![]() ![]() To experience awe, to fully open ourselves up to it, helps us to live happier, healthier lives. By taking us out of ourselves and expanding our sense of time, it counteracts the self-focus and narcissism that is the root of so much modern disenchantment. Proponents of this new science believe that experiencing awe may be an essential pathway to physical and mental well-being. But if you lean into that feeling even for just a moment, the benefits can be manifold. On an average day, a person might come to a place like Point Reyes without feeling anything more profound than a slight unburdening of the soul. Far from being an undefinable caprice, awe, to Keltner, is a panacea, an evolutionary tool that holds the key to humanity’s capacity to flourish in groups. His latest book, “ Awe,” describes two decades of research and arrives at a radical conclusion. But I knew that Keltner was going to argue that I’d just experienced something altogether more tangible.įor the last two decades, Keltner, a professor of psychology at UC Berkeley, has been a leading light of a scientific movement to examine our least-understood emotional state in all its gauzy complexity. It was at this point that a traditional account of a brush with awe might end. The ocean, in its immensity and unseen depths, seemed to harbor hidden meaning. Watching the interplay of sun and sea, I’d felt enlivened, gently electrified. Where did I go in that pregnant quiet before the intervention of Keltner’s bladder? Something had certainly stirred. “It’s the great antagonist of awe in later life!” “I’m 60, so I need to pee,” Keltner said suddenly, striding off down the slope. And then we stood in silence for a long time. “Yeah, that’s very nice,” he replied in a slow, portentous way, which I took to imply that I should stop commentating. “I love that highway of sun,” I said to Keltner, who was standing on my left, looking out to sea. The reflected shards glimmered through the vapor in the far distance, producing an irresistible illusion of endlessness. Out west, the sun was starting to drop into the ocean, its beams casting a wide band of light on the water. ![]() ![]() Wisps of condensation swept up and over the promontory, bathing my legs in cold air. ![]() A coastal fog bank was moving in, shrouding the horizon. He stopped at an outcrop of granite boulders, where the ground fell away toward Driftwood Beach and the wide, open Pacific beyond. We were halfway down the Point Reyes peninsula when Dacher Keltner wandered off-trail. Photography by Lucas Foglia for Noema Magazine. An ostentation of peacocks ( Do you think this is where the word ‘ostentatious’ comes from?)Ī flamboyance of flamingoes at the China Lights in New Orleans City Park China Lights photo ©2016 Edward Branley Sources:Ĭrow comic courtesy of offthemark.Henry Wismayer is a writer based in London.Albans (1486), in three parts on hawking, hunting, and heraldry. These names reflect our love of linguistics, and can be traced back to the fifteenth century when they were first published in The Book of St. Be it for the social interaction, mating season, or herd immunity (groups of animals are harder to attack than solitary ones wandering by themselves). Collective nouns are names used to represent a group of people, animals, or things.Īll animals collect into groups at some point in their lives. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |