I had to retype Attia above three times to undo my phone’s autocorrect, and my overly comfortable brain was actually angry for moment about it. They didn’t much care for the kids who had tons of energy and big ideas; kids who’d think up odd interpretations of readings, invent excuses for why they didn’t do their homework, and morph into mad scientists every lab day. But studies show that helicopter parenting induces anxiety in kids and makes them more prone to anxiety and depression as adults. And we got way out into that lake, to a point where the water was shielded from the wind by the mountains on the other side. We all need to be grateful for this privilege and remember it when we are in the dumps over our first-world problems.

It’s definitely not for everyone, and I don’t know if I would recommend it for a long career as the schedule doesn’t lend itself to a very balanced lifestyle. I find all Hidden Brain podcasts fascinating but those two were especially relevant to our modern lives. I drove three hours deeper into the mountains and up the steep dirt road to arrive at my second friend’s piece of land – a plot of forest in the mountains just outside of Durango. I would be curious to understand how looking for any little problem compares to wanting to improve the world.That’s the percent of people who take the stairs when they also have the option to take an escalator. For example, in my country (Mexico), many people don´t see the ugliness, noise and dirt of their neighborhood, or they perceive it and say “So, what´s the problem?

It’s not always easy, and some days are just grumpy for stupid reasons (like your road-trip incidents), but I do my best to steer my attitude in a more positive direction.From my personal experience, and I agree with author/blogger Mark Manson on this, living in an attention economy with modern technology makes it hard to focus and requires an “attention diet” to improve mental health (much like people require a nutritional diet to improve physical health). It melds topics ranging from medicine and anthropology to theology and philosophy, along with case studies of everyday people doing extraordinary things . The idea is that your brain’s reaction to challenges like what MMM described is to produce dopamine (creating contentment/happiness) vs if you get your dopamine hits from constantly binging Netflix, etc, then your body has to produce less dopamine to recalibrate, making you less happy and more anxious. Even being a fairly active person, it surprised me just how much a few hours of “functional” work (as opposed to “working out”) could have a noticeable positive effect on me.