Tag: Women Men

Honored To Be 1 of 5 Courvoisier Cognac Grant Recipients

Posted on by ClarissaSilva

I recently was fortunate to be one of 5 recipients of the National Urban League in partnership with Courvoisier Cognac Grant for my work in brain health. This award will help me advance science and interventions that address some of the cognitive impairment that pandemic fatigue has brought on as many of us try to WFH and try to keep up with our productivity and performance. Brain Fog has become the most commonly experienced problem for many of us as we WFH, manage teams, and maintain consistent productivity levels. This is especially impacting in the corporate sector.

Covid-19 has created a new norm that we have not been adequately prepared to cope with or adapt to. Social isolation, loneliness, abrupt changes to daily habits, adapting to WFH, and stress can all impact our emotional well-being and cognitive performance. Even for people who have no history of mental health issues, the weeks of lockdown and restrictions that millions are currently experiencing is wrought with emotional and psychological challenges that few had ever experienced. 

In a recent study I conducted with CEOs and Founders exploring the impact of pandemic fatigue on performance, 98% reported experiencing three of the symptoms of brain fog. Additionally, 100% reported that Covid-19 has impacted their emotional well-being in a negative way at different points over the last 8 months. The most powerful driver of Covid-induced brain fog was emotional trauma. 87% reported that Covid-19 brought forward unresolved past emotional trauma to the forefront of their thinking. 95% reported decades-long past unresolved trauma. This tremendous breakthrough that unburdened a pain point that arrested that person’s development and cognitive performance led me to compute lifetime gains for each person as a key outcome of health. 

In my practice, I have developed interventions to address some of these cognitive and emotional features we have been dealing with over the last 9 months. As a society, we have to begin to focus on prevention and intervention because I predict we are headed into a mental and brain health risk burden that exceeds our capacity to provide care. Prolonged exposure to these new norms will have lasting emotional and cognitive effects in the future. Many neuroimaging studies have shown that chronic worries and fears diminish prefrontal cortex activity, damage neurons, shrink areas of the brain, and impair thinking.

Love is the hardest decision we ever make in life. What other decision takes decades to get right?

Posted on by ClarissaSilva

Finding love is the hardest decision we ever make in life. What other decision takes decades to get right?

“Isn’t it ironic that our highly connected world makes it harder to be connected?” This is probably the #1 complaint I hear in practice. We are trying to find love, get over a break-up or understand why we get ghosted in a world that seems to have so much abundance. Yet, so many tell me they are lonely and want to find just one decent person.

The main reason is simple, but love is complex. It is the hardest decision we ever make in life. What other decision takes decades to get right? Dating apps are creating a paradox effect. They are giving off the illusion of many choices while making it harder to find viable options. Apps have become the new bar, but sometimes we unknowingly walk into a frat party; a drunk feast; 2 a.m. stragglers; or a concubine expecting to find decent people. This is not just disempowering, it erodes your self-esteem and alters your decision-making ability. The end result is not making you pickier, it’s making you choose based on lowered expectations.

We’re treating people like we do our social media streams. The shiniest object is what we stop at, then move onto the next shiny object. Are we creating a false reality? What is it doing to our sense of self? Are we becoming more narcissistic? Are we becoming more insecure? Has this behavior become normative? Is technology driving dating, sex and emotion? Are dating patterns just an extension of how we behave on social networks? We’re overlooking good candidates for those that photo filter better. You aren’t in the market for best camera skills, you’re searching for someone that can life co-create with you.

For the past few years, I’ve been developing a new method to address some of these challenges. My Your Happiness Hypothesis method © is designed to help you have relationship success in your life. Relationships are challenging, but sometimes it just takes simple strategies to get you what you really want! Are you wondering when you will find the love of your life? Struggling to find decent people? Want real love? Join me in creating Your Happiness Hypothesis in your own life!

 

Social Media’s Impact on Self-Esteem

Posted on by ClarissaSilva

Social Media’s Impact on Self-Esteem

Social media has been linked to higher levels of loneliness, envy, anxiety, depression, narcissism and decreased social skills. As a Behavioral Scientist, I wonder what causes this paradox? The narratives we share and portray on social media are all positive and celebratory. It’s a hybridized digital version of “Keeping up with the Joneses”. Meaning for some, sometimes it appears everyone you know are in great relationships, taking 5-star vacations and living your dream life.

Credit: Unsplash

 

However, what is shared only broadcasts the positive aspects of our lives-the highlight reels.

Since we’re only getting people’s highlight reels and comparing it to ourselves, it is natural to have reactions to what we’re watching. How does this impact relationships, dating, and our love lives? I conducted in-depth interviews with men and women, ranging from ages 28-73, that are active social media users and found that:

  • 60% of people using social media reported that it has impacted their self-esteem in a negative way
  • 50% reported social media having negative effects on their relationship
  • 80% reported that is easier to deceive others through their social posting

Paradox Effect

It seems that social media is creating a paradox effect: giving off the illusion of many choices while making it harder to find viable options. Can it be that our highly connected world has now become disconnected? Posting dinners, selfies and vacay photos over human interaction for some is interaction. That IS their interaction. The paradox effect in dating is creating the illusion of having more social engagement, social capital, and popularity, but masking one’s true persona. Since some are interfacing digitally more than physically it is much easier to emotionally manipulate others because they are reliant on what I call “Vanity Validation”. The one you portray on your networks and the true you, for some, creates a double consciousness. Your lauded self on social media is constantly seeking more validation through electronic likes, not life.

Vanity Validation

In the latest Match Singles in America study’s findings on how social media has impacted people’s dating lives, they found that 57% of singles say social media has generated a Fear Of Missing Out (FOMO). In my study, 50% reported feeling FOMO when comparing themselves to others on social media, while 60% of millennials reported feeling FOMO. Are we comparing ourselves to other people’s highlight reels? Are we creating a false reality? It seems that we’re only willing to share things that get positive reinforcement. If we’re living through only focusing on the highlight reels, how do we express the negative side of our lives?

If you’re comparing yourself to someone else’s profile, aren’t you discounting yourself? Anything that we share on our streams are things that we’re either excited about or creating some popularity for yourself. Are we supposed to applaud that you eat? Are we supposed to applaud that you are out? Are we supposed to applaud the 100th seflie you took while you were out? Are we beginning to learn to relate to people for immediate gratification only?

Won’t this impact our dating behaviors? If we only broadcast the “look at me”, are we able to deal with the side of rejection, detachment, and non-commitment? Are you surprised when people blow you off or lead you on aka ghost, bench, gaslight or breadcrumb? Yet another paradox. Here we are thinking the world is a positive and reinforcing place, that we are interesting, we’re so popular; then we get ghosted, breadcrumbed, benched.