I'd love to think that if we had a more wonder prone society, we would meet each other with greater tolerance, with more openness, with more curiosity, with more empathy, and that it would create a more tolerant world.
Hello and welcome to the Psychology Podcast. Today's episode is sponsored by Unlikely Collaborators. Their mission is to untangle the stories that hold us back as individuals, communities, nations, and humanity at large, using the Perception Box lens. They do this through storytelling, experiences, impact investments, and scientific research. Unlikely
Collaborators the only way forward is inward. Later on in this episode, I'll talk a lot more about the Perception Box and how it leads to this episode, But right now, let me tell you about today's guest. Today, we welcome Monica Parker to the show. Monica is the founder of global human Analytics and change consultancy HATCHED, whose clients include blue chip companies such as LinkedIn, Google, Crudential, and Lego.
Her career has been nothing short of colorful, having been an opera singer, a museum exhibition designer, a policy director, a Chamber of Commerce CEO, and a homicide investigator. She's also a world renowned speaker, writer, and the author of the book The Power of Wonder. In this episode, I talked to Monica Parker about the power of wonder. In today's fast paced world, most people fail to notice the richness of life to become more wonder prone. Monica encourages
us all to slow down and pursue meaningful exploration. When we pay more attention to the world, we become more empathetic, resilient, and exuberant. Monica shares with us her Cycles of Wonder framework and how we can be more open and present in our daily lives. We also touch on the topics
of personality, post traumatic growth, mindfulness, and education. I really enjoy chatting with Monica about a topic that's very near and dear to my heart, and we also geek out about other things that are also near and dear to my heart, such as importance of mind wandering and productive daydreaming, for instance. I really appreciate Monica and her deep dive into the science and her appreciation of wonder in this world.
So that's fair, Ado, I bring you Monica Parker. Monica Parker, welcome to the Psychology Podcast.
Thank you Scott. It's great to be here.
Yeah, I've been when you talk to you for a long time. You wrote this book called The Power of Wonder, The Extraordinary Emotion that will change the way you live, learn, and lead. You have an interesting background. You know. I usually have scientists on my podcast, but I wanted to have you on the show. You have such a fascinating life and perspective on the topic of wonder. Correct me if I'm wrong. But were you a homicide investigator? I was.
Yeah, I was a homicide investigator for the Department of Justice in Florida. But I worked with the defense teams to try to get people off death.
Roat Okay, and then what followed that career? What was journalism? Was that immediately after? Or no?
So from there I went on to running nonprofits for quite a while and working with children with disabilities, and then from that point I went and got my master's degree in organizational behavior and then started my company called Hatch. So I like to think of myself as an applied scientist.
Yeah, nice, nice, I like that. Well, maybe a lot of people in the health professions helping professions are applied scientists. Okay, Well, when did you start to become interested in the topic of wonder. Did you experience the feeling of wonder at all when you were a homicide investigator? I want to pick up that thread a little bit for a second.
Yeah. Absolutely.
I think that I started to investigate wonder because in my work as a change manager, I wanted to help people be more resilient in change. And as I started to research, I found that there was a red line going all the way back to the work that I did as a homicide investigator, which is that some people who have such grim futures and have had terrible paths, just certain people are able to be more resilient, more buoyant.
And when I discovered really looking at it is that people who held their world with a great deal of wonder, we're just better able to deal with what life through it them. And so it's really picking this up about five years ago and tracking back to the work that I've been doing to see that there's this connectivity of wonder all the way through it.
Yeah. I think there's sort of like a taboo against having wonder for things that socially you're supposed to have discussed for And I think that's a problem that you know that you can be like shun socially shun for having wonder, you know. And there are a lot of situations right now in America. Someone doesn't agree with someone, they want to punch them in the face. But I like to just have wonder, you know. I'd just lean into that. Is that bad? Does that make me a
bad person? That I want to have wonder for things I don't even necessarily agree with.
Not at all?
And that's actually one of the powers I think of wonder is that we I think as humans, we become a bit obsessed with happiness. And I've had some people say, oh,
you hate happiness. But I'm not the grinch that stole happiness, I promise, But I feel that we are so focused on and always these positively valanced emotions, and it's just not a steady state, right Our world is full of really difficult things, And the beauty of wonder is that we can experience difficult things, hard things to discuss, and still feel a sense of wonder in that. And in that then I think we're able to better sort of metabolize what we're experiencing.
