Eureka moments, aha moments, or ideas you come up with while taking a shower. Whatever you want to call them, we’ve all had these moments of clarity where a solution to one of our many problems seems to pop out of thin air when we are engaging in a monotonous activity.
I call it active meditation and we all have this tool at our disposal to utilize during pressing moments. You can intentionally use active meditation as a tool that accompanies focused analytical thinking. Utilize active meditation to open the doors of creativity and let your mind wander, make connections, and solve the problem at hand.
What is it?
When people think of “meditation” most imagine someone sitting in a quiet room, legs folded, eyes closed, their hands laying gently on their knees, inhaling, exhaling, and focusing on their breath (while also possibly getting frustrated because they don’t know if they’re doing this right). The practice of meditation helps to increase the space between each thought. Instead of restlessly and uncontrollably jumping from one idea to another (known as the monkey mind in Buddhism), we create more space between each one. This helps to achieve more mental peace and clarity and unlock joy and creativity from within. This space reduces mental activity, greatly improving focus and clarity. The goal of meditation is to gain control over your mind, so that you can maintain your attention on the present moment without getting distracted by every little thing.
Active meditation is meditation in motion. Researchers found that mildly engaging tasks like showering or walking can produce the most creativity in the recent study published in the journal Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts. The balance between focus and mind wandering seem to produce the best results. Things like showering and walking involve getting some stimulation from the environment you’re in, which according to researchers, may also help boost creativity.
Some forms of active meditation include:
- Preparing food
- Cleaning
- Walking
- Taking a shower
Why it Works
According to John Kounios, a professor of psychology at Drexel University, there are two paths the brain can take to solve a problem. There’s the analytical path, where we deliberately and methodically work through a problem by trying out different solutions. Then, there’s insight, where a solution seems to pop into our heads out of nowhere, a so-called aha! moment.
“Constraining your thoughts through minor stimulation seems to promote more creativity compared to if your mind is wandering and there’s nothing going on around you,” says Zachary C. Irving, an assistant professor at the University of Virginia’s Corcoran Department of Philosophy.
Activities such as walking, running, or showering seem to produce a high number of eureka moments because they may help put the brain in the right state of mind to have an aha! moment. Exercising or being in nature releases a rush of endorphins that can promote a positive, relaxed mood. This, in turn, can broaden your scope of thought to include remote ideas and long-shot possibilities. Kounios says, “You are open to entertaining ideas that, at first blush, may seem a little wacky. You feel like you can take chances.” When you’re anxious, you tend to think more analytically. “It narrows the focus of attention, like mental tunnel vision,” he adds.
Stepping away from a difficult problem or a bad case of writer’s block with a walk also distracts the brain just enough to give it a chance to rest. When you stop thinking deliberately about a problem and daydream a little, your subconscious has a chance to play. Studies have found that after a period of mind wandering, the mind makes more creative connections between bits of information you already know.
So next time you’re stuck on a problem, make your own eureka moment!
Keep Going!
-Ashraf
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