The Hand-Movement Depression Connection

One of the most time honored suggestions for beating the blues has been to "keep busy." I sometimes balk at this advice because a) our culture overvalues busyness and b) staying busy is often a way to avoid addressing problems.

Recently, though, I came across a more convincing argument for keeping yourself occupied: the book Lifting Depression, by neuroscientist Kelly Lambert. She discovered a brain process she labels the "effort driven rewards circuit." From her website: http://kellylambert.com/index.php

"Drawing on innovative research (with rats, whose brains are similar to those of humans), Lambert identifies a circuit in the human brain—connecting movement, feeling and cognition—that is responsible for emotional emptiness, negative thinking, and other symptoms of depression. She reveals how stimulating this “effort-driven reward circuit” with hands-on physical activities that yield tangible rewards builds resilience against the disorder. Involving the hands is especially effective, since so much of the brain is devoted to hand movement.

Lambert shows how when you knit a sweater or plant a garden, when you prepare a meal or simply repair a lamp, you are bathing your brain in feel-good chemicals and creating a kind of mental vitamin. Our grandparents and great grandparents, who had to work hard for basic resources, developed more resilience against depression; even those who suffered great hardships had much lower rates of this mood disorder. But with today’s overly-mechanized lifestyle we have forgotten that our brains crave the well-being that comes from meaningful effort."

What I like about this approach is that you are not required to go out and change your life dramatically, or do things that feel too beyond your ability to cope at the moment. Preparing a simple meal… that's pretty do-able. Do that once a day or a few times a week, and perhaps you're on your way! What I also like about this information is that it connects the dots regarding my restless temperament. More on that – and the concept of "overexciteability" – next time.

Lambert's website and book also discuss the impact of our increasingly passive lifestyles have on our mental health – something I've been thinking about for years. Countless sources have pointed out that humans cannot evolve fast enough to keep up with our ever-changing technology. The unintended mental and emotional consequences – stress and depression - are rarely discussed and problem-solved in our everyday societal life.