Nie and metabolize what we are experiencing. That's a very technical phrasing. There that's something an applied scientist would say. Okay, so that's one of the powers. I mean, you talked about a lot of powers. I want to go through some of the powers. What's a potential downside before I get to all the powers?
Well, a potential downside.
One of the things that I did research is potentially cults is a potential downside that if we become so in awe of a person, there is a degree of plasticity that occurs, and certainly what gets planted in that, you know, that sort of fertile ground could be something positive or negative. So I think that that could be
a potential negative. But other than that, I think that it's just an opportunity for us to see the world through a different lens, and through a lens that I think is more sustainable and more resilient than a lot of the positive thinking movement that is very focused on just happiness.
Yeah. Well, I'm glad that you distinguished these things. Is wonder always an emotion? I mean, I think it's interesting that you have in the site peddle the extraordinary emotion. You could have easily have said the extraordinary cognition and emotion interaction. You know, you could have that wouldn't be a sexy No.
I was going to say, you know, how books are written, we don't usually get to pick our titles. But I actually, when I describe it, I call it an emotional experience, So you know, it starts with openness to experience, which is not an emotion, it's a personality trait, moves into curiosity, which is the two one that we would have. That's sort of the sense of curiosity the noun of wonder, then moving into absorption, which could be a state or a trait, and then finishing with awe, which is what
I see as sort of the noun of wonder. You experiencing a wonder, And I wanted to link all of those concepts together into one, I guess, almost a cycle of wonder, because each time we experienced one of those components, were more likely to experience them in the future, and it becomes this additive upward spiral that's very positive for us.
I like that very Barbara Fredericks interview. I love that, Okay, So what is the difference between the experience of wonder and the experience of awe? Are they the same thing?
I see aw as a subset of wonder. So I see a as sort of the wow and woe. The way I describe it is it's watch wander, whittle, wow and woe, and the wow and woe the big fireworks at the end of the wonder cycle. But one of the reasons why I didn't just research AWE is because I I wanted people to not feel that it was this rare and fleeting thing that sort of if we were lucky enough, we chanced upon it. I wanted people to recognize that there's a process, it's not just about
the destination. That there's this you know, ramp that we take a taking off into AWE, and that that can have just as much value as the AWE experience as well. And so each one of the components has its own benefit and beauty to it, and of course AWE being something that's tremendously impactful for us. But I see it as a subset of wonder.
Now, where did you come up with these five elements? Does that you came of that from your own head of wonder?
It was when I started I started researching wonder and trying to exactly what you say to parse apart well, what is wonder as opposed to awe, and what I found that spiritually, etymologically that wonder was.
Different from awe. And then I started considering, well, we have the verb to wonder, how do we link these two pieces?
And what I kept coming back to is that openness to experience seems to be the foundation of all of this, and so starting understanding openness to experience, that people who are more open are more likely to experience these other elements. And then I just found that absorption seemed to be
this connecting point. And I think you and I actually talked about that that absorption could almost be a light flow state or a light self transcendental experience as opposed to maybe it's just a some people say it's actually a type of super deep curiosity. And so to me, that seemed to link those two concepts. And this is my thesis I guess that I've put forward.
No, it does help make some finally greened distinctions that we don't often see in the psychological literature. And like you said, each one of these five have their own sort of thing going on.
Is that a scientific expression thing going on?
Yes? It is, it is, Yeah, say the only one that I don't that I need a little more clarification on is wittle When I'm in a wittle state, what's going on? Is that a good thing? Do I want to be in a little seat.
It's about pairing back extraneous noise. It's about becoming super hyper focused. I think if we consider awe, yes, we could be slapped across the face with something that's really awe inspiring. But if we're defined one the quotidian, then we need to do that by finding a certain degree of presence. Right, we have to really be present in our environment. And if we're letting that chattering monkey mind go on and we're not paying attention, then we have
the we're going to miss potentially that awe experience. And so this is really about pairing back the attention that we tend to give to too much of things. And
I like the description. I don't know if you're familiar with Frank Lloyd Wright, but he talks about this design idea which he calls compression and release, which is that if you put people into a space that's very dark and compressed, and then you show them the differential of these big, beautiful rooms, that it makes it feel that much more impactful and so I think that this is also a way of reminding us that our brain notices difference, and if we're able to get into a zone where
we're very focused and present, then the awe experience will be I think, more easily seen or noticed noticed.
