How ‘soft fascination’ ease up work from home woes

For months now, some of us are working within the comforts of our home. And working from our homes is wonderful until we find the routine of ‘wake up-eat-work-rest-sleep’ combo all happening in one place too much to bear.

After spending most of my hours in front of my computer screen (like some of you probably do), I suffer from frequent headaches and itchy eyes. Not to discount my bad habits and posture, working inside four walls became dreadful.

Though I have observed a great difference of working inside my room the whole day versus working outside the house (where I can see the light changes from sunlight to twilight, feel the heat and wind against my skin), I never considered it as my daily work-from-home setup.

Not until I read a blog post about How ‘Soft Fascination’ Helps Restore Your Tired Brain. The term ‘soft fascination’ describes how “natural environments are just stimulating enough to gently engage the brain’s attention without unhelpfully concentrating it.”

While most of the work we do requires directed attention, which demands effort, immersing ourselves in nature relieves us from fatigue and restores our tired brain.

From How ‘Soft Fascination’ Helps Restore Your Tired Brain:

“[W]hat makes an environment restorative is the combination of attracting involuntary attention softly while at the same time limiting the need for directing attention,” wrote the authors of a 2010 study in Perspectives on Psychological Sciences. Nature, they added, seems to hit that sweet spot.

It’s been a few weeks since I prop up my stuff under some shade outside our house. And since then, I find myself in the flow, less stressed than usual, and barely having headaches anymore.

So if you can, maybe you’d give it a try, too.

Let me know how it’s working for you!

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