Mr. Keith Richards: I’ll Have What He’s Having

In terms of content, Netflix can certainly come across as an interesting case study. A strong and consistent influx of what is, essentially, mainstream drab at times finds itself broken up by incredible cinematic gems, and when you least expect it as well. Such relief and redemption comes with the newly uploaded Keith Richards bio-doc, an incredibly charming journey through decades of rock ’n’ roll madness and bare knuckle blues. Picking up wisdom and nostalgia along the way, we brush off the dust, swipe through the cigarette smoke, and expose the endless grace, compassion, and emotional empathy that made him a rock god, and bona fide guitar idol.

And the most powerful moment comes only moments into the film.

Keith Richards: Under the Influence opens empathically with ground-up shots of trees bathed in sunlight, accompanied by booming waves of orchestral ambience. It seems hardly fitting for the man under the lens. The camera follows behind Richards roaming the woods.

“Life’s a funny thing, you know. I always thought thirty was about it. Beyond that would be horrible to be alive…until I got to be thirty-one. Then it wasn’t so shabby, you know, ‘I’ll hang in a while’. As you go along, you realize this whole concept of ‘growing up’ is that you’re not done growing up until you’re six feet under. You’re never grown up”.

Cue bone-shaking blues riff while that thought digests.

The notion sticks with a viewer through the rest of the film, adjusting the lens with which we analyze Keith’s layers. His fingers are absolutely haggard, knobby even. Bony, like some 80s spook-flick stereotype. His face famously sags under the weight of decades of drugs, alcohol and nicotine. His voice quivers with age, especially when he sings.

But when the Stones man musters up his infamous slippery grin and brittle laugh to boot, the man glows youth like you’ve never seen. As we move through the film—60s Chicago, New York, London—we slowly understand how such a philosophy is what brought Keith from lower-class, post-War England to the pinnacle of rock ’n’ roll fame.

Never growing up means constantly learning. Consider how strange it must have been for a young man in 50s/60s England to be inspired by the American Delta blues. Buddy Guy? Chuck Berry? Howlin’ Wolf, Bo Diddly, Muddy Waters? It was all quite literally a world away. The Stones made a name for themselves by speeding up these traditional blues roots to fit a modern rhythm, starting a career that would sail Richards through countless guitars, artist inspirations, taking up the piano, the mandolin, and dabbling in Reggae, Country music, and anything else that simply tickled his fancy. It’s what made his music so groundbreaking.

Why is it so relevant? It’s a hair’s breadth from the essence of the PR/Comms scene. It’s a scene so human that it parallels with a fundamental facet of life: that success is dependent on always being open to change, innovation, bringing in foreign concepts, and testing the legitimacy of current orthodoxy every now and then.

In other words, success is about staying young.

We survive by shaping the way clients are perceived, but we triumph by being adaptable, to constantly shape ourselves, and do it better, faster, and all with deeper insight.

As painfully cliché as it might sound, watching Keith decode a blues riff and thoughtfully navigate a guitar’s slender neck reminds me of the conceptual ins and outs of the Comms landscape. The colliding sectors and meshing industries is no different than notes in a chord and chords in a song, or the way a fresh approach inspires and motivates listeners or constituencies. And like Keith says, “music is something that binds people together, […] it’s undefinable and nobody’s got the answer to it. But it’s great fun exploring”.

Catching up on Z’s…And We’re Not Talking About Sleep

Attention all Millennials: Gen Z is coming up fast behind you. Gen Z currently makes up a quarter of the U.S. population, and more that 20 million of them are about to enter the workforce. It seems we are always preparing for those that will follow, going beyond the in-power generation at the helm. That’s what’s expected, that’s what’s healthy – for both sides of any work equation.

So it’s worth asking what we know about Gen Z. They are still young, after all. Gen Z includes those born between the mid-1990s and 2010, give or take a year. That would make the oldest about 20 years old and the youngest only five. The oldest are just starting to make their way out into the world to find and define themselves. Many are still checking the “undecided” box about their plans.

So it makes sense to be humble when it comes to making broad generalizations about this group. Just ask the millennials. They increasingly resist being labeled, according to a recent Pew Research Center survey, and don’t much like or identify with the stereotypes they’ve been tagged with. New research from Carat makes it clear that millennials are a diverse lot and aren’t all the “hyper-connected optimistic digital extroverts” they’ve been made out to be.

