W27 – SPRING 2022
TAKE THE STAIRS
BECOMING MORE COMFORTABLE THROUGH DISCOMFORT by Ethan Sawyer (AMC, ‘22)
At peak hours before classes, the Dubinsky lobby collects a crowd around the elevators. A gathering of mostly fit, healthy, youthful students shift their feet, minutes passing while faint creaks and dings indicate the erratic vertical oscillation of the elevators. Half of these people are waiting to exit at the 3rd floor. A recurring issue I’ve noticed among myself and fellow students is our propensity to fall into bubbles of concentrated comfort. As learners within a highly specialized school, it’s an understandable inevitability. Most of us came here seeking specifics, to achieve exceptionalism in an extremely narrow field of study that we’ve already shown a natural talent for. However, the mindset that this environment nurtures has side effects. Many of us stick to what we know, we actively avoid failure, and we do everything in our power to avoid joining the ideological minority again. It drives us to succeed, yes, but it also seems to drive us toward closing ourselves off from the unavoidable complexity of the world. It’s also a mindset that ac-
tively decays our most valuable asset: our creativity. So how do we accept the chaos of the world and avoid losing our unconventional minds? First, we must increase our cognitive reserve. Cognitive Reserve, or CR, is a fancy neurology term, but the concept isn’t hard to understand. Imagine two cities. One has a single road running through it, and the other has a million roads. Now imagine a single road getting shut down for construction in both cities. For the single road city, this shit’s a disaster, where else are cars gonna go, they only have one road?!? In the million road city, it isn’t as much of an issue, there are a million-minus-one roads that can still be taken. Having a low CR means your brain is like the single road city. When your thoughts get overwhelmed, the only option is to sit down and cry. Having a high CR means your brain is like the million roads city. A
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