Can You Force Someone To Be Healthier?
In wellness, there’s no one-size-fits-all regimen. In fact, the first step on the path to a better, healthier, happier life, is choice.
In a classic study, researchers placed two rats in a cage. Rat A was free to do whatever he liked. He ate whenever he liked, he hopped on his tiny treadmill to do a few laps whenever he was in the mood, and he slept whenever the urge to snooze came upon him. Basically, Rat A lived the rodent high life, and his brain bloomed with new brain cells. Rat B, who was yoked to Rat A and had to do whatever Rat A did, didn’t have it so good. Even though Rat B was on the same “healthy” schedule as the first rat, he lost brain cells. Unlike his thriving counterpart, he lacked one critical factor: Control.
A number of companies are hopping on the wellness bandwagon and using incentives to encourage their employees to adopt healthier lifestyles. Others are going even further and trying to enforce mandatory healthy lifestyles. Adopting a no-tobacco policy at work and at home, offering cash-incentives and gift cards, reimbursing workers for gym memberships and offering insurance premium discounts to those who meet health standards and surcharges to those who don’t, are among the many ways employers are nudging — or should I say “strong-arming” — their employees to make better choices.
As the rat study highlights and as psychologists have known all along, having a choice matters most of all. Activities that are supposed to lower stress can in fact cause stress if done in the wrong spirit or under duress. Recent research further underscores the importance of autonomy. A study from the University of Toronto shows that when employees have freedom over what to do during lunch breaks — either engage in relaxing activities or work through them — they experience enhanced positive affects and were more relaxed and less fatigued. Contrary to expectations, working through lunch can be restorative, but only if employees choose to do so themselves.
Bottom line: Nobody likes to be told what to do. As mentioned, there is no “one size fits all” especially when it comes to health and stress management. Discover what works for you and build more of it into your day.
I wish you all the best,
Dr. Samantha Boardman
How To Help Prevent Suicide
For every suicide that occurs there are 300 attempts. I share some tips and guidance for helping someone who is depressed and suicidal find their way to treatment or therapy.
National Suicide Prevention Lifeline Call 1-800-273-8255, Available 24 hours everyday.
Victoria Johnson
Please put American Eden: David Hosack, Botany, and Medicine in the Garden of the Early Republic by Victoria Johnson at the top of your summer reading list. The book tells the captivating and forgotten story of Alexander Hamilton’s and Aaron Burr’s personal physician, Dr. David Hosack. In addition to being present at the duel that ends Hamilton’s life, Hosack was a world-class botanist and visionary. He conducted some of the first pharmaceutical research in the United States and his famous garden/lab lies buried beneath Rockefeller Center. It is a feast for the mind.
WHAT IS YOUR MOTTO?
It’s actually a question: “What is this an opportunity for?” I learned it from one of my mentors, and I pass it on every semester to all my students.
WHAT WAS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING YOU LEARNED IN HIGH SCHOOL?
That you can conjure up a living, breathing character and her or his entire world through great writing.
WHAT DO YOU WEAR THAT MAKES YOU FEEL STRONG?
I have a necklace made from a small medal struck in the 1830s to honor David Hosack, the hero of American Eden. The medal depicts his life’s great passions: nature, medicine, books, music, and art. I feel connected to him across two centuries when I wear it.
WHAT IS ON YOUR NIGHTSTAND?
Piles and piles of books! I’m currently rereading Elizabeth Gilbert’s sweeping botanical novel The Signature of All Things, which is set at the same time as American Eden.
WHAT GIVES YOU GOOSE BUMPS?
Seeing David Hosack on a Broadway stage in the Hamilton musical after several years of researching his life story.
WHAT IS YOUR BAD DAY BACKUP PLAN?
My motto (see above) gets me through a bad day with my optimism totally intact.
HOW DO YOU DEFINE SUCCESS?
Having a career—writing and teaching—that feels both playful and meaningful.
WHAT MAKES YOU FORGET TO EAT?
Archival research. When I’m hot on the trail of a historical figure through old letters and documents, I feel possessed—like I couldn’t stop if I wanted to.
FAVORITE WORK OF ART?
A gorgeous painting of persimmons that hangs above my dresser, done by my sister Jessica Honigberg. She is a classical musician AND a talented painter.
