Getting the Big Picture

Without some grasp of the meaning of their relationship to the whole, it is not easy for individuals to retain a vivid sense of their own capacity to act as individuals, a sure sense of their own dignity and an awareness of their roles and responsibilities. They tend to accept the spectator role and to sink into passivity.

John Gardner, Self-Renewal

Increase your confidence and determination by self-distancing

Adopting an alter ego is an extreme form of ‘self-distancing’, which involves taking a step back from our immediate feelings to allow us to view a situation more dispassionately.

“Self-distancing gives us a little bit of extra space to think rationally about the situation,” says Rachel White, assistant professor of psychology at Hamilton College in New York State. It allows us to rein in undesirable feelings like anxiety, increases our perseverance on challenging tasks, and boosts our self-control.

In one study, participants were asked to think about a challenging event in the future, such as an important exam, in one of two different ways. The group in the “immersed” condition were told to picture it from the inside, as if they were in the middle of the situation, whereas those in the “distanced” condition were asked to picture it from afar – as if they were a fly on the wall. The differences were striking, with those taking the distanced viewpoint feeling much less anxious about the event, compared to the immersed group. The self-distancing also encouraged greater feelings of self-efficacy – the sense that they could pro-actively cope with the situation and achieve their goal. 

Self-distancing seems to enable people to reap these positive effects by leading them to focus on the bigger picture – it’s possible to see events as part of a broader plan rather than getting bogged down in immediate feelings. 

David Robson writing for the BBC

Don’t count on it

I didn't think I belonged in college. It was my first semester and I was failing my intro to algebra class. The professor was intimidating when he spoke and when he turned away he furiously wrote figures on the chalkboard. I figured if I couldn't do well in a low level class like his, I probably should quit. I dropped the class but stayed in college and discovered something: That professor wasn't doing it right. He disappeared from the schedule the next year. I heard rumors about something being wrong with him and it dawned on me that the reason I wasn’t doing well wasn't me but his poor teaching. Whew! What a relief.

But back when I was sitting in his classroom, I didn’t know what was ahead. I didn’t know I would eventually attend graduate school and one day teach students in their first semester—just like I was. 

Some students will be sitting in college classrooms for the first time this week and by the end of the semester they will think that they don’t belong. They won’t know until another semester or two rolls by that the first semester was an adjustment to a new life. They won't know the context until later. They were just figuring out how to survive college and after that first set of classes they will slowly find their footing. 

There are other students about to have the opposite experience. They will have an easy time during their first semester and assume the rest of college will be a breeze. But somewhere along the way they will hit their ceiling. They just haven't been challenged yet. When they begin to struggle, they’ll have to adjust as well.

Throughout our lives, we’ll be tempted to think that first experience is “the way it is.” Sometimes that’s true. Don’t count on it. 

Stephen Goforth

Brain scans show Ugly

About one or two out of a hundred people has a psychological problem called body dysmorphic disorder. They become preoccupied with what they perceive as physical defects in their face. This can lead to numerous plastic surgeries or even suicide. Most people never get diagnosed. They just think they are ugly.

Scientists at UCLA used brain scans to get a better understanding of how the minds of people with this disorder work. Details of their finding are in the Achives of General Psychiatry.

Researchers scanned the brains of people with body dysmorphic disorder as they looked at photos of their own face and then that of a familiar celebrity – along with altered versions of each. One version obscured the details and another version showed only the details.

It turns out the brain of someone with this disorder doesn’t some parts of their brains that the rest of us use whenever we are looking at the shape and size of faces. They see a distorted, twisted version and fail to grasp how the parts fit into the whole. They're not able to contextualize the information.

The problem for them is really not on the outside at all.

In the same way, people with twisted, distorted views of the world have an inside problem. They’ll never bring the world in focus by making outside changes. The change has to happen on the inside.

Step back and get the big picture. See the painting created by the tapestry of life’s details. By themselves, those details can appear quite ugly. But that’s not the whole picture.

Stephen Goforth