Daydream inventions
We all use the yellow sticky notes, known as the Post-it note. This useful and yet so simple invention is not a product of years of R&D but simply emerged from a daydream.
«On a Sunday morning in 1974, Arthur Fry sat in the front pews of a Presbyterian church in north St. Paul, Minn. An engineer at 3M, Fry was also a singer in the church choir. He had gotten into the habit of inserting little scraps of paper into his choir book, so that he could quickly find the right hymns during the service. The problem, however, was that the papers would often fall out, causing Fry to lose his place.
But then, while listening to the Sunday sermon, Fry started to daydream. Instead of focusing on the pastor’s words, he began to mull over his bookmark problem. “It was during the sermon,” Fry remembers, “that I first thought, ‘What I really need is a little bookmark that will stick to the paper but will not tear the paper when I remove it.’ ” That errant thought – the byproduct of a wandering mind – would later become the yellow Post-it note, one of the most successful office products of all time.»
Scientists have discovered that daydreaming is not a habit of lazy people or lack of discipline, daydreaming is a fundamental feature of the human mind and a crucial tool for creativity.
It was also discovered that kids who never experience moments of sensory stimulation (absence of TV, video games etc.) are not able to daydream.
The tricky thing the scientists found out: daydreaming is not as simple as it might seem! Just letting your mind wander is not enough; you also need to remain conscious enough to access your daydream. The good news: you can practice daydreaming!
Read the full Boston Globe article by Johan Lehner here.
September 18th, 2008 at 2:29 pm
“It was also discovered that kids who never experience moments of sensory stimulation (absence of TV, video games etc.) are not able to daydream.”
What??
I’m sorry, can’t understand it. Do you mean that absence of TV and video games leads to not being able to daydream?
I can’t be true. I would say right the opposite. I never had TV and never played video games, and I’m one of the biggest daydreamers I know between the people around me.
I would say sensory stimulation is much more powerful when painting, modelling, playing music or just playing around with other kids. And maybe the best practice for daydreaming would be reading, as it trains your “mental rendering” skills a lot.
But, well, I’m not a brain professional.
A very interesting thing about all this is comparing the western daydreaming with the eastern-asian idea of meditation. They’re almost opposite ways of thinking, but they both are good at some way. I would love someone of you brain experts to write about that comparison