ability to expand one's perceptions of time availability. Awe can be characterized as an experience of immense perceptual vastness that coincides with an increase in focus. Consequently, it is conceivable that one's temporal perception would slow down when experiencing awe.[86]”

🔗 / Wikipedia /

Spaces for Rest & Relaxation

Some spaces built for rest and relaxation, like spas, are design to give us a sense of time abundance. So perhaps understanding and employing similar elements to theirs could be a way for us to gift ourselves elongated prospected time.

In addition to the environments that inherently offer or are designed to provide time wealth, we also have the ability to actively create it for ourselves.

Spaces that Buy Us Time

“Before the cacophony of family breakfast and your commute, you sneak a rare walk in the early morning light, cicada rifling the air. From nowhere, it seems, a faint line of words arises in your mind, a possible solution related to a problem at work, a solution you’ve sought for over a week. Before you lose it, you pull out your pocket notebook and scribble the line that leads to more clarity. A five-minute walk, you think, saved you hours of grief at work. You head back home, ready for the squawl of pre-school talk and eggs and traffic. This is an experience of shaping time (taking a five-minute walk), experiencing the mind’s wonder in an ordinary setting (a neighborhood road), and actually making time (the time-saving solution arose effortlessly).”

🔗 / Article /

I think that giving ourselves the space to forget about time might be the key to elongating our sense of prospected time. When we’re not worried about how little time we have left, then perhaps we feel that we have all of the time in the world. And that sense of empowerment is what makes us time wealthy.

Conclusion

Our lives are immersed in a world riddled with temporal illusions, but we have the ability to use those illusions to our advantage, in order to design and use our spaces as tools to influence our sense of time.

And just like how time has both an objective and a subjective side, we can both rely on what research says about how we perceive time and we can get creative and figure out our own unique relationship with time.

I see the the temporal world in terms of past, present, and future. A continuum influenced by speed and novelty. But perhaps, your perspective isn’t as linear. Perhaps in your lens time is not unfolding, but prewritten. Perhaps you see time as not linear, but circular. Perhaps you don’t view time as moving on a horizontal axis, but a vertical one. Our individual perspectives and relationships with time are likely to be unique to some degree when compared to one another. So the environmental solutions that we consider for ourselves should probably take our unique differences into consideration.

Favourite Finds For Further Deep Diving

Video: How Your Brain Makes Time Pass Fast or Slow

Video: Why Life Seems to Speed Up as We Age

Documentary: Illusions of Time

Video: How To Slow Down Time

Video: How to Slow Down the Passing of Time | Jedidiah Jenkins

Video: Brain Games- Time Perception (Oddball Effect)

Read: BRAIN TIME