Michael Easter, a writer and professor known for his book The Comfort Crisis, discusses the necessity of embracing discomfort. He reveals how modern conveniences can hinder our mental and physical health. Easter shares his transformative experience participating in a challenging caribou hunt in Alaska, where he confronted intense hunger, solitude, and boredom. He delves into the Japanese concept of misogi, advocating for personal growth through facing life's difficulties, and highlights the evolutionary benefits of solitude and introspection.
Incorporating discomfort into our everyday lives can lead to personal growth and improved mental well-being.
Our reliance on modern comforts is negatively impacting our health and hindering personal growth and resilience.
Reducing electronic device use and embracing boredom can unlock the benefits of increased creativity, lower anxiety, and improved focus and productivity.
Deep dives
The Benefits of Embracing Discomfort
The podcast explores the idea that our comfort-driven lives are negatively impacting our mental, physical, and spiritual well-being. The guest, Michael Easter, shares his personal experience of getting sober and how facing discomfort led to positive transformations in his life. He discusses the concept of Masogi, a Japanese practice of undertaking challenging outdoor activities, and recounts his own Masogi experience of participating in a month-long caribou hunt in Alaska. Through these challenges, Easter highlights the importance of incorporating discomfort into our everyday lives and the benefits it can bring.
The Consequences of Excessive Comfort
The podcast highlights the downsides of living in a world of convenience and comfort. It discusses how our reliance on modern comforts like climate control, smartphones, and easy access to food has led to negative health consequences such as chronic diseases, obesity, and a lack of meaning in life. The comfort creep phenomenon is mentioned, where our perception of comfort shifts over time and we constantly seek new comforts without feeling more satisfied. This lack of discomfort and challenges in our daily lives can hinder personal growth and resilience.
The Power of Embracing Discomfort in Personal Growth
The podcast explores the idea that incorporating discomfort into our lives can lead to personal growth and improved mental well-being. It mentions the concept of time perception, highlighting how new and novel experiences slow down our sense of time, providing a greater sense of awareness and allowing us to make the most of our moments. The guest also shares his own experience of hunger and how facing true physiological hunger can lead to a better understanding of our relationship with food and help in achieving weight loss goals. Additionally, the importance of engaging in physical activities that mimic the challenges our ancestors faced is discussed, emphasizing the benefits of moving beyond the controlled environment of a gym and embracing more natural and demanding physical challenges.
Embracing Discomfort: The Importance of Boredom
The podcast discusses the effects of constantly using electronic devices to combat boredom. The speaker highlights the evolutionary purpose of boredom, which alerts us to find more productive activities. The overreliance on smartphones and other devices for entertainment hinders creative thinking, productivity, and introspection. The speaker recommends embracing boredom and reducing electronic device use to unlock the benefits of increased creativity, lower anxiety, and improved focus and productivity.
Solitude vs. Loneliness: Rediscovering the Power of Being Alone
The podcast explores the distinction between loneliness and solitude. The speaker shares their experiences of being alone in the Alaskan wilderness and the liberating effect it had on them. They discuss how modern society, driven by constant digital connectivity, has led to a lack of genuine solitude. The speaker emphasizes the importance of carving out time to be alone, as solitude allows for introspection, creative thinking, and personal growth. They encourage building the capacity to be alone to foster a richer and more fulfilling life.
Our world has never been more convenient and comfortable. With just a few taps of our fingers, we can order food to our door, access endless entertainment options, and keep our climate at a steady 72 degrees. We don't have to put in much effort, much less face any risk or challenge, in order to sustain our daily lives.
In some ways, this quantum leap in humanity's comfort level is a great boon. But in other ways, it's absolutely killing our minds, bodies, and spirit.
My guest says it's time to reclaim the currently-hard-to-come-by but truly essential benefits of discomfort. His name is Michael Easter, and he's a writer, editor, and professor, and the author of The Comfort Crisis: Embrace Discomfort to Reclaim Your Wild, Happy, Healthy Self. Michael first shares how his experience with getting sober helped him discover the life-changing potential of doing hard things, before digging into what fleeing from discomfort is doing to our mental and physical health. We then discuss the Japanese idea of misogis, which involves taking on an epic outdoor challenge, and why Michael decided to do a misogi in which he participated in a month-long caribou hunt in the backcountry of Alaska. Michael shares what he learned from the various challenges he encountered during his misogi — including intense hunger, boredom, solitude, and physical exertion — as well as what research can teach all of us about why we need to incorporate these same kinds of discomforts into our everyday lives.