There’s little reason to think Gen Z’ers will differ much in this regard. What’s clearly unique about them as a group, though, is this: “We are the first true digital natives,” says Hannah Payne, an 18-year-old UCLA student and lifestyle blogger recently quoted in the New York Times. Think about it – the technology and social media world in which today’s 15-year olds swim like fish was new when many millennials were in their age…and it wasn’t that long ago, either.

The outside world that Gen Z’s inhabit is radically different, too, shaped by post-9/11 trauma, hyper-vigilance, and economic shock. This is probably why surveys are consistently finding that Gen Z’ers tend to be conservative about the future, mature, self-directed and resourceful. They have an entrepreneurial (or is it more a self-reliant?) spirit. A Sparks & Honey survey found 72% of high school students want to start their own business someday. They are “do gooders” who want their jobs to impact the world. However, they are also “practical pragmatists” concerned about career and financial stability.

Recruiting and retaining the best and brightest that Gen Z has to offer confronts employers with the challenge of resolving some of these basic tensions. Offering opportunities for growth and a friendly and flexible work environment is just a start. Gen Z’s will look closely for engagement and meaning in the work itself. They may be charitable…but don’t expect them to donate their careers to you.

SMALL (MAY BE) THE NEW BIG

When the highly appealing “Always #Likeagirl” campaign was awarded the PR Grand Prix at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity this past June, it appeared to bode well for PR’s emergence as a true creative force with a well-earned seat at the integrated marketing communications table.

However Ad Age wasn’t so sure. “Role of Dedicated Shops in Integrated Campaigns Remains Under Debate,” the headline ran, with the story going on to argue that “public relations agencies’ role in the winning work remains murky.”

Whether or not you agree, the suggestion that PR agencies don’t carry the creative torch quite as brightly as their advertising colleagues – even when they win the Grand Prix! -- has got to hurt…at least a little.

And it’s why it’s worth asking, as PR Week recently did, “What is the new PR agency?” What is the best way to build on PR’s “unique mentality and heritage” and yet foster and unleash an often-elusive but magical (you know it when you see it) blend of creativity and engagement that, when achieved to the max, will sparkle and shine its way across today’s multi-media landscape.

In this most exciting of times for communications, agencies both large and small are challenging themselves to work with greater integration and convergence across disciplines (advertising, marketing, PR, digital, etc.), with the goal of helping clients more completely and holistically tell their stories and more deeply engage with communities in today’s complex digital and social media-driven marketplace.

One obvious approach is to re-structure to better reflect the collaboration across disciplines demanded in today’s communications environment, as many are already doing.

The larger PR communications networks would seem to have an advantage in this regard. They already contain within themselves (or can acquire) the ad agencies, digital shops and other resources to, in theory, bring an integrated communications team to the table for any client.

But fostering greater integration among previously distinct (and proud of it!) agencies isn’t easy. Pesky questions about ownership can persist. Once in the same room, those from different disciplines may find they speak different languages and look at the world (and a given client challenge) in fundamentally different ways. Plus, organizational change entails risk, especially for larger organizations that may have more at stake. Nevertheless, this is a key challenge preoccupying those at the helm of the PR world’s most preeminent companies today.

Another approach has been to re-think the traditional hierarchical, “generalist PR” agency model in favor of models that elevate insight (read, creativity) on an equal plane with implementation. We did this when founding the Chandler Chicco Agency 20 years ago, with a “no titles/no walls” philosophy aimed at eliminating artificial barriers to collaboration and creativity. In 2011, GolinHarris did away with the traditional agency practice area/account management structure that many PR agencies share, and organized its people into four communities – the G4 model – based on an analysis of key competencies judged critical to success: insight strategies, idea creators, engagement connectors, and integration analysts. This type of re-imagining of how agencies can work is well worth watching as a harbinger of things to come.

Looking ahead, a compelling “alternative agency reality” could very well be one that is gaining traction as talent migrates out of establishment agencies to embrace new creative challenges and new paths to achieving them. Clients, too -- especially CMO’s and others who see the increasing interdependence of the various disciplines that make up “marketing communications” – are seeking partners who can live “close to the heart” with them and partner intimately to help realize their vision of a truly integrated creative marketing communications strategy for their brand.

Maybe “small is the new big.”