Yeah, I mean, are these these five elements they do they all interact with each other? Or is it like a hierarchy? Is it like you integrate?
I would? I think I see it as a cycle.
I see that it starts with that the openness to experience is the is the is the foundation, and then moving into curiosity that if we have some kind of epistemic curiosity what I sort of call deep curiosity, because of course there's so many different models of curiosity that I wanted to make it simple that there's sort of shallow curiosity, which is like smelling the milk to know if it's gone off, and then deep curiosity, which is just the exploration for the enjoyment of it, and then
moving from that into sort of falling down a rabbit hole into something that's quite deep. And then I describe AH as having two pieces. That's the wow and woe, because of course it's the experience and then the accommodation of it. And I felt that that was sort of a especially when they talk about that at the end of an all experience, your brain is forever changed.
I just thought, like, you know, mind blown is the woe? So to me, I find it quite descriptive the.
Say, and you know the hypnotist hypnosis field, that you can't no one can really be hypnotized against their will in a way, like most of the people are really open to the experience and being hypnotized, and and they become hypnotized. But is it possible to be closed minded and to suddenly encounter something where you're like, whoa, you know, like, can your mind be changed even if you are closed minded? Is there any hope for half of this country?
I think there's absolutely hope.
And the thing is, that's why the presence element is so important, because if it's such a big shift from what you experience, what you expect to it happened, you know, the expectation violation, which is the start of awe, then you will you will be forced to notice it. But if you are rushing, if you already have your preconceived notions of what the single right answer is, then yeah, you may miss it and some of the work of Glancy with the need for cognition as opposed to need
for cognitive closure. That connects also to sort of this deep curiosity and to our likelihood of experiencing AWE and I love the work that he does that says, you know, people who are high and need for cognition are more tolerant, and that is something unlike openness to experience, which there's debates about whether you can change that or not being
a personality trait. Some people I spoke to said absolutely not, and others that our brains are always changing, but need for cognition and need for cognitive closure are things we can practice so we can become less cognitively closed and more open in that sense, and that becomes sort of a mechanism to support some of the things that maybe we were born with or that were fixed by the time we're in our twenties.
Today's podcast is sponsored by Unlikely Collaborators. Their mission is to untangle the stories that hold us back as individuals, communities, nations, and humanity at large using the perception box lens. They do this through storytelling, experiences, impact investments, and scientific research. Today's conversation with Monica really illustrates the importance of expanding
the walls of our perception box. The perception box is the invisible mental box that we all live inside, and it can seriously hinder our ability to understand one another and to understand ourselves. In this episode, Monica vividly describes the wonder cycle, with each cycle having its own benefits and beauty offering an opportunity for discovery about ourselves and how we see the world world. She points out that
wonder is better than happiness. While happiness isn't sustainable all the time, we can cultivate a sense of wonder for our everyday moments, both the light and dark of our lives. From a perception box perspective, expanding our perception box helps us enter a self transcendent state of consciousness. When we are in a judgmental state of mind, we hold so many assumptions about ourselves and others, many which are very limiting.
The act of engaging in curiosity itself can expand our perception box, and once your walls are expanded, you can increase your sense of wonder and compassion for others who may be even very different from yourself. Curiosity is the gateway to wonder because it leads to surprising new information about others and the world. Also, in order to have wonder for something, you have to pay close attention to it, and that often requires letting go of all the stories
you've held about something. This letting go process expands your perception box and allows you to be more open to the wonder of everyday experience, just as Monica so brilliantly describes in this episode. To find out more about unlikely collaborators and the perception box, go to Unlikely Collaborators dot com.
Seems like a lot of other personality traits have elevants here, like what about the neuroticism, domean of personality or OCD, you know, like it seems like score very extremely high in those They might be inhibitors of wonder.
