Author: reubenroyk@gmail.com

My friend recently made an interesting observation, watching movies can be draining. Well yeah perhaps. But to make this more clear, we’ve got to think of watching two movies or even three movies at a time.

Then you can actually feel the drain.

What’s the problem with this? Movies are often associated with resting or recreational activities, perhaps activities that don’t require much mental effort. But it’s instead possible that movies provide no rest and instead are quite draining.

During strenuous work, we sometimes like to watch and episode or a series to re-charge and come back to work more energized or motivated, and often times, the episode does not produce that energizing effect.

Anyway, I wanna know, if I were to study a certain topic, what medium should I study that in? From a text book or a doc? Or a youtube video lecture perhaps?

After a small amount of research, it was noticed that videos are probably more draining that text, one because, the video moves at it’s own pace, not at the pace you’re comfortable with, so you would then have to operate at a faster pace in order to keep up, and because there is more information to process.

But also, if you’re imaginative like me, then your mind does a lot of imagining and visualization as you’re reading. Which could also lead you to become distracted by thoughts and get side-tracked. Video having a set pace, does imply the subject will come to an end within a specified duration. So accumulated drain over time is likely reduced for’ information consumed through the video medium as opposed to written text.

Written text while not as draining, could take far longer to complete, resulting in a stronger draining effect overall.

Anyway, I remember watching a veritasium video about something similar before. I think he summarized that learning is probably best done through a combination of all media.

I remember reading Sam Walton’s autobiography and thinking, oh my god, what a show off. The book was packed with instances of this guy winning over and over again. It made the whole thing feel strangely boring.

Stories are fun when there is trouble, when the main character struggles and then overcomes it. Sam Walton did go through trials and tribulations, but he seemed to recover too quickly. It almost felt fake, or at least exaggerated.

I did not think much about this for years. Until yesterday.

A friend and I spent some time talking about the impact of being social on mood and on general success in life. Success here being tightly coupled with mood, because you simply cannot perform when you are constantly down in the dumps.

For loners like me, the boost in mood and productivity from spending time with a good friend is almost immediate. It is hard to miss once you notice it.

I am overly interested in productivity and self actualization, and because of that I tend to self isolate. In my head, that time can always be repurposed for work. When my friend came to spend their vacation with me, something unexpected happened. My mood lifted, and my ability to work improved noticeably.

That was when it clicked. Maybe Sam Walton was not exaggerating how quickly he bounced back. He was a frequent churchgoer and had strong social circles. It is entirely possible that his baseline mood and energy levels were simply higher more often than not. When hardship hit, he recovered faster because he was not doing it alone.

I find this fascinating. Sometimes you see people who seem capable of carrying several times your own load without burning out, and you wonder how they do it. I do not have a complete answer, but I am convinced that social circles are part of it.

Humans are not built to function in isolation. From an evolutionary and neurological perspective, our brains are wired for connection. Being around others, whether friends, coworkers, or a church community, can dramatically improve mood, focus, and productivity.

When you interact with people in a supportive environment, your brain releases neurotransmitters like dopamine, oxytocin, and serotonin. These chemicals are associated with motivation, bonding, and emotional stability. They reduce stress and make effort feel less taxing. Tasks that feel heavy when you are alone often feel lighter when someone else is simply present, even if they are not directly helping.

Church communities are a strong example of this effect. They offer regular social contact, shared purpose, and predictable structure. This lowers cognitive load. Your brain no longer has to constantly fight loneliness, boredom, or uncertainty. Instead of reaching for quick dopamine through YouTube or social media, your nervous system is already regulated through human connection.

There is also an accountability effect. When others are around, your brain naturally shifts into a cooperative mode. Distraction becomes less rewarding, and focus comes more easily. This is not about pressure. It is about alignment. Your behavior starts to synchronize with the rhythm of the group.

Community also buffers stress. Research consistently shows that people with strong social networks recover faster from setbacks, experience lower baseline anxiety, and maintain better long term mental health. Churches often provide emotional support during difficult periods, which helps keep stress hormones like cortisol in check. The result is better clarity, more energy, and improved self discipline.

In short, social connection is not a luxury or a distraction from productivity. It is a biological requirement. Communities like churches work not only because of belief systems, but because they satisfy deep neurological and psychological needs that modern, isolated lifestyles often ignore.

There are groups of people who don’t really dream, ever. They can’t really visualize things in their mind. People say they lack a minds eye. Researchers think this is a spectrum, going from no capacity to visualize images and scenarios to having vivid imagination and recollection, to the point where it may be like reality.

I tried extended this idea. I noticed I have a rather vivid imagination, and have often relied on it to solve problems for me. This includes math, reasonably long derivation, somewhat complex problem solving and such.

Free body mechanics in physics for instance would come naturally to me, since the scenario in question can be visualized with mass, direction of gravity etc, and I can just watch what happens when the scenario imagined is subjected to external variables.

Solving of most math, including most differentiation and integration problems could simply be completed in my mind.

I also used to be able to solve hundreds of math and science problems on a single piece of paper, since the pen I used had no ink in it. The pen was merely there to simulate writing, and helped me keep items in my mind.

So this vivid imagination really helped me. And I’d come to rely on it regularly. Since I didn’t know about this, I assumed I was just smart.

But when I tried to learn quantum mechanics or relativity… things started falling apart.

1 dimension – You imagine a line.

2 dimensions – 2 lines, a plane maybe.

3 dimensions – We’re going 3D now, this covers everything in daily life.

4 dimensions – Hmm.. how would I imagine that?..

5 dimensions – Um..

A 100 dimensions – I am so lost..

n dimensions – I’m screwed.

Loads of subjects deal with higher dimensions than we are used to. But if you rely on visualization to understand things and store information, you’re pretty much screwed when dealing with these higher dimensions. Unless you put in deliberate effort to deal with this specific issue – though I haven’t done this, so I can’t vouch for it.

People with Aphantasia, had a much easier time dealing with higher dimensions. Since it’s just a few extra variables on a piece of paper. While it made my head ache and made little logical sense.

A friend of mine, who was a phenomenal cartoonist, regularly scored a 100% on history tests. When asked how he learns, he just said that, the entire textbook was just a huge story to him, and the story just replays in his head during tests.

So they should start educating students on this while they’re in school. So they don’t pick up subjects they don’t know how to deal with, or so that they can pick up the skills required for such tasks early.