FAVORITE BOOK?
Fiction: any of the novels by my sister Elizabeth Kostova, who has been writing since we were little girls. Her novels have the fine-grained beauty of poetry. Nonfiction: Andrea Wulf’s The Invention of Nature, an absolutely riproaring biography of the great nineteenth-century scientist Alexander von Humboldt.
WHAT FICTIONAL CHARACTER DO YOU HAVE A CRUSH ON?
Can it please be on a non-fictional character? Because the more I learned about David Hosack, the more I came to love his boundless curiosity, sense of humor, compassion, and commitment to helping his fellow citizens live happy, healthy lives. Otherwise: Mr. Jarndyce of Bleak House, by Charles Dickens.
Victoria Johnson is an associate professor of urban policy and planning at Hunter College of the City University of New York. To learn more about Victoria, pick up a copy of her new book, American Eden: David Hosack, Botany, and Medicine in the Garden of the Early Republic, and follow her on:
Why ‘Follow Your Passion’ Is Terrible Advice
Graduation speeches, self-help books and well-meaning therapists preach the gospel of “following your passion.” It is predicated on the belief that if you follow your passion, you will be happy, and you will become successful in whatever you do. This is actually terrible advice. Stay with me.
Cal Newport, PhD, explores this misguided wisdom is detail in his book So Good They Can’t Ignore You: Why Skills Trump Passion in the Quest for Work You Love. He explains that this is problematic because it assumes:
1. People have preexisting passions.
2. If you match this passion to your job, then you’ll enjoy that job.
3. There is the perfect job somewhere out there waiting for you.
Research shows that many people don’t have preexisting passions and moreover, that workplace satisfaction is far more complex and more nuanced than simply matching innate interest with one’s job description.
Rather than following your passion, Newport argues that passion is something to cultivate and build. Hard work and mastery are the gateways to passion, not the other way around:
When you hear the stories of people who ended up loving what they do, this same pattern comes up again and again. They start by painstakingly developing rare and valuable skills — which we can call career capital. They then leverage this capital to gain rare and valuable traits in their career. These traits lead to a feeling of passion about their working life…Stop worrying about what the world owes you, it says, and instead, put your head down, and strive to become so good you can’t be ignored. It’s this straightforward goal—not some fairy tale about dropping everything to pursue a dream job—that will lead you toward a working life you love.
I wish you all the best,
Dr. Samantha Boardman
The Truth About Happily Ever After
What does it take to make a good marriage? A study at the University of Virginia explored this question in depth. The results challenge some of our fundamental beliefs about wedded bliss.
What happens in Vegas doesn’t stay in Vegas
According to the report, the past matters. The ghosts of the prior romances can haunt new ones. Those who had more romantic experiences…are more likely to have lower-quality marriages than those with a less complicated romantic history.
This is counterintuitive. In most areas of life, more experience is better. Not when it comes to marriage. The researchers believe that the more past relationships one has had, the more one is aware of what could have been. The tendency to compare the current partner with past partners can undermine marriage quality. Also, the more relationships someone has had, the more breakups they have had. The researchers argue that this can lead to a more jaundiced view of marriage.
Sliding versus deciding
How couples navigate their way through transitions is a predictor of marriage quality.
How couples hand choices seems to matter. Some make definitive decisions that move them from one stage of a relationship to another. Others are less intentional. Rather than consciously deciding how and when to transition to the next stage of the relationship, they slide through milestones without prior planning.
For example, couples who make a deliberate decision to live together as compared to those who say, “it just happened” had greater marriage quality later on. Having explicit conversations and making active choices about major milestones clearly matters.
A big fat wedding
Having a formal wedding is associated with higher marriage quality.
(This) may have to do with the act of having a public ceremony, which symbolizes a clear decision to commit to one’s marriage…Wedding ceremonies ritualize the foundation of a commitment.
According to the report, couples who had more than 150 guests attend their wedding had better marriages in the long run. It is possible that a large celebration filled with family and friends functions as a symbol of encouragement and support throughout the marriage.
Bottom Line
Remember that what you do before you say “I do” seems to have a notable impact on your marital future. So decide wisely.
I wish you all the best,
Dr. Samantha Boardman
