A Cure For Narcissism — Awe

Yeah, our society is in trouble. Way too many of us are scrolling endlessly on our phones, basically comparing ourselves to influencers on a constant basis, making ourselves feel crappy because somehow, we don’t measure up. And we’re looking for these external devices, our phones, our TV, our video games, to keep us rewarded and feeling okay when, really, underneath all of these things, there’s an existential angst, a purposelessness, and a boredom. I wonder, what the hell do we need to do to make ourselves happier? Well, there actually is some new science that runs completely contrary to those negative things I’ve just talked about and provide a glimmer of hope and a kind of understanding that’s fundamentally different than basic human emotions that we’ve studied in the past. And this week’s video is all about awe, the emotion of wonder. Stay tuned. Thank you.

As international public speakers and best-selling authors, stay tuned to hear Paul Krismer and Jackson teach the practical science behind happiness and success. Yeah, our culture is all about narcissism right now, and social media drives that. We’re so busy comparing ourselves one to another that we can’t really be any weather focused except on ourselves. And when, so long as we’re focused on ourselves, we tend to find things to feel unhappy about, and then we get competitive with other people and we get filled with spirals of self-hatred and all kinds of stuff that simply isn’t very good for us.

We need ways to step outside of our own self-conscious, narcissistic, overwhelmed feelings that we get in today’s modern society. And mindfulness has always been something we’ve talked about, which is this idea that we exercise our minds in a deliberate way to feel better, more content, and less self-obsessed. Well, this emotion of awe has a lot of the same impacts that mindfulness, over time, can teach the person, but instead, it just comes on naturally. It’s a spontaneously arising emotion. It’s this moment where we become aware of something that’s bigger than us, we almost have to submit to the emotion of awe. It overwhelms us a little, it captures us in a way that almost always is without language. We just go, “Whoa, wow,” and that’s the experience of awe.

It’s been studied enough that we now actually know what it’s like. It has a certain physiological reaction, it has those certain expressions that we put on our face and even certain vocal tones that are consistent throughout the world when people are experiencing awe. So, we know it’s a real thing. But the science is just really focusing on this in recent years. And there’s a new book out by Dr. Keltner, who’s one of my favorite positive psychologists, all about awe. And you know, he observes that awe comes across and occurs much more spontaneously than we usually think.

You know, it’s like being in places of wonder. You know, I was in the Grand Canyon recently, and it’s just, it smacks you with its scale and timelessness. Or, you know, when you go to the ocean sometimes, and you stand, you watch the perfect sunset. That’s awe. And I’m so lucky to live on the west coast of Canada a lot of the year, and you get rainforest beauty, just phenomenal. And I’ve hiked through jungles in Costa Rica and all of these experiences of nature are awe striking.

Also, there’s little microcosms in nature. When you watch an ant carrying a leaf, or you see a rabbit run across a trail, all kinds of things seen in nature are awe-inspiring. And related to that, we can imagine all kinds of things in science. The study of neurophysiology, how the brain is so amazing, or astronomy and look at the amazing images we get from space, and understand the scale of it, and the beauty, or marine biology. All these great discoveries, and any of those little delving into science, even in a very amateur way, can be awe-inspiring.

And then, of course, there’s all kinds of human achievements. Gorgeous music, beautiful art, athletics performed amazingly well, all these kinds of things are awe-inspiring. And we could go and pursue them in kind of logical ways and then get this lowering of our heart rate. Our breathing slows down, we become less and almost unobsessed with our own thinking. But instead, we’re busy observing what’s outside of us. And these very unique qualities of awe deactivate the default mode network.

I’ve talked about in the past, the default mode network is that internal voice that’s basically the play-by-play commentator of your life, and it’s ego-based. It’s all about evaluating how we’re doing relative to the world, and how we could be better, or how we’re already awesome, whatever. And when we’re experiencing awe, that part of our brain shuts off, which is a very content, happy making part of our lives. It’s the absence of self-preoccupation that we get when we’re experiencing awe.

So, there’s all kinds of very practical ways that we could pursue this. Go and watch some documentaries about science, or travel, or even food. Take in amazing endeavors, go on vacations and experience novel things, read about people who inspire you. Think about Gandhi, or Mother Teresa, or Nelson Mandela, all of whom are heroes of mine. And just reading about their lives is awe-inspiring. And it’s subtle and easy too. It just means getting out for a walk and breathing in the fresh air and noticing what’s around you in nature.

Awe, as you can tell from all I’ve said so far, often comes from novelty. So, we know from previous things, including this idea of psychological richness that I’ve talked about in the past, that novelty, in and of itself, is good for us. Which probably supports that science that happiness is not bought by money. We don’t get happier by buying things, at least not after some level of basic needs being met. But we can get more happiness when we use money to buy experiences. And so, there’s another encouragement to go out and just get novel, psychologically rich environments around you. Deliberately cultivate the emotion of awe.

It’s one of many great positive emotions but one that maybe is particularly uniquely needed in this self-obsessed, social media-driven world that we’re in today. So, there you go. That’s it for this week. If you like this kind of content, click the like button, share with your friends and family, and I’ll see you again next week. Thanks for watching. Bye for now.