The Holmes Report explored this notion when they identified the “continued rise of the micro-network” as a #1 Global PR Trend To Watch in 2015. By that they meant there’s a growing market for more agility in meeting client needs and more immediate access to senior-level counsel and specific sector and practice expertise – and that this demand can potentially more readily be met by micro-networks, partnerships, and other entrepreneurial arrangements. Trend #2 was toward “making friends rather than purchases” – an acknowledgement that while mergers and acquisitions are likely be to part of the PR corporate landscape for some time to come, these come with their limitations (organizational, cultural and otherwise) and there is increasing opportunity for specialist, entrepreneurial firms to work in tandem toward meeting clients’ increasingly ambitious goals for “surround-sound” relevance.

Liking vs. doing: a thorny seesaw

As we permit social media to penetrate ever deeper into our DNA, it’s easy to get caught up in its potential for inspiring and capturing audiences and constituencies. Mediums like Twitter and Facebook, as we all know, act as seamless and barrier-free bridges between a voice and targeted ears and minds, creating “atmospheres of conversion”—especially with our plugged-in millennials. 

Yet such undeniable vehicles of information exchange come with their flaws. While social media allows for the transport of voices, it does not, for example, provide the opportunities for physical and emotional engagement in a topic—a crucial aspect for brand loyalty in youthful consumers. Take UNICEF Sweden’s 2013 campaign against “slacktivists”, drawing the line between a “like” on Facebook and donating funds—stressing that only one of these actually puts malaria nets in undeveloped Africa.  

It is exactly this breed of “hashtag activism” that can cause concern, shedding light on the potential for apathy that comes from a world massively connected through cold binary code. With this in mind, other weaknesses like endlessly competing voices and the demand for brevity (Twitter demands 140 characters or less), it is questionable, from a comms standpoint, if social media is actually the golden key to true, pathos-level audience engagement that millennials crave.  

And as is often the case, answers are to be found in the most unlikely places. Say, for example, contemporary installation art.  

Lying on the fringes of modern society, contemporary art in general presents itself as the most unexpected and unsung content medium. Shrouded in a haze of knowledge barriers and demographic niches, it often goes unnoticed—despite having profound implications for millennial-oriented communications.  

Take contemporary artist Ai Weiwei as a strong example, hypothesized as “China’s most dangerous man” by the Smithsonian and “the most powerful artist in the world” by ArtReview magazine. His relentless, social media-driven criticism of the Chinese government has created a following so large he's seen as a national threat, followed and beaten by police and even his studio bulldozed.   

But Ai Weiwei is not an activist. His Instagram account is at a loss for pictures of victims, charitable appeals or brazen government criticism.  

Ai Weiwei poses with piece that lists 5,000+ children who died in collapsed school houses during the 2008 earthquake. Image via Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry (Alison Klayman, 2012). 

He is an artist, and does not place his message in his online accounts. He presents his brand/philosophy as an individual through a medium that is spontaneous, intelligent, overwhelming, and both physically and emotionally engaging—almost becoming irrefutable or impossible to ignore. He emphasizes shock tactics and apologizes for nothing.  

As a package, it’s everything millennials want. Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook only become sharing tools—a delivery system. 

Ai Weiwei makes overwhelming installation pieces such as Sunflower Seeds—pouring 100 million hand-painted porcelain seeds into a warehouse to comment on the “Made in China” culture and its geopolitical effects—or another amazing work, Remembering—where he spelled out, using 9,000 backpacks, the words:  “She lived happily for seven years in this world”  to criticize China’s response to its  2008 earthquake. The engagement starts and ends here with a cohesive and awe-inspiring project that itself holds the message; social media only acting as a platform for organic growth, fed by genuine, raw, emotional responses. The art acts as his voice, Instagram and Twitter instead becoming a discussion platform.  

Why does UNICEF get dismissed with a nonchalant “like” when a Chinese artist can inspire a generation of intellectuals? Put simply, social media does not create engagement, it provides an incubating environment for strong content and media that does. It’s not enough to tell even the largest group of followers there’s a problem to be solved, that your business has a solution, or that you’re “different” like everyone else; it takes creative and outside-the-box reaching out and storytelling that strikes at the audience pathos.  

Stunts, campaigns, avant-garde advertising, innovative media—these are the things that bring traction, not Tweet scheduling or boosted Facebook posts. It’s the difference between Ai Weiwei posting Instagram pictures of earthquake victims and asking for donations, or making art that overwhelmingly expresses the gravitas of the situation, creating a genuine desire to donate. Heart strings can’t be plucked in 140 characters, but it can put that documentary, that thousand-words picture, that interview, that art piece, or that PR stunt on the world stage to spread and do it for you. When UNICEF boarded this train, they launched this brilliant campaign.  

