Anne-Laure Le Cunff (Paris, 35) left her job at Google because it didn’t make her happy. He founded a start which failed and ended up closing. That didn’t make her particularly happy either. But instead of crying, Le Cunff decided to try a little experiment. “I will write a short article on neuroscience every day for 100 working days,” he told himself. Five years later, we can say that the experiment went quite well. The articles became a newsNessLabs, which eventually became a platform. And now they take the form of a book. Micro experiments. The power to try, fail and learn in a world that demands certainty (Conecta Editorial) does not only summarize his personal experience. Even his research, focused on how the brain reacts to learning and curiosity. This doctor in psychology and neuroscience from King’s College London argues that it is necessary to bury the capitalist mantra of the search for the meaning of life in work and defends that our vocations, in the plural, can be many and we must try them all, even if we do not profit from them. You may not succeed in Silicon Valley, but you realize you can be great pizza chefwriter of fan fiction From Dusk or a knitting artist. And you can be very happy that way.
Ask. You have had a brilliant career in a large company. But one day he realized that he was not happy, so he left her. Along the way he learned a valuable lesson that he has now put into a book. Your story is something like the essayist’s hero’s journey, right?
Answer. (Laughs) Maybe. I think many of us have a similar experience with our work. People change their lives when something happens that completely changes their beliefs. It’s very easy to move on, settle into a routine, and think that if something goes wrong, we’ll change it later. But sometimes something happens. It could be an illness, a layoff, or a breakup. Something that pushes you to make a decision. In my case it was a health problem. And I realized how obsessed I was with success and my work. Well, having changed my life, my only ambition with this book is to share this story, to let other people know about my hero’s journey, so to speak. So maybe they can start making some of these changes in their lives without having to go through something as scary as what I went through.
Q. In his book, and in his life, he challenges the idea that we all have one true calling and that we must find our purpose.
R. Our society has become obsessed with finding your one true purpose. Over the past two decades, mentions of the phrase “finding your purpose” have increased by more than 700% in published books, which gives you an idea of our obsession. But life isn’t that simple and you can’t make sense of it based on just one thing. Today we live in a non-linear world. The linear career path of previous generations, where you have a job and keep it throughout your career, no longer exists. This is a fantasy today. If you become obsessed with that one true purpose, you limit your chances of success. You don’t have to put all your eggs in one basket and say “this is it. This is my life. This is my identity. This is my purpose.” Because if that project or career doesn’t work out, your world comes crashing down. That’s why I argue in the book that you don’t need to find a grand purpose. You can try many different things that give meaning to life and you can even change your mind. It’s not a failure. It’s growth.
Q. We’re talking about purpose and satisfaction in life and somehow allusions to work and success creep into your speeches. Do you think we try to find meaning in life through our work?
R. We live in an ultra-capitalist environment, where unfortunately the value of an individual has been linked to his productivity, we believe that if you have a good job you contribute a lot to society, but this is not true. You can have a lot of value as a human being, as a partner, a parent, a friend, as a student… Society often makes us forget this and social networks only make this problem worse. Because now we have a huge leaderboard where we can compare people’s success. A few generations ago, you stopped having contact with the people you grew up with and studied with. But now, if you are in your 30s or 40s, you are aware of everything that has happened to all the people you have met at all stages of your life. It’s not natural. Neither is good. You can compare yourself with others, measure the success of all the people who have crossed your life. And that creates a very harmful social comparison, I think that’s why many people associate their purpose with their work.
Q. From an evolutionary perspective, being useful to the group has always been crucial for survival. But could this idea have intensified with the rise of capitalism and social media?
R. Absolutely, from an evolutionary perspective, being useful has always been important. But before the tribe was much smaller and everyone had exactly the same goals. We need to find resources, we need shelter, stay safe, support each other, make sure kids are safe, etc. So in this way, it works very well. The incentives themselves make you useful, and the tribe, in return, helps you. But the tribe wasn’t designed to be made up of millions of strangers on the Internet yelling at you and harassing you, telling you what you should do to be useful to society. The tribe wasn’t supposed to be one of those big corporations where you’re easily replaceable. This is an example of the discordance between our brain and the current environment, the circumstances have changed, but we have not.
