We talk much about physical hygiene now (with COVID-19). How come we never talk about mental hygiene?

Podcast

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What is hygiene?

Hygiene in Ancient Greek literally means ‘the art of health’ (or the technique [tekhne] of health).

Hugies (same word as hygiene) comes from From Proto-Indo-European *h₂yu-gʷih₃- (“long life”).

So in some ways, hygiene is to be healthy … and to be “healthy” means to have a long and strong life.

Then comes the question:

What is mentally healthy for you? What can give you a strong mind?

What sickens your mind?

The news. Social media. Your phone. Negative people with negative talk. We talk about ‘detoxing’ the body — why not detox your mind?

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How to become more mentally hygienic

To me, mental and bodily is the same. Whenever I read some bullshit online, it creates a hormonal cascade of norepinephrine, cortisol, and all these other stress hormones. It causes my body to physiologically deteriorate.

Thus as a consequence, I quit the news. I stopped reading, following, watching, or consuming the news since around 2014. It has been the best thing I have done for myself. The ultimate ‘productivity’ hack. Less bullshit in your means more opportunity and space for your mind to truly think interesting and deeper thoughts.

Adblock for your mind

We all got ad blockers on YouTube, social media, the internet, etc. I have not met a single programmer or computer scientist who doesn’t have some sort of AdBlocking plugin on Chrome, Firefox or Safari.

Thus makes me wonder:

What if we could create an Adblock of sorts for our own mind?

How could we do this?

Some thoughts: Adblock for the Mind >>>