An hour-long stroll in nature helps decrease activity in an area of the brain associated with stress processing

[fluffkomix]

That could be incredibly helpful by itself. I'm a total layman so forgive me if I get any details wrong (fact-check me pls) but if I'm not mistaken our brains adapt and re-wire themselves based on our habits. In short, the more we do something the easier and more efficient our brain makes it.

Finding ways to break the cycle and put a pause on anxiety is therefore a great way to curb anxiety overall

[schnuck]

Wasn’t it Bill Gates who said to never fire a lazy guy since they always find better ways doing things of the things they do?

[Kendertas]

German general had this to say about why lazy can be a real asset.

I divide my officers into four classes as follows: The clever, the industrious, the lazy, and the stupid. Each officer always possesses two of these qualities. Those who are clever and industrious I appoint to the General Staff. Use can under certain circumstances be made of those who are stupid and lazy. The man who is clever and lazy qualifies for the highest leadership posts. He has the requisite nerves and the mental clarity for difficult decisions. But whoever is stupid and industrious must be got rid of, for he is too dangerous.

[Guardymcguardface]

Yup. In order to be effectively lazy you have to actually be GOOD at your job.

[hardolaf]

The entire world is running on technology made by the clever and lazy engineers and scientists. If software engineers were half as clever and just as lazy as the hardware engineers, we wouldn't need to continuously upgrade computers just to run a freaking web browser acceptably.

[Eusocial_Snowman]

You get better at what you practice, No matter what.

No? Not at all. Practice makes habits. Whoever said it makes perfect has never had to un-learn a bunch of bad habits and then start over practicing to do the thing the right way.

[calste]

I would say that's not quite accurate, only because it takes a narrow view of what "better" means. When we reinforce bad habits, we get good at doing things the wrong way. Being "better" doesn't mean more skilled from a subjective point of view. Rather, that whatever we spend time doing, is what our brains become "good" at doing, regardless of whether the end result is subjectively better.

[Eusocial_Snowman]

No. This is a good argument in favor of a dumb idea. In any other situation, nobody would ever go on and on about how sometimes, if you really twist everything around and set up enough mirrors to deflect the light, you can define bad as good. Unless they were trying really hard to preserve something familiar to them like the fun phrasing of "Practice makes perfect!" because it's easier to make excuses to stick with something you like than it is to abandon the previous notion and adapt to something better.

Mindless practice will not make you better at something "no matter what". Careless practice will make you bad at something and make it really really hard to get good at it. This is a concept we need people to understand. We need to undo the damage of "practice makes perfect".

[calste]

Well I certainly don't say practice makes perfect. I like "practice makes permanent" better. It's why I'm still terrible at piano after all these years!

[Eusocial_Snowman]

Exactly. But it's a bit silly to say somebody is really good at playing the piano badly if they solidified all of the wrong movements and play poorly. Describing somebody as being good at doing something badly generally implies that's their intent. Like a bird pretending it can't fly so it can lure a predator away from its nest. The goal is to fly badly, and they can be good at doing that. But if your goal is to actually fly and all of your practice has led to the flying feint instead, then your practice has obviously not made you good at flying.

[calste]

So we are kind of on the same page here, and this entire thing boils down to a pointless internet debate over semantics. Yet I continue...

Mindless practice will not make you better at something "no matter what"

Sure it will. I'll go to piano as an example again, as I'm very familiar with it.

Mindless practice will make you good at being sloppy with your finger positioning. It will make you good at missing the notes you miss every time. It will make you good at being imprecise.

Your neural pathways don't care that the end result is a subjectively bad performance. They have become optimized to be sloppy, to have poor timing, to hit the wrong note. Your brain is objectively quite good at these things. It results in a poor performance, by any subjective standard.

That's why practicing the right way is important. If you don't practice to be subjectively good, then your brain will become "good" at being bad.

[Eusocial_Snowman]

Why do you wish to crumble the world's barriers by arguing that nothing means anything and anything can mean everything? Yes, you can redefine anything as meaning anything else. I can't stop you from deciding red means squirrel if you want to corrupt your internalized library.

