If you don’t get along well with someone, you say “we’re simply not on the same wavelength”.

Another way of saying the same thing is “the vibe is off”. Vibe is short for vibration.

This doesn’t just apply to people but also food, drinks, movies, music, activities, environments, anything really.

When the vibe is off, it’s off. You just know.

But what is fascinating is that your wavelength is never static.

It can change a lot in the matter of minutes.

For example, after going to the gym my desire for unhealthy fast food is zero. Fast food and I are no longer on the same wavelength.

Alcohol is another obvious example. After a few drinks you’re suddenly able to vibe with people you otherwise couldn’t. You’re able to spend hours in environments you otherwise would leave immediately. Fast food suddenly has an irresistible pull.

“An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools.” - Ernest Hemmingway

It’s hard to talk about these kind of things without sounding woo-woo.

But to me thinking like this is simply a powerful lens to look at the world.

Humans aren’t rational robots. Vibes matter.

It’s one of the most commonly overlooked factors when it comes to productivity, social interactions, and happiness.

Everyone keeps searching for hacks instead of just focusing on raising their vibe.

Sometimes people make implicit use of certain vibe-related ideas but they are rarely ever made explicit.

So let’s do that.

The Science of Vibes

There are two fundamental laws.

1. Stuff at roughly the same wavelength attracts each other, while stuff at wildly different wavelengths repels each other.

2. If stuff at different wavelengths spend time in close proximity, they influence each others wavelengths.

The second law is why you become the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with.

It’s why we say that certain people can “lift a room up” or that others are “vibekillers” simply through their presence.

But again, these laws go far beyond human interactions.

Music is an immensely powerful tool to change your vibe.

Simply being in a beautiful environment can noticable lift your vibe.

The arrow of cause and effect is clear in one direction.

But it always works both ways.

When you discover that a person you don’t like is a big fan of music you like, the music’s vibe goes down.

A room can become ugly in the instance a person you don’t vibe with enters.

The vibe of a room can totally change simply through the music that’s playing.

None of this is news, of course.

But it’s very helpful to look at all of this through this one common lens.

Next, let’s ask: is there any way to turn this into something actionable?

There is.

Applied Science of Vibes

The first step is figuring out what effect stuff has on your vibe.

You want to find high vibe stuff.

The easiest way to do this is to pay close attention the next time you’re in a high vibe state.

Everything you feel attracted to in that state is stuff that’s on your wavelength at that moment.

Since your vibe is high, this is stuff with a high vibe.

What music does feel right? What food is appealing and tasting great? What activities are excited about? What ideas and projects are you excited about? What environment do you feel drawn to?

Similarly, you can figure out this way what stuff is low vibe.

When you’re in a high vibe state, pay close attention to what feels off.

What music are you unable to listen to? What food is unappetizing? What activities are you avoiding? What ideas and projects are you procrastinating on? What environment do you feel uncomfortable in?

You will discover a lot of obvious things but also tons of surprises.

For example, I noticed that pork tastes disgusting to me when I’m in a high vibe state.

I can’t listen to rap music for more than 10 seconds.

Now the crux of the matter is that you need to get into a high vibe state in the first place to figure this out.

You have to pull yourself by the bootstraps.

This is where you have to rely on other people’s recommendations.

Prioritize raising your vibe for a few days by doing only obviously high vibe things.

Spend time in nature, exercise, dance, eat ultra healthy, meditate, journal to get all those negative thoughts out of your system.

Avoid anything that could lower your vibe. Avoid negative news, social media, Netflix, alcohol, fast food, etc.

Then pay close attention to what feels right and what feels off.

A key is doing this alone.

People have a huge impact on your vibe and no outsider can tell you who’s low vibe and who’s high vibe.

So until you have a good grasp on your own vibe, it’s better to spend time alone when trying to figure this out.

Only once you’re fairly confident that you’re in a high vibe state, you can start testing who in your life is high vibe and who is low vibe.

The same is true for work. It’s extremely hard to figure out the vibe of different tasks and projects unless you have a strong grasp on your own vibe.

But once you do, you will notice a ton of nuances.

Maybe that salad you love and thought of as healthy is actually low vibe.

Maybe that friend you thought of as high vibe is actually pulling you down.

Maybe that music you thought is lifting you up is actually lowering your vibe.

Maybe that author you always admired is low vibe and pulling you down.

Cultivating Higher Vibrations

What’s amazing about high vibe states is that you’re largely unbothered by low vibe stuff.

There’s zero temptation.

You have a visceral negative reaction to reading, say, a clickbaity hit piece in the New York Times.

You cannot scroll more than 10 seconds on X before you’re disgusted.

Anyhting put out by people in a low vibe state is simply not vibing with you at that moment.

But this raises the obvious question: how can your vibe get lowered at all?

First of all, most things in the world are low vibe. Low vibe people create low vibe stuff that attracts other low vibe people.

So avoiding low vibe stuff is virtually impossible if you’re living a normal life.

Constant exposure to low vibe stuff eventually does pull you down.

The second reason is mimetics.

Mimetic pulls can overshadow vibe forces.

When you’re surrounded by other people it’s hard to feel your own vibe.

When everyone is drinking beer, you feel a strong pull to do the same.

When everyone else is ordering burger and fries, it feels weird to just order a salad.

Alone the beer or burger wouldn’t feel tempting at all. You might feel disgusted by it.

But if you’re surrounded by other people, the dynamic changes.

Alone you might have zero desire to talk or think badly about other people. But once the group around you starts gossiping you join in.

And once you give in and drink that beer, eat that burger, or start gossiping, your vibe lowers.

But the good news is that once you have a good grasp on the vibes around you, you can start cultivating high vibe states.

The key is realizing that when you’re in a low vibe state you feel repelled by high vibe stuff.

So it takes willpower to raise your vibe.

Take your list of high vibe stuff and do everything you can to have their vibes rub off on you.

Listen to high vibe music, eat high vibe food, do high vibe activities, work on high vibe projects, spend time in high vibe environments, talk to high vibe people, read high vibe books, work on high vibe tasks, etc.

You won’t feel like doing any of this.

But it always works.

Conclusions

I’ve only talked about high and low vibes and acted as if this is a binary thing.

But of course it’s not.

There is a whole spectrum of vibes.

So you regularly have to recalibrate what is high and low vibe for you.

Once you start cultivating high vibe states, you will be able to gradually raise it to higher levels.

Then you’ll discover that things you considered high vibe before are now low vibe. It’s all relative.

Now I’m of course perfectly aware that “good vibes only” has become somewhat of a cringy meme.

There is a ton of spiritual nonsense commonly associated to these ideas.

But I don’t care.

The only thing that matters is: “does this serve me or not?”.

And thinking in terms of vibes is a suprisingly powerful framework.

Do you own experiments.

Get those vibes up.