We’ve been at it a year. How has it been meeting and planning and celebrating via Zoom? What ways have you adapted? What do you enjoy about it? What do you dislike?
I think there is much to be grateful for to be going through isolation with the technology we have now. We do get to connect, talk and share with colleagues and friends and family. Yet it is so very different for our bodies and nervous systems to adapt to this way of seeing each other.
Through Zoom we connect and the experience is paradoxical. Connection yet distance. Community yet isolation. Energetic yet draining.
I had my first experience of leading a group practice recently and came away from it with a whole bunch of new thoughts. I felt into the isolation that comes from being in the guiding position of that group meeting. During the practice, all the sound and visual cues were muted or shrunk down from my view. I was there sharing and connected and in community, yet part of me was searching for the familiar physical cues. They weren’t there. Extra layers of translation had to happen to register the interactions as correct and informative.
I send many thanks to all the teachers and leaders who for the past year have been holding that weird space for all of us and doing such a great job. They’ve been looking at our faces and hoping to glean some kind of feedback through uncanny means. And we’re still gaining a great bit of benefit from their teachings. I wonder how they have found satisfaction in this new way of teaching.
My thoughts about this experience align with studies and theories of how virtual environments affect us. This article from Technology, Mind, and Behavior, titled “Nonverbal overload: A theoretical argument for the causes of Zoom fatigue” addresses several of these. Written by researcher Jeremy N Bailenson, director of Stanford University’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab, it speaks to several nonverbal ways that meeting via Zoom tries our interactive patience. (Also listen to his interview with BBC, which is at the end of the article.)
Here are his informed observations and theories, as interpreted by me.
#1 Extended eye-gaze
IRL: We can shift, look away, give bodies and faces some space.
Zoom: “Zoom effectively transforms listeners into speakers and smothers everyone with eye gaze.”
This is similar to being forced into small spaces…think elevator or crowded subway. In real life, we manage this “too close” contact by looking away, shifting the angle of our body, or just finding another place to go. With Zoom, we are essentially trapped with everyone turned toward us, in our personal space with hardly any options for getting out of this situation.
Mark one for kindling discomfort.
#2 Cognitive load
IRL: We communicate incredibly complex meaning to each other through effortless body language. We receive and send cues in this way and monitor responses mostly under the conversation without much effort.
Zoom: More effort is expended purposefully to send and receive cues. Verbal or physical responses are not timed the same as in person. We look at a camera to create direct eye contact for the viewer, which goes through more layers of description to be interpreted as “eye contact.”
While we are absolutely adaptable, having to reinterpret cues consciously is draining.
Mark two for kindling discomfort.
#3 Gazing in a mirror while in a group
IRL: We spend our days looking out at the world from behind our face. We probably take a few minutes throughout the day check in with our looks and assess how we’re doing visually.
Zoom: Unless you’re consistent with “hiding self view”, you are looking at yourself in the mirror a lot. Self-viewing leads to a lot of negative self-evaluation for some people.
Instead of being in the company of others, focusing on our conversations, we are interrupted by the image of our face talking and making mental or physical adjustments to how we look to make us feel better.
Mark three for kindling discomfort.
#4 Movement
IRL: We stand up, sit down, stretch, walk, do small tasks. These things can happen during in-person meetings, and especially so during phone calls.
Zoom: Depending on context, we have a very limited physical space in which we can move around and still be seen. We are held in a small physical zone by the requirements of the medium.
Mark four for kindling discomfort.
Remembering your body
The physical, mental and subconscious emotional demands of Zoom are significant. They are absolutely draining. As an already mind-centric culture, we are pulled more towards that experience, forgetting our physicality until we are exhausted. To keep yourself healthy and taken care of, remember that you have and are still a body. Look for opportunities to move, nourish, and rest.
If you are interested in learning techniques to restore your energetic self while managing Zoom, schedule a consult and let’s see what we can do.
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