Absolutely, and what I think is really interesting is to see the work that's being done obviously with psychedelics and people with OCD that potentially the awe experience can short circuit that rumination. But absolutely what we're trying to get away from is the rumative mind and that chattering monkey mind and more into something that is absorbed and even we've talked about it daydreaming, but the positive type of daydreaming, not the rumative sort.
Yeah's I've spent my career looking at that.
I know.
So let's talk a little bit about the wander part. Not all minds that wander are loss. Is that right?
Exactly exactly?
It's the this is the curiosity element the verb of to wonder. And I find it particularly exciting because there I know that there is a habit that we have that we think we're being curious when we're sort of scrolling through our phones or that hopping from one idea
to another. But I am hoping that people will start to see the benefit in that deep curiosity and curiosity that has meaning, that is for the enjoyment of exploration, and that that again is a muscle that we can we can flex, that we can learn over time to use. And I love some of the more recent research showing that curiosity may be the difference between whether we experience
post traumatic stress as opposed to traumatic growth. I saw some work I think it was cashed and that said that, and I think that it's really interesting as we start to unfold what curiosity can be for us other than just something that frankly was you know, a lot of people see it or used to see it as a negative, right, curiosity killed the cat, and so recognizing the benefit of deep curiosity and for the exploration of.
It, curious people are curious what killed the cat?
There you go, and curiosity is it's heart. It's the I guess, the foundation of empathy as well. Right, we know that if you are empathetic, it's really about being genuinely curious about another human being. And I also find the interpersonal elements of curiosity particularly fascinating. The research that shows that if you ask someone questions about themselves that are genuinely curious, that person will find you more attractive, which is at a great for anybody who's dating in
the world. You know, to be genuinely curious, and I think that that that interpersonal element. Doctors perform better when they're genuinely curious about their patients. And so this interpersonal element of curiosity to me is very exciting as well.
I'm super interested in that as well. I want to not gloss over this PTSD versus post traumatic growth distinction you make. It's a very important one. You can also be experiencing PTSD at the same time that you are experiencing post traumatic growth. They're not either or situations. But can you go more into what people who are suffering from ruminative trauma how, you know, how can some of how can Wonder help them? Be more explicit about that.
Yeah, well what I have You're more the expert in this probably than I am. But what I've discovered is that it's really about being able to to some degree, and I'm know that we've talked about the default mode network and that sometimes it gets a little bit blamed for some things. It's not always bad, but it's about being able to start to short circuit that in a
positive way. So that's the rumination. Also, there was some research done around that there's a hippocampal role in people who experience post traumatic stress, and that Wonder does trigger the hippocampus, and certainly curiosity does as well, So there might be some way that it's increasing the strength of the hippocampus in some way that allows people to be more resilient. It was a twin study that yeah, showed that small those with the smaller hippocampus were more likely
to experience post traumatic stress. So I think that there's a lot of different ways that it can connect in, but obviously that's still being explored. And as not being a researcher, I'm just sort of like a ganet, just collecting all the different little bits that I can and seeing the picture that it creates.
Yeah, but you're very curious that the research literature, and you're you're setting a lot of stuff I can tell. I can tell you were really citing a lot of the literacy.
And I love scientists.
I love what you all do, and I think it's so exciting, and I love seeing that that sense of exploration that scientists make their entire living.
Over you too. I love when people blame things on their brain areas, like, you know, my small hippocampus made me do it. You know, like we could start at a certain level, we can blame everything on.
I think the symptoms is like bad brain brain area.
If we want to find something, you know, every time we don't eat, we can do it. Every time every time we eat something we know we're not supposed to, we can blame our prepunt the cortexic.
There you go.
I feel like we live in a society right now where everyone likes blaming everyone else for their problems, and people are not really taking responsibility for themselves. Even blaming a brain area is not really taking responsibility. It's still blaming something else, even though it's part of you.
I agree, and I think that it's making people very fragile. And one of the things that I do love about the benefit of wonder is I think that it makes us stronger. I think it allows us to be more resilient. It pushes us forward rather than retreating. Right we are when we're in a wonder state, we're desirous of moving ourselves forward, either into new experiences or new ideas, or to new people, And that I think is just contrary
to fragility, to judgment, to intolerance. So, you know, maybe I'm being a Pollyanna, but I'd love to think that if we had a more wonder prone society, we would meet each other with greater tolerance, with more openness, with more curiosity, with more empathy, and that it would create a more tolerant world.
