Mindfulness In Design

Mindfulness is defined as bringing one’s attention into the present moment with the acceptance of one’s emotions without judgment. Meditation can be used as a tactic to strengthen mindfulness as it is a practice of training one’s attention to concentrate on one thing. Integrating a practice of meditation into one’s daily routine can change the structure and chemical makeup of the brain resulting in relief of stress and anxiety, improvement of concentration and decision making and an overall increase in life-satisfaction. (Al-Mashat)

Sarah Lazar, a neuroscientist at Harvard Medical School, proved this change in structure by creating a Mindfulness Meditation Program. She examined the brain structure, with MRI technology, of non-meditators before and after going through the Mindfulness Meditation Program. She concluded that 3 regions in the brain, of her subjects, exhibited a change in volume after 8 weeks of integrating a daily practice of mindfulness meditation.

First, the hippocampus increased in volume. The hippocampus is the region of the brain dedicated to the storage of memories, spatial orientation and regulation of emotions. Second, was an increase in the Temporoparietal Junction, which largely affects our ability of empathy and compassion. The third fluctuation Lazar noticed was a decrease in volume of the amygdala. The amygdala is a structure that triggers fight or flight. In turn, the smaller the amygdala the less stressed people feel. (Beautiful Science)

In direct correspondence to these findings, I will relate the uptick in social media usage in our current society and how this also affects the structures and chemical makeup of our brain. First, it is important to note that the attentional system in our brain only has a finite amount of energy available to it in a day, and, with society’s current connection to social media, we are faced with more information in our day-to-day lives than ever before.

We have entered a point of incessant information overload which comes with perpetual decision overload. By browsing content on social media decision making processes subconsciously overloads our brains with questions like: Do I read this? Do I trust it? Do I like it? Should I respond? Should I read the comments? By asking our brain to make these simultaneous and fast decisions we are continuously using our attentional systems energy supply - now think of how much content you consume on one app in 15 minutes and times that by how many apps you go on.

By asking our brain to focus on so many different things and to continuously make decisions, we are forcing our prefrontal cortex to work overtime, which in turn drastically lowers our ability to focus on our other daily tasks. Two hormones are released in an unfocused brain, adrenaline and cortisol, which are inherently tied to stress and anxiety. (Riley)

Social media platforms have labeled cognition as a currency because the more time a user spends on a certain platform the more revenue that is generated by selling advertisements. My question is: does social media need to be a place of distress and loss of focus or can it be an outlet to view content that is inspiring, motivating and encouraging? Ultimately, as a designer I believe that a mindful and empathetic approach to “cognition as a currency” can positively benefit the user’s experience of the platform of their choice.

I believe this can be cultivated through a strong brand strategy. A brand strategy is a plan, used by a business, to create a particular image of itself in the minds of current and potential customers. This involves the aesthetics and design of the brand as well as establishing why the business exists and the values it upholds. (Mumaw)

The article, "Top 15 Brands Killing It On Instagram” by Lauren Moren highlights businesses that exhibit a mindful approach to their brand strategy. By establishing a strong strategy they are able to continuously make a positive impact on their followers, create a genuine community around their brand and see exponential growth as a business. One example is the CBD Seltzer Brand, Recess.

Recess has taken a completely organic approach to advertising. (Moreno) The Founder of Recess, Benjamin Witte does not view his brand as consumer-packaged-goods company but rather he explains that, “selling canned seltzer is almost incidental to Recess’ larger mission — building a media company to inspire the creative community.” (Koss)

Witte realizes that the novelty of CBD products will wear off given enough time and he wants to set his business in a position to succeed far after. Witte explains that he looks at Recess’s Instagram Strategy as a social commentary on millennial existence – “We’re speaking to the issues that we’re all going through that lead to stress and anxiety in a very unique, Recess way.” (Koss) With this being said, Witte’s mindful approach to creating a CBD Seltzer brand allows the business to not be confined to one area. The consumers and followers of Recess know their voice and their art style and look forward to seeing and supporting their posts because they feel genuinely connected to it and inspired by it.

In conclusion, online businesses have the unique ability to inspire and create positive change through their brand strategy and creation of content for the social media application Instagram. Through tactics of mindfulness, knowledge of design and processes of the human brain, designers can create content that exhibits a clear intention, sticks out from others and positively affects the emotions of the consumers.

Social media and digital content consumption has been on the rise and will only further become the way we interact, shop, form opinions, etc. All in all, art and design have the ability to evolve consciousness, as the visionary artist Alex Grey says: “a creator channels their creative force into an artifact, and this artifact then becomes a battery ready to zap a viewer into a new way of seeing the world.” (Grey)

Now is a time unlike ever before, where our artifact, as creators, is a digital device that 48.2% percent of the world’s population holds in their hand or has in their pocket most hours of the day. (Turner) As a designer, knowing that my creations could potentially reach billions of people, I take responsibility to make sure that the content I am creating is rooted in tactics of mindfulness and the necessary knowledge of design and processes of the human brain, so that I can most effectively reach the consumer in a positive and valuable way. My hope is that other businesses begin to as well.