Q. Let’s talk about chrono AND kairos. Why is it important to differentiate these two concepts instead of just talking about time?
R. We can’t think about our mental health in today’s world without talking about our relationship with time. And our relationship with time has become really one-dimensional, where there are just seconds and minutes and hours, and these little boxes on our calendar that we have to fill with as many things as possible. I was fascinated to discover that this is not the only way we can define time. The ancient Greeks had two ways of thinking about time: Chronowhich is the quantitative definition of time. AND kairoswhich is the best definition of time, the quality of time, the depth of time. It’s the time to see a beautiful sunset, the time to read a story to your child, when you’re deep in conversation with a friend and time is running out. If we want to have greater well-being, but also greater creativity and, paradoxically, perhaps greater productivity in our lives without sacrificing our mental health, we need to make sure we have more moments kairos in our lives and otherwise chrono.
Q. It sounds great, but is it possible today? I would like to experiment more, enjoy more quality time, not be such a perfectionist… But I don’t think my boss would really like the idea.
R. This is exactly why the book is called “Micro Experiments” and not “Big Experiments to Change Everything and Quit Your Job”. And that’s exactly what I’m advocating: anyone can find a little experiment to do. And when I talk about developing an experimental mindset and living an experimental life, I’m not talking about quitting your job and changing everything. I’m sure you can find a little space, a little part of your life that’s more like a laboratory, where you experiment and try new things. This is living and experiencing.
Q. In this sense, how do you interpret the growing popularity of book clubs or ceramics courses?
R. I think we are exhausted because of the digital world we live in. We are hyperconnected to an overwhelming flow of non-stop information. We don’t even have time to interpret and integrate the information we receive, which is usually quite negative. Problems overtake us, we have no idea what we should do on our scale… Pottery, book clubs or knitting and sewing workshops are a way to disconnect from the digital world and reconnect with the real world. Reconnect with yourself, with your creativity and your thinking. Plus, they’re a way to meet other people and connect on a social level.
Q. When we adopt an experimental mindset, how does our brain respond?
R. Neuroscience shows us that, contrary to popular belief, neuroplasticity continues into adulthood. Many people think it only happens in childhood, but it continues into adulthood if you proactively make an effort to keep learning new things, experimenting, challenging yourself to try things a little different so you can form those new neural pathways. Therefore, conducting small experiments is a way to stay young. This daily practice of learning, this daily practice of really reinventing yourself and when you have to reinvent yourself, you have to form new connections, and so you keep your brain plastic in this way. That’s why there’s tons of research on lifelong learning, and we know that lifelong learning is actually one of the best ways to keep age-related neural problems at bay. That’s why I also believe that experimentation has many benefits beyond the short term of discovering what you like.
Q. These small experiments can become big over time. His was a newsletter, Ness Labs, which today has 70,000 subscribers and led to this book.
R. Yes, it’s my biggest experiment. This little experiment started five years ago, and it’s the first version, the first iteration, because… it’s also something I talk about, right? The first version of an experiment does not have to be final. You can try different versions and keep experimenting. In the first version I said to myself: “I will write a short article on neuroscience every day for 100 working days”. This was my experiment. At first I was a little scared, because English is not my native language. I didn’t consider myself an online writer, but I enjoyed it so much that I decided to keep going, even though it was too intense to write 100 articles in 100 working days. So in the next few iterations I came up with a few articles per week. And then I did another iteration. And now, in my current version, five years later, I write one article a week. And it was a great way to find my tribe.
Q. Five years later and after turning it into a work, he still talks about iterations and experimentation.
R. Absolutely, and I will never abandon that mindset because I think that’s what makes travel so interesting. I don’t have an end goal. If I had perspective, I would always compare my current situation to the end goal in the future; I would never feel like it was enough, I would never feel like I was working hard enough. So I’m focusing on learning in the moment and learning along the way. I also know that what I like today might be different from what I want in the future, which is my priority. It’s very important to keep it as a series of experimental cycles and see where I go.