Wouldn't that be nice?
Amazing?
How does wonder like shift our perceptions, you know, of of reality and maybe even shift what's possible in our lives, you know, I mean isn't it. You know, we often get these these blinders on or you know, yeah, we get these blinders and we get stuck in these in our perception boxes, as my friend calls it. Yeah, so like what what how can we get out of it?
I think that it allows us to start connecting the dots in ways that maybe we hadn't before. And of course, if we want to throw in psychedelics in the mix, I mean that certainly can be a mechanism for changing the way that we see the world. But I don't think that we all just have to go and take mushrooms in order to have that experience. I think that
we can experience it through big wonder moments. We can experience it through deep meditation, which is sort of slow thought that helps us get us closer to wonder.
But to me, it's just.
About being actually looking at our world as opposed to assuming what we think we're going to see. And that is one of the challenges, is that we're always so busy, always moving forward, always believing we know what the next thing will be, that we miss so many opportunities for just amazing, mind blowing wonder, and yet we just rush right by it. You know, the perfect autumn leaf, or a beautiful strain of music, or even just the way
that you look into somebody else's eyes. But we're just in such a hurry that we're missing so much of it.
Ah or whoa, whoa, whoa?
Who was deeper than wow in your five part model.
It's it's the last. It's the last, It's the last.
But yep, yeah, whoa silocybin wow in marijuana.
Interesting?
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Le bit Yeah.
Absolutely, I use that thank Goodness eason to describe anything that helps us slow down. So it's going to be something that definitely helps us create a presence practice that gives us a greater degree of attentional control. So again, meditation being one of those ways that we can do it. Narrative journaling, nostalgia, I think is even a fascinating way.
Just reflecting daydreaming could be a slow thought practice, positive constructive daydreaming, not the rumative kind, gratitude practice or prayer, anything that allows us to create that sort of small self and to explore our inner workings in our inner world in a way that is very present in our external world, rather than moving through an autopilot, which we do so much of. And also I think that our
technology doesn't necessarily help. I think that we have corporate cultures that are very much about move fast and break things and there's not a lot of time or respect given to slowing down, and I would love to see. You know, there's a slow food movement, there's slow slow teaching, slow sex, and I think that there can be slow thought and that it can really help us connect to our inner workings and our inner being.
Wow. Yeah, you do cover such a wide range of examples in your book, which is something I really liked about it and probably something you can bring to the table. I mean, this is why you're uniquely poised to write such a book. You know, you cover it from architecture and which I've definitely experienced whoe you know for lots of architecture, the love experience. For sure sex. You just talked a little aout slow sex. You can double click on that in a second sleep. What does woe sleep look
like like? Is that like when you really feel rested well.
I spoke to.
A couple of different sleep scientists and what they told me was that it's really about sleep being the precursor to being able to have that attentional control. Because we know that if we are sleep deprived, then our brains are using just the bare minimum of resources to just get through the day and it's certainly not going to take the time to notice what's going on around us.
It's not going to want to slow down, and so it's about having that be part of the slow thought practice in order to be able to find the ability and the desire to have intentional control.
Wow. Yeah, it's so true. I mean, it's so true that when you have not slept well, it makes much harder inhibit your ruminations that we all have.
And I'm an insomniac, I know it. It's terrible. I can understand why it's a form of torture right to deprive people of sleep.
Yeah, absolutely terrible. What about its situations in your life? You know, not just sleep, but what about situations in your life in general where you're in a very fast paced environment. How can you use wonder to maybe slow down your brain even in a very fast biased mindent. You know, let's say you're in a football field and you can't just tell everyone hold off if you're the quarterback, you know, like, I need to have some more time to get into my wonder state.
I think that that's probably where you start thinking about a wonder mindset. So it's not about doing it in that moment but it's about becoming so in dept at utilizing the tools that help you get closer to wonder that then when you're in this moment that is very fraught with energy, that you can still tap into it a little bit, like you see these people who are master yogi's and who can dial it up at any time.
