We're All David After Dentist — Forever

But there's hope for us yet

We’re all David After Dentist. But maybe not inescapably.

This ancient YouTube video from the halcyon days of 2008 features a loopy 7-year-old boy named David awakening after a heavily sedated dental procedure. He oscillates between bewilderment and bellows of rage before settling into talkative stupefaction.

“Is this going to be forever?” he asks his father, seemingly halfway between despair and wonder.

Around 142 million people have laughed at this video, but few realize we’re all David After Dentist much of the time. The overwhelming intensity of now seems like it will last forever, and we’re too in it to notice our delusion and the mistakes stemming from it.

If we don’t correct for this, the results can be disastrous.

We’re a Little Drunk on the Now

No one balks at this life advice: Don’t make consequential decisions while drunk or drugged.

These substances warp our senses while narrowing our focus to what’s happening now¹, with predictable intensification of emotions. Whatever we’re dealing with seems all-encompassing while the rest of existence fades. To avoid blunders, it makes sense to put off significant decisions till we’re clearheaded.

But we’re frequently intoxicated when totally sober, stupified by immersion in the now and incapable of seeing what’s beyond the immediate.

I once helped — with a few other bystanders — the survivors of a head-on SUV-motorcycle collision. My efforts lasted five minutes, but I will never unsee the twitching, boneless, contorted bodies of the motorcycle driver and his passenger. The sight became so lodged in my brain that I could think of little else for three days.

I tried to go on with life, but my mind dragged me back to those twisted bodies every time I wasn’t actively distracting it. I made uncharacteristic mistakes because I was only half aware of what I was doing. I was essentially living back at the crash site. I couldn’t shift out of that one gear, like a nightmare I couldn’t wake from. I was David After Dentist.

This is an extreme example, but we all oscillate into these “extreme zoom” modes that are hard to escape and heavily compromise our ability to live the good life.

• Anxiety does it

• Desire does it

• Anger does it

• Even ecstatic excitement and joy might push out everything else

We even find this in the everyday, low-stakes moments. Simple work or relationship problem solving is compromised when we’ve stared at the problem so long we see nothing else. Modern psychology and therapy research suggests this inability to spot the broader perspective leads to big problems.

On one extreme, refusing to zoom in on fears to avoid facing them causes them to loom larger and become more severe², a self-reinforcing cycle. This refusal to look robs us of the exploration that can deflate fears entirely.

Look on the Dark Side for a Change

But there’s another side of this that’s less frequently discussed — the inability to zoom out and see the bigger picture. A kind of avoidance — usually relabeled “positive distraction” — is useful when it doesn’t stray into chronic avoidance.

One study concluded³: “unlike avoidance, positive distraction (and to a lesser degree neutral distraction) was related to positive outcomes such as higher well-being and positive emotions, and fewer depressive symptoms.”

So if we’re frequently drunk on the moment and unable to be as clear-headed as we might hope, what’s to be done?

Whenever I’m feeling stuck, my favorite question for myself is, “what would it feel like to have more perspective on this?”

I will gravitate toward one of the perspective-enhancing therapeutic exercises below, though which one suits the moment sometimes surprises me.

The View From Above:

“Look on all things earthly as though from some point far above, upon herds, armies, and agriculture, marriages and divorces, births and deaths…”
— Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 7.48

Psychotherapist and Philosopher

Donald J. Robertson

and

Jon Brooks

discussed the promise of the view from above in this video. Plato suggested the approach, and the Stoics integrated it as a therapeutic practice that could break the spell of whatever now a person was wound up in.

You see your situation as if from far away — temporally, physically, and in relation to the rest of humanity — to experience an injection of perspective.

Walk Away:

I’m often so wrapped up in a piece of writing or other struggle that I can’t see beyond what isn’t working.

Physically taking a walk away from the problem is a great way to find what will work. Not only does walking enhance creativity, but it also distracts us from what we’re stuck on so we can look at it in a new light. I discuss using walking as a cognitive enhancer here:

We're All Cognitively Impaired Now

Meditation:

What is meditation but attention redirection — away from what the mind locked on and onto something considerably less emotionally charged? If meditation works for you, it can often bring perspective shifts and relief.

Prosochē

“Perfection of character requires this, that you should live each day as though it were your last, and be neither agitated, nor lethargic, nor act a part.” — Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 7.69

Prosochē is the closest Stoicism comes to mindfulness. It’s an interrogation of ourselves in the moment to find out if we’re living up to our ideals. Prosochē removes our attention from what we don’t have direct control over and reapplies it to what we control (virtue).

In challenging situations, this refocus often crowbars me free of whatever emotion or problem drew me in and blinded me. I discuss virtue more here:

No One Tries This When They’re Unhappy (It’s Life-Changing)

The Art Zoom

Reverential art can zoom us out in a way that allows us to see the bigger picture in life, while irreverent art erodes our certainties, exposing the warts on our sacred cows. Both have their place, and I discuss how art can be utilized for these purposes here.

Michelangelo’s David (1504) and Peter Lenk’s Laubebrunen Konstanz (1991)

Try Out Death

"We are always complaining that our days are few, and acting as though there would be no end of them." — Seneca, On the Shortness of Life

Death shakes us from the status quo because it forces us to confront an unbreakable boundary. There is an end to all suffering, all relationships, and to all pleasant and lamentable things. Finding ways to confront some version of this in any moment can cause an instant expansion of perspective.

Three Ways Death Makes Us Happier

Shaken by Awe

Awe can be used to shake us from ruts and awaken us to the larger picture. Find places that slap you and use awe as an anti-ennui engine:

A Charm Against Life Weariness and Despair

Gratitude

I wouldn’t have thought gratitude could defeat anger. But there’s an often hard-to-endure person who I owe a lot to. Forcing myself to mentally acknowledge how much impact they’ve had on me shifts me from annoyance to gratitude.

When I’m having a problem with a person, or I’m stuck in a woe-is-me mode, being grateful for the really hard things and the easy things is a great way to get free.

People who struggle with gratitude make the same mistake

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1. Some drugs expand perspective in a useful way, even having therapeutic properties. But this expanded perspective is also too extreme for good in-the-moment decision making, and may only have lasting relevance if they’re used as a touchstone to bring this perspective into normal life.

2. Hofmann SG, et al. Rethinking avoidance: Toward a balanced approach to avoidance in treating anxiety disorders. J Anxiety Disord. 2018 Apr;55:14-21. doi: 10.1016/j.janxdis.2018.03.004.

3. Waugh, C. E., Et al. (2020). Not all disengagement coping strategies are created equal: positive distraction, but not avoidance, can be an adaptive coping strategy for chronic life stressors. Anxiety, Stress, & Coping, 33(5), 511–529. https://doi.org/10.1080/10615806.2020.1755820