Move when you're stuck.

[00:00:00] You are listening to the Daily Five, an experimental podcast by Aurooba, where I talk about something for five minutes. So let's get to it, shall we?

[00:00:16] What do you do when you get stuck or you feel stuck? For me, a lot of the times when I feel stuck, at work, especially, a weird coding problem or a sort of social professional dilemma that I can't figure out the solution to, I move. During good weather, that will mean I will head out for a 15 minute walk, with music in my ears.

[00:00:53] Not a podcast, not an audiobook, nothing "useful", just get my body [00:01:00] moving in a different environment and music in my ears. When it's winter, I will often set a timer for 10 minutes or an alarm, and I will close the door and I will dance, anything to get me feeling different and change my perspective.

[00:01:25] And I started doing this a lot, just out of instinct before, I would be like really stressed about something and feel this weird energy in me and need to get rid of it. And the easiest way to do it was to go for a walk or dance it out, and then I later read some research on it and realized that I'm not alone in

[00:01:54] finding the benefits of moving and being physically [00:02:00] active when your mind is stuck somewhere. And I use "stuck somewhere" as a phrase very intentionally here because I found that moving physically, being physically active doesn't just help when you are stuck , like with a coding problem or a work problem, it also helps you think better and think clearly when you're feeling any kind of weird emotional or mental distress.

[00:02:35] You know, if I am having an argument, I will often start moving or pacing, but if you move and pace while you're arguing, for example, in the same place, that doesn't actually make a difference. It's like you have to be physically active and remove yourself somehow from this current state, current [00:03:00] place if you can.

[00:03:02] And that's why I like music, especially with in-ear headphones and active noise canceling really helps a lot because sometimes you can't physically leave the place you're in, but you can put your active noice canceling headphones on and listen to some music and zone out for a little bit and try to move wherever you are and you start to feel better and you can step away from the situation just a little bit and think and see things a little bit more.

[00:03:38] I think this is different from, you know, the concept of cooling off. You're not necessarily cooling off. You might still be angry or frustrated or not feeling happy or content when you come back, but hopefully, by being physically active and [00:04:00] removing yourself from the current situation, just for a little bit, maybe five, 10 minutes, you have a different perspective or a different angle from which you can approach the situation, and sometimes that might mean that you have cooled off indeed, and other times it might mean that you are now better at articulating what you mean.

[00:04:22] Or able to approach the issue from a different angle that will work out better for everyone. Or suddenly you have a different way that you can code the issue and fix the problem. But anyway, just move when you have an issue. I found it helps a lot. Thanks for listening. Talk to you tomorrow.