Bored and Brilliant Summary
Four: I acted on what I learned about the importance of mind-wandering.
Johann Hari • Stolen Focus: Why You Can't Pay Attention--and How to Think Deeply Again
Boring places can impact our mental health, stifling our ‘biological need for intrigue’.48 But boredom also has a purpose. As Sherry Turkle puts it, ‘Boredom can be recognized as your imagination calling you.’49 For her, such moments are ‘signs to attend more closely to things, not to turn away’.
Rob Hopkins • From What Is to What If: Unleashing the Power of Imagination to Create the Future We Want
Task-negative mode is more colloquially known as daydreaming, and, as Daniel J. Levitin of McGill University has written, it “is responsible for our moments of greatest creativity and insight, when we’re able to solve problems that previously seemed unsolvable.”
David Leonhardt • Opinion | You’re Too Busy. You Need a ‘Shultz Hour.’ (Published 2017)
In a recent series of studies at Cornell University, psychologists Thomas Gilovich and Clayton Critcher asked participants to think about what they'd be doing if they weren't in the lab: Some were asked to think about leisure, others about obligations. Then, all participants completed a jigsaw puzzle. Afterward, they were asked if their minds had w... See more