It's about that, and I see it, I really do see it as a practice that the more that we see to find it, the more we recognize it, the more that we write about it, the more that we share it, wonder share it is wonder multiplied that then we become more adept at being able to draw it down in the times that we need it, even if it's in a chaotic environment.
So it's really a resource available to us any time. Is that what you're saying?
Absolutely, we just need to be willing to find it and then to hone the skills in identifying things that make us feel wonder and to be able to see it in just the quotidian in our day to day life and in terrible times, you know, to be able to see it when you're watching about the war in Ukraine, or to see it when we see these terrible earthquakes, that there's still wonder there, because I think that the negative news cycle definitely wants to kill our empathy, it
wants to kill our awareness, It almost wants to stunt our recognition of humanity, and I think that wonder is a way to still stay connected to that.
And deal with an emergency.
It's interesting because I did speak to a gentleman who deals with people who come back from crisis situations, so things like plane crashes or being castaway. He actually works with people who are kidnapped and held hostage and then released in order to help them reintegrate. And what he found is that people who are able to find wonder even in these terrible situations, that then because of that, it gives them a clarity that allows them to problem solve,
to be more aware. And I spoke to gentleman Stephen Callahan who was adrift for something like eighty days and he wrote a very famous book about it, and he said that he was certain that the sense of wonder he felt from the beauty in the environment that he was in helped him have the alacrity to be able to survive in an environment where if he had been sort of terror struck all the time that he wouldn't have been able to see the answers that existed in his sphere.
Oh wow, So I have you used the phrase wonder struck?
Mmmm?
Is that a phrase you've used?
Yes? And he uses.
It nice voice.
Nice.
So so if you're if you're flying an airplane and it's going down, you know, and you're about twenty seconds away from dying, and still you can still harness the power of wonder.
I don't I don't want to give anybody any any bad advice. I think that's where probably the checklist manifesto comes in helpful. But I think if we're looking at something that's more long term, okay, that and some of this, there is some really interesting research around the people that are able to manage in the first few weeks of a crisis, and a lot of that has to do
also with having a sense of purpose. And I see purpose and meaning being very connected to wonder, to these wonder elements, epistemic curiosity being about meaningful curiosity all tending to have some sort of purpose to it. So I think that there is there's something there about being able to find a purpose quickly, and that that also helps booy us.
What did Steve Jobs say in his deathbed? Do you remember?
I don't.
It was oh wow, wow, wow, there you go. And people think maybe he was seeing something. Probably absolutely, but he was, you know, he was always kind of, I think, open to experience.
He was someone who was My recollection was that he was a master meditator. He was someone that was very connected. And I love William James's description of the Filmiest of Screens and that's really I think what Wonder helps us do is that it allows us to, at different times to sort of peel back that veil and see what is on the other side. And I enjoyed talking to scientists and asking them, well, what do you think is on the other side, and most of them said, that's just not something.
That science can answer.
And so part of why I enjoyed this, and I was actually told by some of the scientists, you're released from being able to be able to have the conversation about the soul of this topic as opposed to just the science. And I think that that's where you move from science to soul is when you part that filmyus of screens and probably what Jobs was experiencing sort of that transition and seeing what's on the other side.
I think a lot of people transfer from soul to science when they enter grad school. Just talk about how soul is grad school is okay? Anyway, What are wonder bringers and how do we find them?
Yeah, so wonderbringers are, I mean, a great way to know if you're in the presence of a wonderbringers. If it gives you goosebumps, that can certainly be an indication of I know I did, I mean, I'd write about it.
Sex.
Sex can be all there are types of sex that can be wonderbringing. Tends to be in a committed relationship, tends to be very deep, but you can have that can be one of the wonderbringers. But why I want people I see that exploring what your wonder bringers are as something that is a real self exploration and a way to start to understand what it is that gets
you excited, what makes you feel alive. And I wish that it could almost become a language that we use, sort of like a love language in a sense, to say to people that that's my wonder bringer. If music is your wonder bringer, it's not just about a hobby. If hiking is your wonder bringer. It's fundamental to who you are as a human and you have to have it in order to have an enriched life. And so the more that we can start to understand, do they occur in nature?
Are they cognitive?
Like I'm a nerd, I love almost all of my wonderbringers are very cognitive in nature or in you know the type that they are, and is it or is it interpersonal? Is it with other people? And starting to have that conversation with yourself about what gives you that sense of wonder I think could be really powerful for our own understanding of ourselves.