In short, don’t just start a conversation. Give them something to talk about.  

How a "Team of Teams" Empowers Everyone

Romanticized notions of crisis management often involve a dose of nobly bombastic leadership. Picture a high-ranking renegade, thinking clearer and harder than his panicked crew to swoop in and turn the ship around without hesitation, and with miraculous timing. It’s the stuff of legend. 

However, in the wonderfully intelligent book Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement For a Complex World, author Stanley McChrystal suggests that these tactics stay in Hollywood. Taking command of the Joint Special Operations Task Force of the US Military on 2004, General McChrystal quickly noticed that conventional tactics of hierarchical command were failing his country. Against a decentralized and highly adaptive opponent, all the advantages of numbers, resources, and training America had were of no advantage in the face of a looming inability to improvise. 

In the heart of a damning war, the general gave the Task Force a re-haul. Needing to match the speed and flexibility of Al Qaeda without sacrificing the behemoth size of the US Military, the now-retired general created the “team of teams” system. The hierarchy was flattened, transparency was emphasized, and decision-making was decentralized among three continents via strong technological prowess. 

Al Qaeda was pushed back. 

The “team of teams” structure is a loose concept that has already established itself through several forms as a strong trend in modern business. Zappos is changing course to the Holacracy and moving through with open sails. More and more startups are ditching conventional trickle down decision-making in exchange for collaboration.

And that is just the point. Collaboration trumps command. 

General McChrystal (center) leads a visit to Kapisa Province, Afghanistan. 

In the most ironic way, Al Qaeda has taught us that small, decentralized teams united by a common goal will outpace stiff hierarchy every time, as transparent, lateral communication is endlessly more efficient than downward demands. As McChrystal insists, the purpose of Navy BUD/S (Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL) training “is not to produce super soldiers. It is to produce super teams”. 

The thoughtfulness continues. “We needed to enable a team operating in an interdependent environment to understand the butterfly-effect ramifications of their work and make them aware of the other teams with whom they would have to cooperate in order to achieve strategic—not just tactical—success”. 

This perspective is deeply explored throughout the book, including several mind-bending testaments to the power of collaboration. In particular, Team of Teams combs through the story of Dr. E. J. Caterson, who after a ten-hour operation was intercepted from the end of the day by a hospital resident, saying “a bomb just went off”. It was April 15, 2013. The Boston Marathon. 

Caterson’s team and others converged in the emergency room. “No one had any sense of what the scope of the event was”, he explains, taking half a chapter of the book to reminisce. “As far as we knew, this could be three thousand people”. Trauma surgeons, orthopedic surgeons, and vascular surgeons put their heads together in the heat of the moment to co-devise an immediate plan to treat the incoming patients of critical condition. 

One patient in particular comes flying through the doors with mere remnants of a leg. The go-to orthodox method would call for an above-knee amputation and prosthetic limb. That, however, wasn’t good enough for Caterson—or his team of teams. 

The medical task force dove in. They took skin grafts from the victim’s leg and back to heal the wound over an interim period. A 22cm and 40cm strip were removed from his back, threaded together by a 2mm-thick blood vessel to make a skin pattern with stitching finer than a human hair. After removing the bone, putting it back in his leg, and soldiering through eight surgeries, their patient recovered with a functioning knee. An amputation would have meant up to a 70% increase in energy output during walking for the rest of his life, leading to early joint failure, cardiovascular issues, and pulmonary issues. “That was a complete deviation from normal practices” Caterson says. “But as a result, that person will be able to run a marathon again”. 

Conceptual diagram via Fast Company: http://www.fastcompany.com/3045477/work-smart/goodbye-org-chart

This is the true stuff of legend. In a situation that is almost life and death, neglecting many heads for the command of one would be insanity. Imagine if the vascular surgeons couldn’t communicate with the orthopedic surgeons, or if Caterson could report only to his superior. Decisions would take too long on a single, vertical elevator of reconnaissance, and a lack of collective empowerment would likely inspire the lone play-caller to dodge the risk and resort to conventional tactics, leaving the patient with a completely different quality of life. 

Collaboration supports healthy risk-taking. It emphasizes transparency, efficiency, empowerment, and creative solutions. Most of all, collaboration sacrifices authority for agility. Taking a “team of teams” approach like the newly tempting Holacracy can radically change the synergy and internal communication of modern businesses, supporting heightened levels of home-grown trust networks and motivating individuals to contribute. When knowing your actions could have a permeating ripple effect, and not a trajectory fizzling out two floors short of the CEO’s office, everyone becomes empowered. 

