For the past decades, we as a country thought that corporate life was the norm. The cubicle space became synonymous with workers wearing ties and suits. These were the professionals that we all strived to become. Many of us took out large student loans in order to put ourselves through business schools in order to achieve the prestige of working at a large company. Movies as well as TV Shows showed the politics, and cash that went hand in hand with working on the floor.

The problem is that too many of us have achieved this so called level of success. We are now stuck in tiny cubicles, and feel more like boxed in cattle than successful individuals. Years of this type of environment wrecks havoc on our health and mind being. All organisms take many thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of years in order to evolve. We are no different. Taking humans from the great outdoors and squeezing them into confined gray spaces has been known to cause stress, panic attacks and in some extreme cases insanity.

I would compare this to a life in a large city such as New York for example. There are millions of people living in a very small area, but yet not many even know their neighbors. This causes alienation, anxiety and the feelings of hopelessness in many. That is one of the reasons that their public parks are so closely guarded to make sure that nothing is ever built to replace or diminish their size.

We feel a connection to plants, because we are connected to them. That’s why the cubicles with the window are so important to strive for if you are striving for being in such an environment at all. There have been many studies in the past few years outlining the importance of having either plants or just pictures of the outdoors around us as it calms our brains and allow for us to stay focused longer. Seeing green basically improves our wellbeing as we are programmed to do well in that exact environment. Even though we changed our habits, evolution has not been able to keep up with our choices.

I recommend to make your work space as green as possible. This could be by placing photos, pictures or even a small plant on your desk. Since most of us are stuck looking at the computer screens for long periods of time I would start by changing the background and screen saver to reflect nature. It is very important to at least fool our bodies into feeling calm in order to stop any diseases or mental issues from developing. I work out of my house, did the cubicle gig already, and noticed the increase in my productivity and health after I moved my desk next to the window and placing a few nature pictures, calendars all around me. I still keep a poster of a nice car close by, but that’s more for motivation than anything else.