Miss Ashley Pants

When I get stuck alone in the doctor’s office, I’ll start fiddling with stuff.

Especially that room in the back with no phone reception.

Move the table around, play with the blinds, mess with the aseptic doo-hickeys…

Why not?

Don’t lie to me. You’ve done it too. But what if you were stuck there for a super long time… and there weren’t any fun toys to tinker with? Just a big “Touch me, I dare you” button on the wall that’d shock you slightly if you touched it? Would you do it? Just to feel something – anything – other than bored?

A study recently looked at men and women of all ages who were asked to sit alone in a room for fifteen minutes with nada but their thought pasta. In most cases, the men voluntary shocked themselves with a buzzer they had said previously the would “pay never to feel again”. And in a fourth of the cases, the women opted for the self shockery too.

So, what gives?

Can’t we just be alone with our thoughts for a quarter of an hour?

Scientist who ran the study claim that it doesn’t have to do with fast paced society – and that people just want to engage and interact. I’d agree with him, if it weren’t for the fact that this same “entertain me at the expense of my own body” didn’t carry over to our actual voluntary alone time. Research done not long ago reminded me of this one in that people who knew staying up late in the glow of blue light or holding poor computer or phone posture would hurt them physically and psychologically – did it habitually anyway.

Why? Work – in some cases.

But, in others, it was that they’d rather do the entertaining thing instead of facing the boring nature of getting in bed and waiting to go unconscious.

You know, my first reaction is to get judge-y and think things like, “well why don’t they just meditate while they’re waiting around?” But a good point was brought up about control. Most people don’t mind sitting in silence or stillness occasionally – but they’re only willing to do it when they can be in control of the when and the where circumstances. There’s that concept of “letting go” (or “surrender”, they call it) when giving into the flow of non-thinking or yoga or anything meditative. It’s a kind of vulnerability, I suppose. And we don’t like being vulnerable around strangers. So, it’s tougher to do in a public place you don’t feel comfy or safe in. Plus it sucks thinking people are watching you. My shittiest yoga efforts have been in those first classes where I was mind-racing: “Ah, that girl’s really good. I bet she’s judging me ‘cause I suck. Wait – is my face fat hanging down? My face fat is definitely hanging down. That’s why nobody loves me. Because of my gravitational face hang”

(Meanwhile, she’s totes not even judging me. Just doing what yogis do.)

Likewise, for these study folk, the plain room isn’t of their choosing and not only are they being watched – they’re being studied. And they know it (‘cause, duh, they volunteered for it). Plus, we all know everyone’s iphone is little more than Belle’s magic outside-world mirror welded to our carpals like Captain Hook’s prosthetic weapon. Eliminate that perceived vital electronic limb and suddenly you realize you’re being studied, there’s no one to talk at, and voila: it’s panic o’ clock. So my guess is that people are self-conscious but not very self-aware about what and why they feel what they feel. It takes a pretty evolved person to say, “Yeah, I’m being watched. No, there aren’t people here. Yes, my body is feeling anxiety about that. But I still don’t have to give into the emotion that follows which makes self-harm seem sexy.”

And while most stuff’s alright in moderation – anything (whether it’s technology pills or pushing your body’s limits) that takes you perpetually out of awareness is terrible – especially when it dictates your happiness by being the only answer to bad feelings that make you feel alone in the world.

That said, I wonder how many subjects only self-zapped to give the scientists a show?

I like that idea, but I’d have taken it in a slighlty diff direction…

Why cause yourself pain when you can know you’re making the Jigsaw watching you laugh?