In the future…perhaps very soon…everyone will access wellness states on-demand.
Wellness states like relaxation, focus, feelings of purpose, connection, warmth, happiness, being at ease…the ways we want to feel.
How?
There are techniques that help us access these states.
As more people learn and practice these techniques, more of us will be able to step into these states with ease.
We see massive numbers of people becoming interested in meditation and yoga (practices that have been shown to improve wellness).
This trend will continue. Soon more people will have more mastery over themselves, leading to all kinds of positive outcomes.
Looking into the future, I believe we will see a broader acceptance of even more esoteric practices like breathing exercises, qi gong, and tai chi. And maybe even some “far out” practices from different traditions.
We see some of this now, like the “Iceman” Wim Hof and his methods. Breathing practices like his are making their way into the mainstream. Elite performance coaches understand the power of breathing exercises (see Dana Santas and The Art of Breath).
As time goes on, more of these kinds of practices (that seem fringe as first) will become commonplace.
These practices become popular because they work and they help people feel good.
With science and technology, we’re able to show how they work and prove their effectiveness.
Case in point: there are 1000s of studies showing how meditation practices improve wellbeing. Many of these use neurotechnology to validate how meditation works and how it changes the brain.
The continued development of science and technology will help drive the research and acceptance of new wellness practices.
These two cultures: wellness practices with centuries of history and science/technology are coming together. More now than ever.
One result is we will be able to measure things that we never were able to before. Things like meditation states, wellness states, and progression along these lines.
NOTE ON MEASURING: It’s important to point out that there are some things that don’t need to be measured and probably just can’t be measured.
But, the trend is humans are able to continuously measure more and more of their existence (in almost all domains from engineering, physics, medicine, psychology, even marketing and sales).
Everywhere you look, advances in a domain go hand in hand with being able to measure more information accurately and act on it intelligently.
An example…part of the reason why medical outcomes are better than ever is because of the research and technologies we have developed that help measure what works and what doesn’t.
Another (perhaps more nefarious example) is advertising has become more personalized and targeted as marketers are able to measure more about what we like, the websites we go to and what we do on the internet.
Historically, wellness practices “measure” success based on how you feel. This works. There is nothing wrong with it.
But an analogy comes to mind…
Imagine training to run a marathon and all you had to gauge your training was how you feel. Run until you feel like you’re done. Rest until you feel like your ready again.
This approach might work, but looking at today’s athletes, we can tell that training precision has helped break barriers that would astound previous generations.
Because we can measure how far you run, how fast, how long your stride is, your heart rate, your heart rate variability, your glucose levels, your biomechanics, and just about every other aspect of the human body, we’re able to learn more quickly how to improve performance.
But, for the mental side of things, our ways of approaching improvement have largely remained unchanged.
This is because it’s hard to measure what’s going on inside our heads. We might rely on surveys or other ways to understand how people are thinking and feeling.
What if we could bring the level of precision that is common in other domains to wellness practices?
What insights would that reveal and what progress could we make?
Wearable technologies like FocusCalm give us insight into what meditations or brain training make the biggest impact on our ability to control our minds.
These insights allow us to see how we’re improving in our ability to quickly and consistently enter states of relaxation.
So what does the future hold?
Imagine an app that serves up the perfect guided meditations or brain games based on exactly what your state of mind is.
It would be like having an expert sitting at your side, providing you with exactly the right instruction at the right time to help you unwind and feel better.
And, the more you use the app, the more personalized and effective the instructions become.
Imagine being able to track your progress just like you track how far you run or how much weight you lift when working out.
Imagine better, faster results, and getting on with your life because you were able to enter the wellness state of your choosing on-demand.
This is the promise of wearable technology and wellness practices coming together. And FocusCalm is the first to combine this level of personalization to brain training and mindfulness.
If you’re interested in this space, you can get our latest version of FocusCalm through our Kickstarter page. Sign up here for more information on when that will launch.
