On Aug 7, 2008, at 9:00 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
insight tends to arrive during "relaxation", when we are not "thinking about" the problem -- e.g. when we're taking a shower, or just sitting in a subway being carried along. But when he does this he is, in effect, talking about our conscious state. "Put the problem aside for a while; go do something else, something not cerebral." I like the story (which I read elsewhere) of the physicist whose Nobel Prize inspiration came to him during a long car drive.
I call this "Looking Away," and I usually give the example of looking out the window and trying very hard to see a squirrel in the trees. It's almost impossible to do it right away; I have to relax and "look away" or let my vision go out of focus on the trees, and then I perceive the small movements and variations that reveal the squirrels.
It's the same as the advice to writers or artists (I suppose to musical composers, too) to put their work aside, turn the canvas to the wall, not concentrate on it for a while, and then see things when you resume.
I like to do the NY Times crossword puzzles, the big ones. When I get stumped and I can't proceed, I put it aside and later that day or the next, when I pick it up, my mental tools of verbal associations are fresh and open to new associations. Which, btw, is like the techniques to help you remember a word that is just on the tip of your tongue but you can't get it.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Michael Brady [EMAIL PROTECTED]
