What if you become a creator instead of an appreciator?

There’s an entire genre and subculture of internet video clips with millions of views that portray repetitive events or actions that viewers find, as the cool kids call it, oddly satisfying.

From hydraulic presses to hands kneading slime to frosting pastries to plastic balls perfectly falling into cylinders, people can’t tear their eyes away.

Many people watch these videos before they go to bed to help them sleep. It’s a form of micro therapy and stress reduction.

Hey, it’s healthier than pounding sleeping pills and whiskey. We all do whatever we need to survive.

My question is, what’s the appeal? More importantly, how can more people take advantage of the generic principles to improve their lives?

Now, multiple studies have been conducted on the trend of these oddly satisfying videos, and the research points to several commonalities.

One is the sensory or tactile nature of the content. Videos activate this very human preference for symmetry, patterns and repetition. It’s called the autonomous sensory meridian response, which is that tingling sensation that typically begins on the scalp and moves down the back of the neck and upper spine.

It’s just so lovely when that slightly hypnotizing brain massage happens, isn’t it? Who wouldn’t want the ability to pull that trigger with the click of a button?

Another theory on the appeal of oddly satisfying videos is, they appeal to our sense of completion. Seeing order and control fulfills our existential longing in a chaotic world. We may not be able to comprehend our careers or relationships or spiritual journeys, but damn it if watching a machinist use a spindle bore lathe to make chips out of a piece of metal doesn’t make everything okay.

You can almost feel the stress melting away like those iron scraps.

One final observation scientists have made about oddly satisfying videos is, there is an undeniable psychological reward people get from watching them. In essence, we derive vicarious pleasure as if we were actually conducting the action ourselves.

It’s like sharing your personal goals with friends. Doing so feels real in your mind. The more you talk about something you want, the more your brain substitutes the talking for doing.

Okay, let’s come back to the original question.

Now that we know the appeal of these videos, how can more people take advantage of the generic principles to improve our lives?

Well, obviously, we can watch these videos to our heart’s desire. There are millions of them, instantly and freely available at our fingertips.

But my recommendation is to replace our watching with doing.

What if, rather than watching other people do things that were oddly satisfying, we actually performed those acts ourselves? What if we became creators instead of appreciators? Might that create the psychic nourishment we so deeply desire?

That’s what bothers me most about modern media. We’re spending thirty hours a week watching other people do things.

Instead of creating things from whole cloth, we’re anesthetizing ourselves with our phones while other people are out there taking action.

Instead of getting to work ourselves, we’re investing massive amounts of time, energy and emotion in other people’s art, fetishizing their process, walking around their museums, engaging in endless conversations about their lives.

Yes, being a fan is a necessary feature of the creative life. We still have to know what great art feels like.

But as an artist, the only discipline that counts is the discipline to create regularly. Everything else is shadow work. Disciplining ourselves to publish sophisticated book reports of other people’s work is commendable, but doesn’t make us creators.

Perhaps today we can satisfy our need for symmetry, patterns and repetition by building a new website.

Perhaps today we can earn that tingling sensation in the back of our scape by publishing our most radically honest feelings.

Perhaps today we can feel a sense of completion by pressing send on a confrontational email that’s been sitting in our drafts folder for the last month.

Doing so would almost certainly give us authentic rather than vicarious fulfillment.

Are you hypnotizing yourself into a technicolor dream of instant satisfaction, or making something that shows people how you see life?