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dot oorg. That's sacoaching dot org. I look forward to welcoming you in December. How can we teach us in schools?
I think that I'm actually working with some educators to create a teacher's guide that is that's associated with the book, and hopefully that will come out towards the end of the year. Wonder is such an amazing mechanism for teaching and learning. We know we talked about the hippocampus that if something gives you, if it really surprises you, if it gives you a sense of that deep curiosity or even the wow, then it will embed in your long
term memory. But I also believe that teachers who teach from a place of wonder are able to impart that enthusiasm and that genuine curiosity to the children that they're teaching.
And my concern is.
That we are teaching children in schools to the single right answer. So everything is very codified and there and I understand teaching is complicated, that this is how I guess the systems are set up. But you look at the benefits of say a Montessori and then you get kids into middle school, high school, and it's so regimented.
And I believe that teaching kids that.
There's a single right answer in school, they grow up to be adults that believe there's a single right answer. And so I think that having schools that are not wonder based enough, we're developing children who are higher in that need for cognitive closure and not as high in
this need for cognition. They don't enjoy the exploration because they're not given the chance to, and so they grow up to adults that think that everything has a single right answer, and when they find it, that gives them comfort. And I believe that actually taking wonder out of our schools is creating a more intolerant populace.
But that's just a theory.
Taking it out of the schools. It was never in the schools.
Some schools, I think some schools have it. I think you look at Montessori. When you're little, you know you're.
Allowed to play, but then it's removed as we get older. And I was lucky I had some teachers who are very wonder based, and I still remember the lessons that had But it ends up being very very individual to the teacher that you have. And I would love to see more teaching and learning using wonder as a mechanism for for long term learning and for life long learning.
Wouldn't it be wonderful? M M Yeah, I don't. I don't think I ever felt a sense of wonder taking the SATs.
No, standardization is not gonna is not gonna help us, and you know, it's it's unfortunate that that's that's what has been created with education, and then you get into master's degrees and PhDs. I spoke to one gentleman that said that MBAs in particular, that we're creating basically psychopaths. So my hope is that it becomes just that we're allowed more freewheeling exploration, more play, and that we don't see that as contrary.
To learning, or is it is the causality there that psychopaths are attracted getting an NBA could be.
But of course there's a lot of but there's a lot of competition. I think that's the other challenge as well, is that children are learning a sense of competition as opposed to collaboration. So young, you know, they're being told you you sit in this, you know, this pecking order in your intelligence or your performance. And I think when we start to do that, then they become I guess, effectuated to this idea that this is how we have to behave we become we have to rank ourselves with
other people. And that's just on steroids in an MBA program. Not I'm not dissing MBAs, but you do see that there's a lot of competition, which I don't think is necessarily healthy.
I got, yeah, I'm not dissing psychopaths either. No, no offense to MPAs or psychopaths. We're just stating some packs. No, okay, so o d dreaming in schools. I've argued for many years, that we need more, we need dadreaming time in schools.
Absolutely, and that what was that article was something like a wandering mind as an unhappy mind. That just did that set any kind of daydreaming science back so much.
I wasn't a fan of that.
No, it was terrible.
And they said, see, we knew daydreaming was bad for you. Absolutely don't believe that it's good. And you and I have had this conversation. It's good for our brain to construct future scenarios, for us to play out different activities in our mind. And I think that absolutely children need that day dreaming time. Even better at that day dreaming time is you know, in nature or an environment that is that's very free cognitively. But again it's recognizing the
different types of day dreaming. We don't want that rumination, We don't want it to be so distracting that we're not able to get things done. But that positive constructive daydreaming, I don't see how that can't be good for especially a developing brain.
Yeah, and that's not They weren't referring to positive constructive dreaming. They were speaking about mind wandering, which specifically is scientifically defined is getting off track, you know, and you have a when you have a goal, you know, how many times does your mind wander wander away from the goal? But it's also a very goal directed way of thinking.
And yes, and is maybe there's a reason it's wandering because there's something that perhaps your brain.
Would find more more intriguing.
Yes, yes, yes, wonder there you go. I have ever thought about that? You ever thought about the word wonderful?
