I remember growing up occasionally hearing the words, “stop daydreaming.” Looking back now I think what a super power to have in this day and age we live. When we daydream we are actually engaging different parts of our brain by shunting the focus to other areas. Many of the greatest discoveries before and even during our lifetime were rarely discovered when the person was deep in focus putting hours and weeks into work. Some examples : Newton and the law of gravity – out walking and noticing an apple fall, Archimedes and the Law of buoyancy while sitting in the bathtub and watching water being displaced and so on and so forth.
When we let our minds wonder, we engage our brain in what scientists call the default mode network. Remember your old desktop PC growing up. You would switch of the monitor screen but you would hear the huge processing unit on the side still going. Default mode network. Basically your brain is on but not really on. This is the time when your brain is making sense of the world as Johann Hari puts it in his epic book Stolen Focus. Your brain is making connections between things ; solving unresolved issues.
The problem with being “constantly wired and on” because of information overload, there is little time left for the brain to engage in just clearing and sifting through the data. We are inputting so much that our brain is barely able to catch a breath except when we are sleeping – and even still sleep has been on the decline. We should allow ourselves and our kids minds to wander. And it is not some grandiose activity that needs prep, centering, grounding etc etc. Nope. Just finding pockets in the day where you just gaze outside, or even sitting in a bath watching the bubbles. One I am trying to get our kids to do is cloud watching. We throw a mat at the backyard and just lie on our backs and watch the clouds move from point A to B. The image above inspired this post. It was a piece of string that our son came home with the other day and I realized what a great activity for mind wandering. Mind wandering I believe is a learned skill. Which goes back to something I care deeply about – minimal interruption. When a child is just sitting there, or doing something that may not seem meaningful to us as adults – just whistle by and keep moving. Do not interrupt. They are engaging in deep work that we may not be able to comprehend.
All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their mind wake in the day to find it was all vanity. But the dreamers of the day, they are dangerous men for they may act out their dreams with eyes wide open to make them possible. – T.E Lawrence.