QUE/OVERTHINKING
hang on,
let me overthink this
Thesis Statement
“Funny thing about the mind...it can trap and free you at the same time” — Sonya Teclai.
I have always thought my anxiety was just a hindrance to my life and work; recently, it was pointed out to me by my dear professor, Kristen Coogan, that some of my greatest work has been produced because my anxiety translated itself into a source of creativity. As designers, we strive to look at problems from many different perspectives in order to take all possible outcomes into account - in a way, we are constantly facing uncertainty; all that matters then is how we can use our creative skills to help people navigate, cope with, and talk openly about anxiety.
Anxiety is formally defined by the American Psychological Association as feelings of tension, worried thoughts, and physical changes like increased blood pressure, accompanied by recurring intrusive thoughts or concerns
and symptoms such as trembling, dizziness or a rapid heartbeat. Everyone experiences feelings of anxiety at some point in their lives, but when you have anxiety it becomes an uncontrollable, excessive feeling that affects your quality of life. Mental health has always been important, but with the increase in reported symptoms of anxiety and depression in the post-pandemic world, it has become more relevant than everand has become a point of focus and topic of discussion for many people and organizations because members of the Millennial and Gen Z generations have been named two of the most anxious generations to date. Not only do these definitions and statistics
create discomfort, they also only see anxiety from one perspective, which feeds the negativity and stigma that surround anxiety and the broader topic
of mental health.
My journey through Boston University’s MFA program has been an incredible experience and has tested the limits of my anxiety time and again. I have had the opportunity to grow as a designer, but I feel the most important takeaway I have received is the realization that the things I see as limits and obstacles can be seen from an opposing point of view as drivers of creativity and productivity. This realization has led me down the path of looking at obstacles such as anxiety from different vantage points to take advantage of the ways it may benefit me. As I reflected upon my experience as an MFA student, I often found my anxiety taking over the way I approached each project
My thesis explores the relationship between visual communication design and anxiety - how can we use design to reframe anxiety and give it a visual form and identity? While design is the craft of creating visual content that is meant to be seen, anxiety is a condition that is essentially invisible. As a designer who struggles with anxiety, I plan to examine this relationship through a body of work formed by the practices of self-reflection, research, and experimentation. Hang On, Let Me Overthink This tells the story of my personal journey as a designer, and just a human being, with anxiety through a body of work developed over two years. This body of work aims to raise awareness about anxiety and remove the stigma associated with it by telling my story using projects that strive to give anxiety an identity, create accessible educational resources and provide support for addressing anxiety with creative, design-based, solutions. My projects will span various physical and digital mediums to explore situational anxiety with elements of play, nostalgia, and physical movement, anchored by personal stories and experiences.
*click presentation to see full captions
Hello everyone, thank you for joining today! My name is Rhea Jauhar and I will be sharing my exploration of mental health through the lens of design today.
As someone who comes from an Indian background, I have seen the stigma around mental health but also the complete denial of it’s existence. While researching, I came across an interesting statistic that Asian-Americans are three times less likely to seek mental health services due to the notion that admitting the presence of mental illness would bring shame upon ones family. I have always been very interested in psychology, specifically mental responses to external stimuli.
Thank you!
Hello everyone, thank you for joining today! My name is Rhea Jauhar and I will be sharing my exploration of mental health through the lens of design today.
stumped...
50 questions
Asking questions isn’t as easy as it looks. As designers, we are tasked with continuously asking questions about the world, about design and about yourself. Through extensive research and exploration of new content I developed a set of internal and external questions as a practicing designer to inform my thesis.
There was a sort of fluidity in the process of forming questions, refining them and organizing them that inspired me to create an individual magnet for each question in order to ensure that the set of questions could be added to or subtracted from and organized and re-organized as needed.
CONSTRUCT/DECONSTRUCT/RECONSTRUCT
Anxietea
Anxietea: an assortment
of organic teas with health
benefits including, but
not limited to, stress and anxiety reduction, inflammation relief, and increased energy levels. This assortment is made up of six types of tea; rose, lavender, valerian root, lemon balm, peppermint, and chamomile.
Using a shade of blue as
the main brand color, representing tranquility
and trust, along with kraft paper packaging and a
soft, geometric typeface referencing the organic, human-centric nature of t
he product, I created a visual identity for the Anxietea brand.
Using micro-movements, breathing exercises and action-based activities have been proven to provide people with anxiety relief.
As I shook my leg and cracked my knuckles, I realized that these small movements, although made subconsciously, helped me ease my anxiety. This led me to think about the effectiveness of fidget spinners and how a product like that may get more depth through research and more relatablility through modification of nostalgic objects and activites.
Using nostalgia and the concept of play, I created various different objects that not only help people cope with their anxiety, but also take them back to the simpler times of their childhood.
Describe your image
Describe your image
AnxKit
Micro-movements & Deep Breaths
![[EmBrace].jpg](https://static.wixstatic.com/media/2cc679_0161958e1a224f988b1592197bd3ba03~mv2.png/v1/fill/w_980,h_652,al_c,q_90,usm_0.66_1.00_0.01,enc_avif,quality_auto/2cc679_0161958e1a224f988b1592197bd3ba03~mv2.png)
![[EmBrace] Weighted Blanket](https://static.wixstatic.com/media/2cc679_86749d14f82e4f8894d25455603df4f8~mv2.jpg/v1/fill/w_980,h_738,al_c,q_85,usm_0.66_1.00_0.01,enc_avif,quality_auto/2cc679_86749d14f82e4f8894d25455603df4f8~mv2.jpg)
Compression & Weighted Therapy
[EmBrace]
Wrapping yourself up in a blanket is therapeutic in itself, but research has shown that the weight of a blanket can affect the level
of comfort it provides. [EmBrace] is a weighted blanket I designed featuring graphics that showcase situations that often cause my anxiety as well as actions I take when anxious, such as excessive Google searches.
Anxiety is known to increase your heart rate; using a weighted blanket can help calm you down by activating the parasympathetic nervous system, which lowers your heart rate when you’re stressed or anxious.
The Minds // Matter campaign is a collaboration between Urban Outfitters, a lifestyle retailer, and Mind, a mental health charity.
The collaboration between Urban Outfitters and Mind aims to promote conversations around mental health by fostering a community and bringing people together, removing the stigma associated with mental
health, and injecting humor into an otherwise serious
and heavy topic.
Using collaborative products, social media communications, and in-store displays, Minds // Matter targets young adults facing mental health issues with open, honest, and humor-based messaging.
Minds// Matter
Mental health from the outside, in.
