Every January, fitness centers and yoga classes fill to the brim with new members, food delivery apps are deleted from phones, credit cards are cut into shreds and many of us vow to be better versions of ourselves in the new year.
Some people denigrate the tradition of new year’s resolutions because, let’s face it, most of us have abandoned them by Valentine’s Day. But gosh we’re so virtuous for those six weeks, aren’t we? There has to be a benefit to that, right?
Personally, I love the sense of turning over a new leaf at the beginning of the year, but I’ve gotten away from making resolutions. Instead, I pick one word that represents my focus for the year. One year it was “debt-free,” and while I didn’t eliminate my debt, I did reduce it considerably. This year my word is “travel,” and I already have two trips planned.
Not surprisingly, publishers release a lot of self-help books in December and January. It’s not a genre I typically read, but one came out on Dec. 27 that resonated with me: “How to Calm Your Mind” (Viking Penguin, $28) by Chris Bailey.
In his new book, Bailey, a motivational speaker and author on productivity, defines calm as the opposite of anxiety. It’s common knowledge that the number of people diagnosed with anxiety disorders is on the rise. I feel very lucky to not be one of those people. But more than once recently I have commented to friends that I feel more distracted than usual these days. After reading Bailey’s book, I think I know why.
According to Bailey, dopamine is the root of the problem because a lot of us have become junkies for the stuff. When stimulated, our brains release the chemical, which has the effect of making us feel a sense of pleasure. Our brains naturally crave novelty and when we experience it, we’re rewarded with a shot of dopamine. The easier and more accessible it is to get that dopamine hit, the more we want it. And that’s how we find ourselves scrolling through TikTok and YouTube, watching videos of skateboard-riding bulldogs and makeup tutorials until 1 a.m. when we should be sleeping.
That’s an example of what Bailey calls superstimuli, “highly processed, exaggerated versions of things we’re naturally wired to enjoy,” he writes. “They’re artificial, more stimulating versions of the real thing — with the most desirable components cranked way up to produce more dopamine, which leads us to come back for more.”
It comes as no shock to learn that “most superstimuli are found on the internet.”
Bailey claims that the more analog we can make our lives, the calmer we will become. This is the part that I found most sobering: He contends that checking Facebook or Instagram is more stimulating to our brains than talking to a friend face-to-face. Ordering a pizza on your phone is more stimulating than cooking at home. Bingeing murder documentaries on Netflix is more stimulating than quietly reading a book. Good Lord, that describes my entire month of December.
To calm our anxious, distracted minds, Bailey recommends that we cut back on the digital stimulation, like playing video games, constantly refreshing social media accounts and obsessively checking our email. He advocates for making more room in our lives for analog pleasures — reading a book, visiting with a friend, playing a board game, engaging in physical activity. An added benefit is that analog activities slow down our perception of the passage time, and who doesn’t want that?
Bailey recognizes that the digital aspect of our lives is here to stay and it has its place. He just thinks we could do a better job balancing it with stuff that’s more worthwhile.
“(W)hen we want to do an activity efficiently, we should do it digitally,” he writes, “and when we want our actions to be meaningful, we should do things the analog way.”
Suzanne Van Atten is a book critic and contributing editor to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Contact her at svanatten@ajc.com.
