Scientists asked citizenry to do one matter differently while walking , and the results were astounding .
Dacher Keltneris on a military mission to fill our lives with more awe .
He has spent the last two decades studying awe , which he says is distinct from joyousness or fear , and how experiencing it can positively affect our bodies , our relationship with others , and how we see and interact with the mankind around us .
Keltner , a professor of psychology at the University of California , Berkeley , andthe film director of the Greater Good Science Centerrecently chatted with us — Raj Punjabi and Noah Michelson , hosts ofHuffPost ’s “ Am I Doing It haywire ? ” podcast — about his oeuvre , specifically why we should endeavor to shoot more reverence into our life story , and what will occur if we do .
“ It ’s amazing ! It secern us so much about the evolution of the human anxious organization , ” Keltner , the generator of “ Awe : The New Science Of Everyday Wonder And How It Can Transform Your Life , ” told us . “ One region of the brain is inactivate [ when we experience awe ] — the default mood net . That is where all the ego - representational processes take property : I ’m thinking about myself , my time , my goal , my pains , my checklist . That quiets down during awe . ”
Awe activates our tenth cranial nerve nervus . That ’s “ the big bundle of mettle starting in the top of your spinal cord that helps you look at masses and vocalise , ” Keltner explained , and it also “ slow up our heart rate , helps with digestion and opens up our bodies to things big than us . ”
“ Awe also chill down the inflammation physical process , ” Keltner sound out his studies have shown . “ It ’s part of your immune organisation that round diseases , and we want it to be cooler and not always blistering . ”
So how do we go through more awe ? Keltner , who served as the scientific consultant behind Pixar ’s “ Inside Out , ” said it can be as childlike as taking what he name an “ veneration walk of life . ”
He and several of his colleagues studied that experience to discover more about awe and what happen when we feel it .
″[The sketch involve ] people who were 75 years old or senior , so you ’re starting to get queasy and downhearted about the end of life [ and you ’re experience ] more body pain in the ass , ” Keltner say . “ The control circumstance — once a calendar week they went out on a walk . Our ‘ fear walk of life ’ condition , we said , ‘ You know , while you ’re out on your base on balls , go some place where you might feel a small tyke - like wonder and depend around — attend at the modest things and look at the big things and just follow that mother wit of mystery and curiosity . ’ That ’s all we enquire them to do . ”
Keltner explain that encounter fear and wonder on a walk ( or anywhere else ) can be as unsubdivided as pausing and noticing the world around us — from something as seemingly small as a newly flower flower to something as with child as a sunset stretched across the entire sky . Other sources of awe include what he refer to as “ moral beauty ” — see the forgivingness or good or generosity of other people — or listen to euphony , realise art and contemplating braggy estimation , all of which can bump during an “ veneration walk . ”
Keltner state that they happen “ three really nerveless things ” when they compare the event of ascendancy mathematical group to the “ fear walk ” group .
“ Over the eight weeks [ of the report ] , [ the ‘ veneration manner of walking ’ group ] started to feel more and more veneration . So , as we search for awe , we find more of it , which I think is really important . … These people — 75 year honest-to-goodness or older — over metre mat less pain and distress . Chronic infliction and pain when you ’re old is serious . It just rattle your cognizance , and here was a little technique that gave them some peace . ”
The scientists also document what Keltner call “ the disappearance of the ego . ”
“ Each workweek we had [ the study player ] take a characterisation of themselves and what we found was , [ those in the subject field who were going on the awe walk of life ] start to move off to the side [ of the ] photograph . They kind of disappear ! What that tell us is their consciousness is — they ’re not call back about ‘ OK , there ’s my face and I get it absolutely situated in the photo . ’ They ’re more concerned in the vast scene that they ’re part of and losing track of themselves and that ’s authoritative — that ’s important to expand our attention to thing outside of the ego . ”
in the end , Keltner argues the more fear and wonder masses of any age experience , the better off they ’ll be .
“ It [ creates ] an amazing cascade of physiology that we can witness almost any day and is very safe for you , ” he tell us .
We also discuss what Keltner hollo the “ eight wonders of life , ” how reverence can act as an counterpoison to narcissism and much more .
