One of the things that I have done in the past few years to help
reduce my stress levels and increase my coolness factor is playing
ambient videos on my TV screen.
It started with aquarium videos. I love aquariums and looking at them
but I hate cleaning them. The anger, the water, the idea that I'm
scooping poop and dead fish out just is not appealing to me.
I found a couple of aquarium screensavers that were awesome but they
were only on my computer. As televisions got bigger and became more
and more big computer monitors I tried to run my computer on them but
found that having the screensaver blink off as soon as anybody touched
anything on the computer was frustrating.
As YouTube became more and more available on bigger screen TVs just as
a streaming thing and then also with the Chromecast and other things I
started showing aquarium videos on my TV in my living room. But I was
stuck and left at the whim of the Internet connection. So I found a
way to download YouTube videos I started downloading aquarium videos
and putting them on thumb drives and plugging them in the back of the
TV and playing them.
It was amazing! Relaxing, we had our on the big screen instead of
just having a big dark screen in the living room unless you are
watching something, it was less distracting but more relaxing all at
the same time. I loved it!
I started watching beach scenes and mountain stream scenes and other
relaxing ambient videos. They're all a lot of fun and I really enjoy
them.
I tried to get into some of the random window sites that have popped
up over the years. While they were good they weren't as relaxing as I
thought they might be. They were good for a few minutes but then
would jump to a different window and the view wouldn't be that good or
it wouldn't be something that I want to watch. So I really didn't get
into them.
I did find a couple of videos of outdoor caf�s and Sweden or Denmark
that had an electric cable car that came by like a bus every few
minutes. That was actually cool because you saw actual people doing
real things and that was fun. They made me want to go visit those
places!
I tried the train videos and the view out of the train window. Some
of those are okay but I get tired of looking at train tracks.
I did find a couple of virtual tours of Venice that my wife and I
really enjoyed. Sitting there watching because it was so beautiful and
so different from our cities.
But the videos were always at my house. I now have them on my home
office 48 inch monitor and I play them in my work office on my 40+
inch monitor that just got mounted to the wall.
I have playlists of videos that you might enjoy on YouTube. You can
find them at https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVqI204q3ewk3SQ7Uj5DXRq97hSCwQs0B&si=aZSs5GRjX5PV4VUC
and https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVqI204q3ewkHCrd-lO9xG3C-9X7P22t7&si=XFPnXK_flSxeL8JS.
I hope you find a way to use your technology to decrease your stress
levels rather than be driven by the dings and the notifications that
keep us on edge. Enjoy!
