Mind Wandering Archives - David A. Frenz, M.D.

The Power of Now

Spiritual masters have long held that we are happiest when our minds are situated in the present. They note that suffering occurs when our minds wander to the past or future. But is this empirically true?

Matt Killingsworth and Daniel Gilbert conducted a brilliant study involving real time experience sampling. This was exceptionally difficult to do before smartphones.

We solved this problem by developing a Web application for the iPhone (Apple Incorporated, Cupertino, California), which we used to create an unusually large database of real-time reports of thoughts, feelings, and actions of a broad range of people as they went about their daily activities.The application contacts participants through their iPhones at random moments during their waking hours, presents them with questions,and records their answers to a database at www.trackyourhappiness.org.¹

Here’s what they found:

**Figure 1**. Mean happiness reported during each activity (**top**) and while mind wandering to unpleasant topics, neutral topics, pleasant topics or not mind wandering (**bottom**). Dashed line indicates mean of happiness across all samples. Bubble area indicates the frequency of occurrence. The largest bubble (“not mind wandering”) corresponds to 53.1% of the samples, and the smallest bubble (“praying/worshipping/meditating”) corresponds to 0.1% of the samples.

First, people’s minds wandered frequently, regardless of what they were doing.

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Second, multilevel regression revealed that people were less happy when their minds were wandering than when they were not [...] and this was true during all activities [...].

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Third, what people were thinking was a better predictor of their happiness than was what they were doing.

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In conclusion, a human mind is a wandering mind, and a wandering mind is an unhappy mind.The ability to think about what is not happening is a cognitive achievement that comes at an emotional cost.

What are the implications for living well? Be here now. ✸

Killingsworth MA, Gilbert DT. A wandering mind is an unhappy mind. Science 2010;330(6006):932. PMID: 21071660.

Self-Care During a Pandemic

Update [10/12/2020]: Here’s the recording of the session. Enjoy!

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Remember airplanes? In the event of an emergency, flight attendants advise us to adjust our own oxygen masks before helping others. I’ve always found that an apt metaphor for anyone in the healing arts.

Tomorrow I’m presenting on self-care during a pandemic (but it could be any personal or shared crisis really). Not self-care for our patients and clients—but self-care for ourselves. The main message concerns the relationship that we have toward time and the present, although there will some other stuff sprinkled in as well.

Many thanks to the University of Minnesota’s Center for Practice Transformation for hosting the event. It’s not too late to sign up and the price is right (free)! ✸

Be Here Now

[ Updated with links to the resulting on-air segment / and here ]

I’m scheduled to appear on WCCO 4 News This Morning on Monday, June 22nd, at 5:45 a.m. The subject will be happiness. I’ll be representing Allina Health

We’ll be discussing a recent NORC at the University of Chicago study that found a historic decrease in happiness. NORC has been surveying Americans since 1972 with the following question:

Taken all together, how would you say things are these days—would you say that you are very happy, pretty happy, or not too happy?

Only 14% of people reported feeling “very happy,” which was a sharp drop from the usual run rate. In contrast, 23% of respondents indicated that they are “not too happy.” Both findings are unprecedented (red oval)

Correlation does not imply causation, however, the investigators pursued some provocative Covid-19-related explanations dealing with viral hotspots, loneliness and income. And while George Floyd was not mentioned in NORC’s report, his senseless death on May 25th occurred right in the middle of the survey period. I’d speculate that tragedy and the national reckoning which has followed was also on respondents’ minds

Regardless of the causes, what are some ways to improve happiness?

I generally recommend making peace with the present. This perennial wisdom that has strong, contemporary scientific support. For example, a seminal study by Matthew Killingsworth and Daniel Gilbert tracked happiness in real time using iPhone surveys. They found that people were happiest when their minds weren’t wandering—that is, when they were totally present in the now

In conclusion, a human mind is a wandering mind, and a wandering mind is an unhappy mind. The ability to think about what is not happening is a cognitive achievement that comes at an emotional cost
Science 2010;330:932

You can prove this to yourself by enrolling in the study, which is still running

Present moment awareness is sometimes called mindfulness, a trendy, frequently misunderstood word that I’ve avoided up until now. If you’re intrigued, I suggest snagging a copy of The Power of Now, the classic book by Eckhart Tolle. I often point people to “Wherever You Are, Be There Totally” (section), which starts on Page 82 in Google Books

I’ll try to mention other tips and tricks on the air, and hope to add them to my profile page at Allina Health later this week. ✸