Posted on by johanne_marais

Master the Science of Slowing Down

As with all diurnal cycles, mine begins with the sunrise. I blink my eyes open in the blue hour when some of the city still sleeps. Then, the hum of a singing bowl encounters my body with the crispness of morning air and a subtle shiver. Invigorating!

A so-called typical day in my life as an MSc student at the Wits School of Physiology can be tricky to convey. I often find that the best I can do is have a plan but go with the flow. Whatever transpires, the sun will rise again tomorrow. I can plan to read 30 journal articles a month, and sometimes the one-a-day mentality works out. Yet, life outside of the university perimeter does not slow down to ensure I don’t sometimes miss my one-a-day aim. The vlog that I’ve created to share a Friday in my life with you reminded me how I try to integrate three main themes into every day:

  1. Rest. This theme moves beyond just adequate, restorative sleep. It embraces that I am a person who makes mistakes and needs to regulate my emotions. This is “down time”, not processing power. This is giving yourself space to do what you can to breathe a little deeper. Prioritize intentional rest.
  • Digest. Postgraduate “demands” are often overwhelming. Feeling stuck between writing paragraphs or tearful frustration after an hour of feedback can rain upon your progress parade! It becomes increasingly useful to digest my day, one metaphorical meal at a time – the information I have taken in; the discursive encounters with friends and colleagues; or the embarrassment of nearly hitting a professor with an obnoxiously oversized, yellow sign that reads “Silence please. Exams in progress.” Sorry again, Prof. Woodiwiss!
  • Invest. My friends ask “So, if you’re still waiting to finalize some niggly bits of your project, what do you do to stay busy?”. I make it a point not to stay busy, but rather to keep motivated. Each day, I do as much as is within my reasonable capacity to invest cognitive energy, desire, passion (and even complacency, fear, fatigue) and patience into what I want to create for my future. I read, write, engage, challenge, and absorb.

How might these themes materialize? Playing piano in the Adler Museum has kept me balanced on lengthy campus days (reads: rest). I also spend a portion of my work-and-play time analyzing starred sections of journal articles and transforming my thoughts to prose, not for reasons other than love and intrigue (hello, howzit, digest)!  I volunteer for the South African Society for Sleep and Health as a content creator. I allocate about five hours a week to this (invest, invest, invest).

So, rest when you need to. Find your way to chew up the challenges of your day. Finally, this is a gentle reminder that on some days self-investment means doing less. Less than that. Lesser, still.

Posted on by johanne_marais

I am if you are, and if you aren’t I still am.

I am…

Take a moment. Breathe in. 

Say, “I am…” and the first few things that come to mind. Notice how these thoughts feel. Any words that follow “I am…” have the power to mould and manoeuvre your sense of self.

I am human. I am curious. I am kind. It is perhaps one of the greatest instincts of the human condition to attach ourselves to a sense of identity. This may be rooted in connection, community or companionship.  Perhaps identity stems from creation, control, or ceremony. To construct a comfortable and assured interaction with the environment, we tell ourselves (and those around us) who we are. I am not my research, though I am working in the field of sleep science – diagnosing obstructive sleep apnoea in persons living with HIV. This involves tracking the brain patterns of a sleeping patient, as well as their breathing. I am constantly reminded to be humble in my knowledge acquisition.

I am a learner. I am a teacher. I am a neuroscientist. Effectively, this means I study the squishy, convoluted pink organ housed within the skull. This lump of biologically active stuff, which somewhat governs our lived experience, fascinates me so deeply that I am compelled to tell you why it is part of who I am.

As you read this sentence, your brain is making associations between what I write; the sounds in your environment; any aromas wafting past your nostrils; and even the temperature of your body. When you think back to this moment, your brain will recount – within milliseconds – all the sensations activated within you to remind you of this experience.

The average human brain can create about 60 000 thoughts every day!

We can practice calming or stimulating our minds by the type and timing of awareness we employ. I might be so bold as to say this awareness is a series of thoughts. So, what is a thought? A thought is an electrochemical trace that occupies multi-dimensional space in your brain. A thought is the internal experience of how we process external stimuli. This internal experience relates to one’s senses and (new term incoming) somatosensation, or the sensory relationships of our bodies with the space around it – a tickle, an itch, a chill. We even have this epic internal ‘sixth sense’ called interoception – sensing what we feel within our bodies! In some ways, I agree that what we think we can become.

Still, I am more than just my brain’s interpretations of my body’s sensations.

Humans have humanity. We adapt to circumstance and unite in hardship. I am an activist. I am an advocate. I am an ally. I situate myself at the intersection of neuroscience, public health, and social justice. I have more than just a love for science – I have a love for sharing science. This brings me to a chilling (but in no way “chilled”) fact:

In 2020, the Annual Mental State of the World Report showed that 36 % of South Africans are living in mental health distress. Let that number sink in. 36 % is about four out of ten people. I dream of a day where we see this number crumble like the last rusk in the packet. My research aims will likely centre around this dream for as far into our future as I can imagine. This percentage is not the fault of our brains, but a psychosocial consequence of centuries of suffering and oppression.

Restructuring the paradigm of cognitive wellness requires not only inclusion of minority groups, but in fact building new systems with excluded groups at the centre of our focus. While I have an ongoing love-affair with the brain, I feel even more inspired by Black joy, trans joy and accessible places for people with disabilities. As I pursue my neuroscientific dreams, I want to cultivate safer mental health spaces and research outcomes for LGBTQPIA+ people, Indigenous peoples and disabled persons.

There is no quick fix for mental health reform, but I am committed to proactively prioritizing both systemic and systematic wellness. I invite you to ask yourself, “Am I?”.