Education & Career Trends: September 14
Curated by the Knowledge Team of ICS Career GPS
- Experts are taken from an article published on psychologytoday.com.
Individuals with an aesthetic sensibility often possess a natural curiosity, a zest for exploration, and a drive to engage in creative pursuits. Embracing aesthetics can not only enrich our daily existence but also serve as a path to enhancing our overall health and well-being.
Consider, for instance, the way aesthetic encounters with landscapes, natural vistas like sunrise and sunset, or observing wildlife in their natural habitat tend to evoke feelings of serenity, relaxation, and harmony.
Here are six key factors that can aid you in cultivating an aesthetic mindset:
1. Cultivate Curiosity
- Curiosity, the inherent desire to comprehend the world around us, serves as a powerful motivator for learning throughout our lives.
- The pursuit of fresh knowledge and experiences is central to a fulfilling existence.
- Curiosity is often defined as the gap between what we know and what we want to know.
- This gap, this mystery, fuels our quest for answers, granting us moments of joy and satisfaction.
2. Embrace Novelty
- Novelty, the unexpected and the new stimulate our brains like nothing else.
- Our minds are naturally attuned to novel stimuli, which capture our attention by challenging our expectations.
- Predictable environments can lead to reduced focus and diminished arousal.
- Novelty can manifest in many forms – from encountering a painting for the first time to learning a new word or experiencing something pleasant or unpleasant.
- As filmmaker Federico Fellini once wisely noted, “You have to live spherically — in many directions. Never lose your childish enthusiasm — and things will come your way.”
3. Experience Awe
- Moments when we encounter something vastly greater than ourselves can provoke feelings of awe, astonishment, and wonder, while also promoting humility.
- Connecting with experiences that transcend our individuality offers numerous benefits.
- Awe-inspiring moments, such as listening to magnificent music, can help us put our anxieties in perspective.
- When confronted with the vast and indescribable, we often find our worries shrinking in significance.
4. Surround Yourself with Enrichment
- Enriched environments teem with distinctive and engaging stimuli, capable of significantly reshaping our brains.
- Biophilic design, for instance, encourages a connection with the natural world within indoor spaces.
- This theory posits that humans possess an innate inclination to bond with nature.
- Simple changes like introducing houseplants, selecting floral patterns, and incorporating natural colours (particularly greens and blues) can have a calming effect.
- Architectural elements like ceiling height, natural light, and room volume can also stimulate creativity.
5. Nurture Your Creative Spirit
- In our daily lives, we all encounter challenges that demand creative solutions.
- Creative responses are inherently original and unique, enabling us to forge novel and meaningful connections between information and ideas.
- Creativity thrives when we venture beyond the confines of what we already know, adopting a receptive attitude towards fresh ideas.
- Restricting ourselves to existing knowledge can limit our capacity for broader thinking or what is often termed ‘thinking outside the box.’
6. Shape Your Narrative
- We frequently engage in storytelling, sometimes without even realising it.
- Our brains are naturally drawn to narratives, and these narratives significantly influence our self-perception.
- These stories can become deeply ingrained and resistant to change.
- By changing our stories, we can fundamentally transform our lives.
- Seek to see the best in people rather than fixating on their flaws.
- Embrace the growth mindset – the belief that we are novices before we become experts – to gain confidence in learning new skills.
In summary, the positive emotional impact of aesthetic experiences can profoundly influence our mood and indirectly enhance our overall health and well-being. Everyday aesthetics offer us a means to improve our quality of life by recognising the extraordinary within the mundane. Aesthetic pleasure differs from physical pleasures like food or games; it has the capacity to sustain our interest for longer durations, making it an enduring source of joy in our lives.
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Have you checked out yesterday’s blog yet
How to Write a Cover Letter
(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in the article mentioned above are those of the author(s). They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of ICS Career GPS or its staff.)
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