Yes?
And wonder filled, which apparently is also the strap line for oreos.
So I couldn't use so much.
I know interesting. I've been eating Goloden free oreos lately and they're pretty good. Pretty good. You know, I get no money for saying that. You know, what are some of the things you want readers to take away from your wonder Field the book?
I think the.
Key element for me is that it's this idea that there's more that what we see in our day to day life. What we're rushing through is it's just really a fraction of what there is to experience, either in this reality or another one. And the way that I describe it, it's sort of like a tapping herd through the wall. I think we all know that there is something else there, but there are all these reasons why
we block ourselves from trying to explore it. And I think that wonder is the potentially the key to that door. And certainly when you get into psychedelics, that can be yes, kicking the door down, We'll say. But that's the key thing that I'd like people to take away is that there's more. And I do believe that if we meet each other with openness, with curiosity, with presence, that we will be.
A more tolerant world.
And that is something that I don't think.
I'm a Pollyanna.
That's just something i'd like to see all.
I love that you really think that if we culture, each of us went through the practices in your book individually, that collectively would be a better society.
I do believe that.
Now I'm not I'm not thinking that. Yes, then if somebody is a horrible human being, that they're fractured, that they're terrorists, that somehow doing a wonder practice will fix them. I don't believe that, but I think that the average person can really benefit from that, and it will create more pro social behaviors that connect us to one another rather than behaviors that push other people away, and in that is tolerance.
Gotcha, tolerance, you know, tolerance and even to maybe even just love love as well. Everyone is like stops at tolerance. That's good enough, that's all you.
Could we just have that. I'd be happy with that.
You'd be happy with just that right now? Yeah, yeah, I hear you, I hear you. So to help people, you know, they're feeling inspired, they're listening to you in this episode, and they want to do something to teach them how to take a daily wonder walk.
Absolutely so a wonderwalk great if you can do it outside. Our brain notices newness, so we love novelty. If it can be a different newness things that they said.
That would be.
Very nice, very focused. That's not what you said. Okay, it's not, but you.
Could take it. You could take a.
Walk towards nudice. But we notice newness, so something that has some element of novelty in it, an element that allows us to either see something that's big, like the sea or a mountain. But if you can't go big, then go small to notice the little details that you might have missed otherwise. And I find that at the end of a wonder walk, if you just do a little bit of journaling. I know if people aren't wild about journaling, but it really does help your brain hold
on to the experience. If you just do a little bit of writing and leave the phone, You've got to leave the phone because that's just going to take you away from the experience of your wonder walk and just yeah, you'll lose the opportunity. I love the research that I think it was Keldner, but it was certainly about awe that they set people on walks and one on a regular walk and one on an all walk, And the people that came back from the all walk even just
had bigger smiles in their selfies. So I think that that says it all. So just a news route, something where you're not distracted, and if you can't go big, go small.
This episode gave me a big smile. Oh thanks Scott, Yeah too, I feel more good glad to hear that. So you think we all all can do things, even just maybe simple things in our day to become more wonder prone. Yeah. Do you think that doing this will give us a greater sense of magic for the world?
Oh goodness, I certainly hope so. And I don't see how it can't.
Because you're going to start to see things in a way that you hadn't before. You will recognize that actually you believe that you have everything so figured out, but in fact you don't, And there is so much magic that we just move through.
I mean even for me.
Flying, I fly so much for work, but every time that plane takes off, I am just blown away. It's the most miraculous, magical thing. I am in the air in a metal tube. It's incredible. But we just stop seeing the magic that's around us. And I guess that's one of the things that I hope people will start to do, is to see the magic, to marinate in the magic, and to allow yourself to be changed by the magic.
Yes, changed, you know, from a state of fear and anxiety to wonder, you know, if maybe have a fear of mine, maybe shifting that a little more to.
The curiosity of curiosity magic. Absolutely.
Yeah, Well, thanks for a magical podcast chat and congratulations again on the publication of your book. It's no easy feats writing a book, but then write a book and wonder, you know, and trying to have the magic jump out of the pages is no easy feed either. But you succeeded and yeah, congratulations, thanks for thanks for finally being on my show.
Thank you so much, Scott. It was awesome, wonderful, excellent.
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