Creative people enjoy their idle time, and it’s often when fresh ideas inspire them. Find out how a new study shows we need to find time to relax with our thoughts in this hectic, digital age.
I’ve been working from the cottage this week, keeping up with some urgent work, but otherwise taking it easy. I enjoy being idle in a natural setting, and some of my more active and practical friends sometimes find that (among countless other things) odd about me.
I seem to get happily lost in thought, with one idea drifting into another. I don’t know where my thoughts come from or why they inspire me to write and do other creative things, but I’m happiest when I sit still and let my mind wander.
Even during the pandemic, I often welcomed the solitude of the lockdown. I had a lot going on in my personal life during that period, and the “me time” gave me the chance to think things through and cope with challenges more effectively.
Mysteries of Our Inner Mental Lives
Dr. Jessica Andrews-Hanna is an associate professor in the University of Arizona’s psychology department. She’s been on a quest to probe the mysteries of our inner mental lives, including the thoughts, memories, feelings and emotions that make us unique, for the past fifteen years.
This week, the Creativity Research Journal published a study on which Professor Hanna was the senior author, with her graduate student Quentin Raffaeli as lead author.”I am particularly interested in creativity because we wanted to know what’s going on in the mind of creative individuals, especially in situations where nothing constrains their thoughts,” Mr Raffaeli said.
Left sitting alone in a quiet room, the researchers found that creative people were less bored on average than the general population. The team also found that, during the lockdowns, creative people found the isolation less wearisome than others because they were more engaged with their own thoughts.
Time to Be Alone With One’s Thoughts Without Distraction
Social media, family and work responsibilities all play a role in how we deal with solitude as well. As Professor Andrews-Hanna put it, “In today’s busy and digitally connected society, time to be alone with one’s thoughts without distraction may be becoming a rare commodity.”
Professor Andrews-Hanna points out that many of history’s most famous scientists, artists and philosophers reportedly enjoyed being alone with their thoughts. Their biographies tell us these especially creative people had their best ideas during their idle time.
This was a two-part study. In part one, the team told participants to hand in all their digital devices and sit quietly in a room for 10 minutes.
Participants’ Tendency to “Think Outside the Box”
The team assessed participants’ creativity using a verbal “divergent thinking test.” It’s a tool for measuring a person’s tendency to “think outside the box.”
As they sat, all participants were asked to express their thoughts out loud, which the researchers recorded. This generated 81 audio files for the team to transcribe and analyze.
The researchers found that the more creative people, based on divergent thinking scores, displayed streams of interrelated ideas. The thoughts that other participants expressed often seemed unrelated, as if they just popped randomly into their heads.
“Creative People Rated Themselves as Less Bored”
“Creative people rated themselves as being less bored, even over those 10 minutes,” Professor Andrews-Hanna explained. “They also spoke more words overall, which indicated that their thoughts were more likely to move freely,”
The second part of the study looked at a larger group of participants over a far longer timespan. The researchers surveyed 2,600 adults using an application Professor Andrews-Hanna and graduate student Eric Andrews developed called Mind Window.
As with the 10-minute time-outs, those who considered themselves creative people also reported that they experienced less boredom during the COVID-19 isolation. So, it seems as if solitude inspires creativity, or at least creative people.
Creativity Sets Humanity Apart
Creativity is one of the most important traits that sets humanity apart from other living beings. It propels individuals and cultures toward progress and innovation.
When we think outside the box, we challenge boundaries and explore new possibilities. Creativity is the skill we need to solve complex problems and explore unsolved mysteries.
Life Without Creativity: “Nasty Brutish and Short”
Without creative people, we might never have achieved our scientific, technical and artistic advances. Our lives would still be, in Thomas Hobbes’ phrase, “nasty, brutish and short”
Professor Andrews-Hanna has some suggestions about how we can promote more creativity in our lives. “As we become more overworked, over-scheduled and addicted to our digital devices, I think we need to do a better job in our homes, our workplaces and our schools to cultivate time to simply relax with our thoughts,” she said.
Our creativity has generated tremendous progress, but our accomplishments have come with costs. The industrial revolution we’ve created, along with its impact on our climate and biodiversity threatens to become humanity’s downfall.
And Another Thing…
At a time when we need everyone to apply their utmost creativity, the lifestyles we’ve created tend to crush the very innovation that provided our leisure. This study is a reminder that we all need to inject some solitude and tranquility into our hectic, modern lifestyle.
The Mind Window app is is available for free download if readers would like to give it a try and contribute to science. It’s how Professor Andrews-Hanna and her team plan to continue their research in this area.
Professor Andrews-Hanna wrapped up the discussion saying, “Understanding why different people think the way they do may lead to promising interventions to improve health and well-being.”
We always have more to learn if we dare to know.
Learn more:
Creative people enjoy idle time more than others
Creative Minds at Rest: Creative Individuals are More Associative and Engaged with Their Idle Thoughts
Genius: Is It Real? What Is It?
Nature Walks Benefit Both Mind and Body
Social Media Distancing: Flattening the Infodemic Curve
