How Nature Restores Your Ability to Focus | Dr. Marc Berman & Dr. Andrew Huberman

00:00:00.000 | If you were at this point to give a kind of a best recommendation in terms of how to reset one's attentional abilities, what are the basic requirements?

00:00:12.700 | So I think there's a lot there, too. I think you have to be really mindful about directed attention fatigue. So if you're trying to study or you're at work and you're having a really hard time concentrating, I would recommend not just trying to power through.

00:00:33.540 | If you have the ability and the time to take a break, I recommend that you stop and you take a break. And what kind of break do I recommend you do? I recommend that you go and try to find some nature and walk in nature.

00:00:46.540 | What if you're having a hard time getting into a focused state at all? It's not that you fatigued it that day. You know, so many people that I hear from who listen to the podcast and elsewhere will say, you know, they get up, they did their best to get their sleep.

00:01:03.220 | They get their morning sunlight, they hydrate, they drink their caffeine, they sit down to their computer and they just can't focus.

00:01:09.200 | And then they start thinking like, do they have brain fog? Do they need a nootropic? You know, all these questions start to arise. What are your thoughts?

00:01:19.120 | I think in some sense, even though you might be very well slept and very well fed, you could still be in a directed attention fatigue state.

00:01:27.600 | So I think, yeah, if you can't concentrate right in the beginning of the morning, then you should go for a walk right.

00:01:32.900 | That should be the first thing you should do. Or if you don't have access to nature, maybe listen to some nature sounds or watch a nature video or something like that.

00:01:41.820 | We find that all those things can be beneficial. Even looking out the window to nature can be beneficial. Looking at a picture, you've got a picture of nature here, looking at a picture of nature can be beneficial.

00:01:51.320 | So I would say anytime you're having trouble concentrating, it doesn't matter if it's at the beginning of the day or the end of the day or the middle of the day.

00:02:00.240 | I would recommend that you take some kind of break with nature and it could be simulated nature, like listening to nature sounds, watching a nature video, looking at nature pictures or even better is if you can actually get out and interact with nature.

00:02:16.200 | Because Steve Kaplan used to also talk about these other elements that might be important for a restorative environment.

00:02:23.120 | One was that the environment had to have extent, meaning that it had to have enough interesting things to look at.

00:02:30.920 | Now, it doesn't mean that it has to be Yosemite Valley, which has incredible spatial extent.

00:02:37.060 | I mean, it's huge. It's enormous.

00:02:38.720 | But, you know, like near my office at the University of Chicago, we have this Japanese garden, the Garden of the Phoenix.

00:02:48.040 | It might be only like 100 square meters. It's pretty small.

00:02:52.340 | But, man, it's still got a lot of extent.

00:02:55.500 | You know, it's got a walking path. It's got a little waterfall.

00:02:59.080 | You can see Lake Michigan.

00:03:00.520 | So that's one element.

00:03:03.660 | Another thing about the nature is that you want it to be compatible with your goals.

00:03:11.560 | So what do I mean by that?

00:03:13.260 | If you've got a big exam and you haven't studied, I'm not sure going for the walk in nature is going to work.

00:03:19.980 | You better use that time to study.

00:03:23.880 | But if you can't concentrate, you know, trying to power through, I don't think it's going to be compatible with your goals.

00:03:29.300 | I think going in for the nature walk is compatible with your goals.

00:03:33.340 | So that's another thing that's going to be really important.

00:03:36.660 | And the other concept that Steve used to talk about being important is that the environment needs to give you the sense of being away,

00:03:43.780 | that you're kind of removed from your current environment, almost like a change of mindset.

00:03:51.720 | And again, that doesn't mean you have to go really, really far away, but you might want to go to a location that's not at your desk.

00:03:57.820 | So maybe don't sit at your desk and look at the nature pictures.

00:04:00.940 | Maybe you want to go somewhere else and look at the nature pictures.

00:04:04.020 | And this kind of distance, I think, could be helpful.

00:04:07.520 | I don't know if Cal Newport talks about this in his deep work, but, you know, I've heard people talking about in an office, you might want to have like a separate area of your office for deep work.

00:04:16.700 | And I think this kind of sense of being away is related to that.

00:04:19.720 | You kind of want to get out of your current state and go into this other environment that might be able to replenish those resources.

00:04:28.120 | So I'm hearing that there are two sides of the coin.

00:04:30.220 | One is to designate an area for work that's truly for deep work.

00:04:34.300 | Yes.

00:04:34.760 | I followed Cal's recommendation, and now I have an area in my basement, believe it or not.

00:04:39.100 | And there has never been a phone in that basement.

00:04:42.920 | There are no phones allowed in that basement.

00:04:44.560 | That's not a rule.

00:04:45.900 | It's not a protocol.

00:04:46.740 | It's a policy.

00:04:47.500 | Right.

00:04:47.740 | And I remember he talked about in his, he has this library office that he goes to, and I very much agree with that.

00:04:54.060 | Yeah.

00:04:54.300 | Now, I do get internet access down there a little bit if I need to look for papers, but I've been turning off Wi-Fi on my computer when I go down there to work.

00:05:02.780 | And I get more done in three hours down there than I would in three weeks above ground.

00:05:08.960 | Yeah.

00:05:09.240 | I swear.

00:05:09.900 | It's a huge effect.

00:05:11.300 | Yeah.

00:05:11.980 | The other side of the coin is this business of getting out into a different environment, and it sounds like these walks or these ventures into nature don't take terribly long.

00:05:22.160 | How long does one need to do this in order to get the enhancement and focus and working memory?

00:05:26.320 | Like, what do the data say?

00:05:27.400 | Yeah.

00:05:27.640 | I mean, when we did the, our walking study was 50 minutes, but I've seen other studies with as little as 20 minutes.

00:05:34.460 | You can get the effects.

00:05:35.480 | For cognitive enhancement.

00:05:36.340 | For cognitive enhancement.

00:05:37.240 | And there's actually been some interesting studies with kids with ADHD.

00:05:41.160 | And they find attention benefits for these kids with ADHD after just a 20-minute walk in nature that actually was similar to, like, a dose of Ritalin.

00:05:52.500 | So that was pretty incredible.

00:05:54.380 | So it doesn't have to be super long.

00:05:55.980 | And when we were doing the slideshow of nature pictures, that was only for about 10 minutes.

00:06:02.020 | So it doesn't have to be a really, really long immersion.

00:06:05.400 | There have been other studies that have suggested, like, overall, you might want to get about two hours a week in nature.

00:06:13.160 | So it's a really long immersion.

00:06:14.160 | So it's a really long immersion.

00:06:15.160 | So it's a really long immersion.

00:06:16.160 | So it's a really long immersion.

00:06:17.160 | So it's a really long immersion.

00:06:18.160 | So it's a really long immersion.

00:06:19.160 | So it's a really long immersion.

00:06:20.160 | So it's a really long immersion.

How Nature Restores Your Ability to Focus | Dr. Marc Berman & Dr. Andrew Huberman

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