Around 250 BC, Archimedes, a famous Greek scientist, found himself in a tough spot. The local king, Hiero II, had given him a problem never solved before.
Hiero had given a gold block to a goldsmith to make a crown, but upon receiving the crown, he was skeptical of its purity, so he weighed it. The crown weighed the same as the original gold block, but Hiero still felt that the goldsmith had mixed silver in the crown and kept the remaining gold for himself.
So, Hiero asked Archimedes to check the purity of gold in the crown without destroying it. How could the volume of an irregular object be measured? Archimedes struggled with the problem for a while until a miracle happened.
One day, still occupied with the problem, Archimedes went to a bath. He noticed that water was displaced as his body sank into the bath, and particularly the total volume of water displaced was proportional to the volume of his body immersed in the water. With the sudden ecstasy of finding this insight, he leaped out of the water and ran into the streets naked, shouting Eureka! (“I have found it!”).
More than 2000 years later, as historians doubt the validity of some details in this story, especially the “running naked” part, there are at least two truths that cannot be denied. First, that Archimedes made a significant contribution to the field of hydrostatics. And second, that sometimes solutions to our toughest problems suddenly appear during mindless activities like taking a shower.
A Moment of Mindlessness
Order is the foundation of civilization. Roads, maps, rules, class schedules, and more, everything is built on predictability, where A leads to B, and X gives you Y. Such linearity means that our prefrontal cortex, the systematic and linear thinking part of the brain, is always working at full throttle.
But something changes when we switch to mindless action, like washing dishes, organizing wardrobe, taking a shower, or walking. Thanks to our innate laziness and the pursuit of the brain to conserve energy, whenever we do repetitive motor actions, our brain reduces the energy allocated to the prefrontal cortex. This provides an opportunity for the other parts of the brain to take over, especially the creative, diffused thinking part. In fact, some research suggests that sleep follows a similar mental switch.
In scientific parlance, this is called “transient hypofrontality” (“hypo” for “less” and “frontality” referring to “prefrontal cortex”), an altered state of consciousness where the linear thinking mind takes a back seat, and the creative horses start running.
It seems that a moment of mindlessness is a prerequisite for transient hypofrontality, which in turn makes way for “Eureka! Moments” (or “Aha! Moments”) like the one experienced by Archimedes in the bath.
Insights Lie Outside the Boundaries
Roadblocks are common when solving a problem. We struggle to reach the solution or get an insight no matter how hard we think. We feel we have tried all the possible paths and are close to giving up. But during this period of struggle, there comes a moment while taking some rest or doing a chore, that the insight suddenly pops up in mind. We feel sudden joy and are somehow even convinced that the insight is correct.
This is probably because our logical mind is all about order and boundaries. But this also makes it biased. When we think hard about a solution, the logical mind thinks only within our known boundaries of that topic, which limits the chances of finding an insight. But in the state of transient hypofrontality, our creative brain is the primary thinking vehicle, and it knows no boundaries. As a result, the brain connects seemingly dissimilar concepts in its quest to find a solution. Since all this happens without our conscious effort, when the solution is found, it appears as if it occurred suddenly, like a miracle.
This mode of reaching insights has been a savior for scientists and creatives for centuries. For example, scientists had long been trying to find the molecular structure of Benzene, as it is one of the most fundamental hydrocarbons, and is used to synthesize many other important chemicals. But it was only in the winter of 1861 when Kekule dozed off in front of a fire and dreamt of a snake eating its own tail that its mysterious structure came to be known. Suddenly everything became clear, and upon waking up he drew the Benzene molecule as a ring.
It is safe to assume that transient hypofrontality is one of the best ways to think “out of the box,” just like how the dream of a snake helped Kekule solve a chemistry problem. But wouldn’t it be great if we could enter this altered state of consciousness willingly?
Mindlessness Mastery
If we look at the daily rituals of some great minds, it is evident that many of them believed in transient hypofrontality intuitively way before neuroscience worked on it. For example, during his Princeton years, Einstein was not to be disturbed during his daily 2.4 km walks to and from the university. In fact, he was merely following the steps of his role model, Charles Darwin, who was known to take three 45-minute walks every day.
On a similar note, Sara Blakely, self-made billionaire and founder of Spanx, always wanted to do something of her own but was stuck as a fax machine saleswoman. However, she did not give up. She knew that all she needed was one good idea, so she kept looking for it. How?
Blakely had noticed that her brain was always popping with new ideas whenever she was driving, so she made a ritual out of it. She frequently took her idea journal and went on aimless drives and as soon as an idea popped in her head, she noted it down. This way, she had compiled a long list of ideas that could turn into a business someday. And one day she wrote down the idea of Spanx. The rest is history.
And if they can do it, SO CAN YOU!
All you need are two components:
A problem: You should be struggling with a problem. The more you are immersed in it, the better. The nature of the problem has little relevance and can range from academics to business
A mindless break: You need some breathing space where the creative mind tries to solve what the logical failed to do
Just find that one menial task, something you do without any conscious effort, a mindless repetitive action. It could be anything like walking, driving, or the most common one, a shower. And once found, schedule it in your day. Chances are you already know it.
And remember, you don’t have to think about anything consciously. Just do the task for 10-20 minutes as you would have otherwise, treating it as a chore without expectations.