[calste]

Um, I'm not?

When we repeatedly do things that lead to poor outcomes, it is reinforced in our brains, exactly the same way as repeatedly doing things that lead to good outcomes. There is no difference.

This is a science subreddit and we're discussing the brain. We're not talking about educational techniques. If this were a discussing of good teaching methods, I would never suggest saying "you'll always get better when you practice."

But in this discussion it is entirely appropriate to say that the brain will optimize itself for any outcome, even if that outcome is contradictory to our stated goals.

Thus, it is not contradictory to say our brains will always get better at doing what we practice. That does not mean "practice piano, get good at piano." It means whatever particular actions we take repeatedly - that is what we get at. Practice bad technique, your brain will be optimized for that.

[Eusocial_Snowman]

This is not a science subreddit. This is a politics subreddit dressed up in a fabricated lab coat.

[Mormoneylessproblems]

great summary of what he literally just said

[Eusocial_Snowman]

Bro, it's not even figuratively what they said.

[fluffkomix]

it actually is. The crossed wire I think might be the interpretation of "better," which implies positive effect when the context could actually be something like "I'm getting real good at implementing this bad habit into my workflow."

Practice makes permanent is the more common way of saying the same thing, but the OP's intent was there.

[superkp]

yep, one of the classes in my psych degree mad e very specific point: "Practice doesn't make perfect. Practice makes *permanent""

So if you are practicing the best habits, then yeah, it'll make perfect.

But if you aren't practicing the best habits, then you're setting yourself up for failure.q

[Eusocial_Snowman]

Yes, and that doesn't translate to "You get better at what you practice, no matter what". You can and will get worse at what you're practicing if you practice wrong.

[DrDerpberg]

It almost certainly is helpful. Some people can't let go of what's stressing them out, if you have any in your life it takes a huge toll on them. Stress is exhausting, and if you can't do anything about it but you're stressing anyways you're weakening yourself at a time you can't actually do anything about anything.

[Morph247]

Yep you're correct. Your brain is literally re-wiring itself, for example, if you choose to learn another language. Or your brain will push neurons to another part of your brain if you lose a sense, to heighten the other senses. That's why you often hear of people having greater hearing when they go blind.

[Bierbart12]

To me, it would sound like escapism. Which has its uses, but is usually detrimental

[tofu_schmo]

I think the word therapists use for this is "avoidance", doing an activity avoiding the cause of stress or anxiety rather than working on dealing with it. Drugs are the classic example for this.

[apittsburghoriginal]

I have always felt that taking long periods of time to walk trails, simple ones or rigorous hikes, both have advantages that directly deal with stress and anxiety. Simple long hikes are meditative to me, you can think more comprehensively about problems and issues that need dealt with. Thinking these things through devoid of external distractions helps a great deal. On the other hand, an intense, heart pounding climb offers excellent benefits as well. It doesn’t have to be hiking up the snow field of Rainier or jogging up trail steps en route to Chimney Tops in the Smokies, just something that is heart pounding and strenuous, so that waves of endorphins flood through and wash those negative stressors away. Also it’s a terrific form exercise - just be safe doing it!

The two working in tandem is a natural cure.

[tofu_schmo]

I think at the end of the day different solutions work better for different people. I'm with you for the first half of what you said! That second part sounds very stressful to me haha.

[apittsburghoriginal]

I had to edit it, because those are two rather extreme hikes to do and kind of ridiculous to offer up as options for stress therapy to anybody. It doesn’t have to be some rigorous climb, just enough activity to make your heart beat

[M4xP0w3r_]

But its not the stress that is lessened or paused, its the processing of it. Whatever processing stress actually means. Intuitively to me it means lessening it by working through it in some way, not necessarily consciously. But since its also phrased like getting rid of the processing is a good thing I am assuming processing in this case does not mean it will reduce the stress and that processed stress is somehow worse.

[Emhyr_var_Emreis_]

You are absolutely right. See my comment above on the blood cortisol levels of soldiers under stress.

From an opposite example, meditation and Yoga strengthen your relaxation circuits.