“Be amazed at things outside yourself”
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“Be amazed at things outside yourself”
How you can reconnect with things way larger than yourself
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On holiday this summer, I found myself standing in front of a crystal-clear turquoise sea on a tiny island in Greece. There was nobody, except my family, around for miles. “Wow,” I said out loud. I didn’t want to take a photo and share it with others. I wanted to dive in. It was refreshingly cold. As I swam, I felt this calming sense of smallness in this vast sea. I felt filled with awe.
It got me thinking: where do we find awe? And in our post-pandemic world, do we need more awe in our lives?
Back to awe, after our weekly Rethink recap and recommendations:
I’m interested to know what you want to rethink in this newsletter.
suggested the idea of ‘self-reliance’ – interesting! Please share your ideas here.I’m on a binge of the Design Matters podcast. I’d recommend the episode with Alan Dye, VP of Human Interface Design at Apple.
I rewatched Es Devlin’s episode on Abstract: The Art of Design on Netflix. I was struck by the five ingredients of her design – space, light, darkness, time, and scale.
And finally, a warm welcome to all new Rethinkers! Please introduce yourself to the community here.
Where does awe come from?
When was the last time you felt awe? Was it in art, music, sports, food, or nature? I’ve tried to become more aware of things that make me think or feel ‘wow’ or ‘whoa.’ A star-filled sky, a baby’s tiny foot, a singer’s voice, or the leaves turning red on an enormous tree.
A tree and tiny toes are very different things in life, so how are they emotionally connected in our brains? To understand why, I dived into a wonderful book by psychologist Dacher Keltner called Awe: The New Science of Everyday Wonder and How It Can Transform Your Life.
Keltner defines awe as:
“The emotion we experience when we encounter mysteries that we don’t understand.”
After interviewing thousands of people around the world, Keltner discovered that we find awe in eight wonders of life: moral beauty, collective effervescence*, nature, music, visual design, spirituality, religion, life and death, and finally, an epiphany.
*Collective effervescence is a term introduced by French sociologist Emile Durkheim to describe the warm crackling feeling we get in a shared experience at say a wedding, graduation or even a funeral. It’s a deep sense of “we” not “me”.
Notably, money was not mentioned in stories of awe. No one mentioned their Nikes, car, or any kind of consumer purchase. Nor Instagram, Tik Tok or any other social media platform. “Awe occurs in a realm separate from the mundane world of materiality, money, acquisition, and status signally,” writes Keltner.
Awe is not the same as beauty; it is felt in the presence of things we don’t quite understand. It’s often experienced in vastness, like the expansive turquoise sea or the ceilings of a giant cathedral. But we also find the extraordinary in the ordinary: the shadows through trees, a perfectly poached egg, or even a child sleeping.
Being amazed at things outside of ourselves
Jane Goodall, the legendary primatologist, says chimpanzees feel awe from ordinary things because they have the capacity to “be amazed at things outside yourself.” Wow, I love that! In many ways, awe seems like a counterforce to the selfie narcissistic culture systemic today. Awe is not looking in but transports us out of a self-focused mindset.
Alchemy of wonder and fear
The 19th century painter John Ruskin compared awe to watching “a stormy sea from the shore.” Something beyond us with the power to inspire fear or respect. It gets to the root meaning of the word awe, which didn’t always mean ‘wonder’.
Awesome, and its sibling awful are suffixes of the word awe. The term awe stems from the Old English word ege, meaning “terror and dread,” which may have arisen from the Greek word áchos, meaning ‘pain.’ That is why awe can be beautiful but also challenging and unsettling. Like a violent storm, wildfire or watching a loved one die.
But the power of awe stems from its ability to prompt us to search for new forms of understanding. To move our minds toward mystery and the unknown.
As Albert Einstein once said: “The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands in the cradle of true art and science.”
So, if you’re like me and looking to reconnect with things way larger than yourself, fill your life with more awe.
Question: Where do you find awe? Please do share your experiences below.
Finally, if you enjoyed this newsletter, I think you’re like the one on “why nothing new happens in the known.”
Warmly,
“Be amazed at things outside yourself”
I find awe in the innocence of my five-year-old niece. It never ceases to amaze me how things in life can feel like they're falling apart, yet she is jumping, dancing, smiling, and finding pure amusement in the simplest things.
I also had many awe moments walking across Galata Bridge in Istanbul, Turkey. I had one every time I crossed that bridge towards the Egyptian Bazaar on the other side: the view of the mosques, the bazaar, the fishermen along the bridge, the noise, the colors, and the boats were breathtaking.
Great post <3
I have something I do every few weeks called nature therapy.
My therapist and I walk through a chosen wood, forest, fen and talk about issues but also find awe in so many things during our walk. Rising mist from a lake; a falling leaf's path to the ground; the sound of the wind simply passing your ears; a fast striding elder, smiling and enjoying their day. And yes, like Dangie' example, everyday things are there to be awe inspiring if we just take notice of them.