Are you in a good place?
Place is such a basic metaphor, that sometimes we forget there is a difference between our physical location and our state of mind. We've all heard that the thing that counts in real estate is "location, location, location." There's a good reason for that. According to research described by Annie Murphy Paul in The Extended Brain , we use our surroundings as a way to prompt our thoughts. When we are out in nature, we think one way and when we are staring at a computer screen, we think another. Although our experience of our thoughts is that they are related to content, often the kind of thoughts we think are also related to context. We have a lot of language about place: we have to find our place and know our place (sometimes in that order). While it's hard to change what goes on inside our heads directly, it's easier to change our place. We can get up and move to a new location. We can choose a walk under trees or a quiet, safe den (we name our thinking spa...