Jiro Ono and The Work Ethic of a Shokunin

Every art has their masters—their da Vincis, Mozarts, and DiCaprios—acting as ambassadors to the mainstream waters and setting the bar for brilliance. Their job is to innovate, to inspire, to push the envelope and, ultimately, spark progression and herald the new wave of their craft. Many artistic histories are vibrant and controversial, several legends battling it out years later among modern memory for an unequivocal acceptance as “the greatest”. The story of sushi is one that takes no such tone. 

Its history stretches even the capacity of our understanding. Starting as a humble street food like the New York hot dog, sushi eventually rose to upper class status, breaking into America and spreading through Europe, only to become so recognized it was again demoted to conveyor belts and grocery store access. Its global adoption is both so overwhelmingly organic and yet so humble, no one knows who or when the California Roll was even invented. Despite this, sushi has its master.

An ambassador and guardian of its purest form and greatest potential, 89 year old Jiro Ono holds the title—competition at an utter loss. His 3 Michelin Star Sukiyabashi seats ten people. Reservations are mandatory, and only accepted a month in advance. Pricing for twenty pieces starts at ¥30,000 ($245) per person, and increases with market conditions. A meal could last 15 minutes, in that sense rendering it the most expensive restaurant in the world. There are no appetizers or aperitifs on offer—Jiro is a specializing man, and one of our greatest living icons of hard work reaping success. 

Film still from Jiro Dreams of Sushi (David Gelb, 2012)

“We don’t care about money”, Jiro emphatically explains among elated violas in the breathtaking documentary Jiro Dreams of Sushi, “All I want to do is make better sushi. I do the same thing over and over, improving bit by bit. There is always a yearning to achieve more. I’ll continue to climb, trying to reach the top… but no one knows where the top is”. 

The militarism shows; its the only thing that is as much a part of his icon status as the sushi itself. Jiro does not do vacations, only leaving the restaurant for funerals and medical emergencies. His steely, aging gaze holds decades of dedication in every glance, a vast majority of patrons saying they are too intimidated to eat in front of him. 

His techniques marry subtle innovation with staunch tradition, only the best fish purchased from the reigning champions. Tuna from the tuna expert, shrimp from the shrimp expert, rice from the rice expert. Various ingredients come from a man who’s grandfather was harked as “the god of sea eel”. Gender arrangement at the bar of ten is memorized before the restaurant opens, sushi sizes being made accordingly so everyone finishes at the same time. Upon noticing a left-handed visitor, Jiro will place the next piece on the left side to accommodate, which is wiped clean after each morsel. The twenty pieces are arranged by taste composition like an orchestra first thing in the morning—each hand pressed and gently stroked with soy sauce, placed in front of a visitor like a glistening, breathing supercar or priceless jewel. “Even at my age, after decades of work,” he insists, “I don’t think I have achieved perfection. But I feel ecstatic all day, I love making sushi”. 

Despite decades of dedication and a conscious pursuit of perfection, Jiro’s success does indeed lie in his ability to love what he does. It provides the strong foundation for his shokunin philosophy, one that demands ceaseless repetition for a mastery of a craft that is both “spiritual and materialistic”. “Once you’ve decided on your occupation, you must immerse yourself in your work”, he insists, smiling. “You have to fall in love with your work. Never complain about your job. You must dedicate your life to mastering your skill. That’s the secret of success, and the key to being regarded honorably”. 

And what of the argument for talent? Of secret ingredients, shortcuts, and masterwork tools?

“The techniques we use are no big secret” Jiro’s eldest son and heir apparent, Yoshikazu, calmly explains, hand-roasting seaweed in the hallway. “It really comes down to making an effort and repeating the same thing every day”. 

Yielding to the "Yolo" Millennial Consumers

“Millennials” has almost become an intimidating word, an uncomfortable and bewildering discussion topic. Highly tech-savvy and driven by an elusive, simultaneous “YOLO” lust for both individuality and social media acceptance, marketing has never before been so radically forced to shift gears and juggle so many things at once. An utter dependence on being “connected”has created a strong, incoming climate that is placing the innovative on a pedestal above the powerful. Brand values now come before brand labels. Being “different” is heralded as a higher truth, being “the biggest” no longer impresses. 

Take Marriott Hotel’s new strategy that sums it up the best, turning their tried-and-true business model upside-down to accommodate. 

Image from Forbes' "Inside the Millennial Mind: The Do's & Don'ts of Marketing to this Powerful Generation": http://www.forbes.com/sites/patrickspenner/2014/04/16/inside-the-millennial-mind-the-dos-donts-of-marketing-to-this-powerful-generation-3/2/

What worked with the baby-boomers—a flawlessly repeated formula of perfect execution and predictability—is exactly what is leading younger consumers to distance themselves from large hotel chains. Traveling abroad 23% more than the preceding generation, millennials are driven by a need for unique experiences and spontaneity. As freelance market consulting agency K-Hole explains in Fragmoretation, “future growth potential lies in tapping consumers’ desire to realize their individuality”. 

But this isn’t exactly a pivotal realization. It’s a fundamental testament, an understanding of how to attract the most elusive breed of consumers ever.  

Marriott proceeded to become what everyone thought they weren’t. Staff and local entrepreneurs pitched ideas to the marketing team spearheading the campaign, racing for a $50,000 reward that would turn the winning ideas into innovative realities. What resulted was blank rooftops being turned into pop-up bars, edgy restaurants that challenged negative connotations of hotel food, and ideas locally crowd-sourced through Facebook to creatively utilize empty spaces. 

Image from Forbes' "Inside the Millennial Mind: The Do's & Don'ts of Marketing to this Powerful Generation": ttp://www.forbes.com/sites/patrickspenner/2014/04/16/inside-the-millennial-mind-the-dos-donts-of-marketing-to-this-powerful-generation-3/2/

A yearning for such experiences is mirrored in other hugely successful marketing campaigns that targeted this young demographic. It’s the backbone philosophy behind Bud Light’s #Upforwhatever campaign, where a Superbowl TV commercial had an unsuspecting bar-goer hurled into a limo to play ping pong with Arnold Schwarzenegger. It’s the explanation behind Shake Shack CEO Danny Meyer telling his staff "The bigger we get, the smaller we need to act". It’s why customizable fast-casual dining like Chipotle has become the go-to, it’s why Airbnb is exploding in popularity, and it’s why Whole Foods sometimes struggles. 

The millennials are fundamentally built around individuality, trading pragmatism and familiarity for sheer spontaneity and labels that go beyond “the customer”. Millennials want to know they are contributing to a unique brand philosophy and are being welcomed by a brand’s personality, constantly looking for innovative ways to actively and emotionally engage with their choices as consumers. They are, after all, an audience that is perpetually plugged-in and stimulated. 

In essence, shifting currents in consumer loyalty mean a name in itself isn’t enough to drive young people anymore. It’s what’s in the name that counts.

Positive visualization may have effect on physical healing

A very interesting trend is taking hold in healthcare: that positive visualization and general optimism may tie to enhanced physical recovery. Investigations into the increasing use of virtual reality with hospital patients, as well as literature exploring the effect of general optimism on injured athletes, points to healing being more of a mental game than we thought. 

A 2006 study by Handergard, et al., involved athletes listening to recorded audio messages directing the listener to focus on the injured body part healing, improving its range of motion, and getting stronger. The athletes who participated reported an increase in confidence that those who did not participate failed to acknowledge, and attributed 30-40% of their recovery to mental imagery. 

Image via unsplash.com

The growing influence of virtual reality suggests a similar conclusion, as a study from the University of South Australia shows children undergoing physiotherapy after ligament surgery for cerebral palsy-related muscle spasticity had significantly lower pain levels reported when distracted by a virtual reality game in conjunction with their normal pain dosages. Virtual reality has also shown promising effects of making physical therapy more fun in senior homes, translating into improved willingness to participate and improved results. 

Scientist Barbara Fredrickson spent years accumulating research and insights that remind us regular mental positivity can have physical effects that stretch from improved sleep and fewer colds to improved recovery from cardiovascular stress. The same University of Minnesota article reminds us a two-way correlation indeed exists, as chronic negativity can lead to high blood pressure and even digestive disorders. 

Even the basic grasp of “forgiveness” can have notable effects. 27% of 260 adults that participated in a 6-week Stanford Forgiveness Project ultimately reported a decrease in physical ailments that included general pain, gastrointestinal upset, or dizziness. 

The mental aspects of healing from physical trauma need not be ignored. Perspective and positivity have been proven to affect physical health and the specific recovery processes, meaning a new chance to facilitate recuperation in hospital patients. It will be interesting to see where virtual reality, a major player in this new approach, and other visualization techniques take modern healing and recovery practices.