Did you know your artistic mind needs a special kind of downtime to be its most creative? Do you give your imagination the right circumstances to play, innovate, and recharge? And how comfortable are you just doing nothing because that is largely what it takes to recharge the creative mind.
In this episode, I’ll talk about what this particular kind of downtime is, what it’s not, why you need it, and how to achieve it so that your imagination and creative thinking is as joyful, productive, and authentic as it can be. Backed by scientific studies on creativity and the brain, I think you’ll be surprised by the importance of this little discussed role of focus and, more particularly, not focusing, and how it can affect your art and your process.
Resources:
hbr.org/2017/05/your-brain-can-only-take-so-much-focus
www.fastcompany.com/90701856/science-says-its-essential-to-make-time-to-do-nothing-heres-why
www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/play-your-way-sane/202201/the-scientific-case-downtime
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CREDITS:
Cover design by Sage; Illustration by Olga Kostenko
Music by Playsound
Episode Cover, Sestina, by Sage Bray Varon
Transcript
(AI transcribed, unedited. Please excuse the copious errors.)
Speak 0:12
Hello, all My super chill creative friends out there. Thank you for joining me on the Sage Arts podcast. This is Sage here for another solo sage show. The sun is shining madly outside, and I really wish I could do this out there, but between our waterfalls, there’s three two foot long waterfalls in our pond. We have crows and hawks having tussles in the trees next door, which they do every spring. And my dogs are busy barking at people in the park behind us. So it’s just not really conducive for that. But let’s promise ourselves we’ll get out and soak up some sunshine today, assuming you have somewhere you are, either because you haven’t seen much lately like us, or if you’re in the southern hemisphere because you don’t know how much more you’re going to have of that burning orb of joy in the sky before your winter hits you. So, yes, plan on getting out and doing nothing after you do your focus listening here. Now, why do nothing? Because that’s the subject matter for today. We’re talking about dedicating ourselves to unfocused time. It’s like downtime, but downtime on Quaaludes, if you. Oh, it can’t be downtime on steroids because that’s just the opposite of what I’m proposing you do here. So stick around. I think you’ll be surprised some of the things I’m going to discuss and suggest unfocused time is in many ways the antithesis to what we are constantly taught and groomed for. You know, keeping busy and squeezing out as much productive time in our day as we can. But you’ll see why that can actually have the opposite effect. This subject is really going to have a little bit for everyone or maybe a lot of it. For a lot of you. It’s for those of you who work too much and have like a workaholic issue, me included in that I have reasoning for you for backing off sometimes and ways to take time out that won’t drive your workaholic muse kind of batty right? It’s also for those who may feel like they take too much downtime because we’ll be able to assuage some of that guilt and ease the pressure you might feel when you’re goofing off. Because what you’re doing isn’t a bad thing. It’s just a matter of balance, which of course you kind of know. But I’ll give you the reasoning behind it, and I think that helps. This episode is also for those of you who feel like you have a pretty good balance between work and downtime, but you might not be using your downtime in the most supportive way for your creative mind. And I promise you, I’m going to be coming at this from some different angles and is often heard. So just focus here for the time being and then unfocused later, as I’ll suggest. But before we amble on down that road, I have a few very wonderful people I have to thank, plus a story to share. Let’s start with a story. As I mentioned last week, the perfectionism episode, which is episode 18, so two episodes ago, and that makes this episode 20, which is kind of a mile marker for me. So yeah, but anyways, the perfectionism episode really struck a chord with a lot of people and I’m still getting comments on it. But of all the notes and comments I’ve gotten, I think my favorite is this story from Marie Young, who was listening to the episode while making a cake for a grand niece’s first birthday. Apparently, my show’s Marie says, makes her feel like I can see inside her head, which I promise I cannot and would not if I could, because I’ve got so much going on in mine as it is. But this time, she said she felt like I fully possessed her, which again, not enough energy for such things. But it’s so awesome that I’m hitting the subjects you want to hear. So in Marie’s words, starting off talking about this cakes you want to make, she said. I had a Pinterest board full of grandiose ideas, but this morning I ran out of time and energy, which threw my inner critic into overdrive. When you got to the part in the episode where you talked about Kintsugi, I looked down at the pile of cracked egg shells on my counter. I grabbed my camera and started shooting away at the mess. I don’t know how the cake is going to turn out, but I’m in a much better mood. Thank you for being in my kitchen today. Hopefully next episode I’ll be back to listening while I’m working on Polymer. Man, That just made me laugh out loud because I think that’s exactly what I would have done. A little redirecting of that creative energy into something that I or you can control, that you can manage, can help quiet the critic and bring your muse the joy and play it’s really looking for. So kudos to you, Marie, for that great redirection. I did hear back from Marie later, by the way, that the cake came out delicious, if maybe not visually what she was after, but I think that was a win win for the day in the end. So thank you so much for sharing your story, Marie. I also have to thank Becky Fox, one of my longtime readers and listeners, for her contribution this past week. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your generosity and your ongoing support. You’re simply the best. Huge hugs and unending gratitude to Becky and Megan Skelton, who just now sent in a little monetary support as I was finishing this up. First of all, Megan, thank you so much. But, you know, I’m just going to turn out and buy some your artwork, right? Megan is the whimsical hand behind Megan’s brushstrokes. She does these fun, high energy pen and watercolor urban sketches. You can find her on Instagram and Etsy under Megan’s brush strokes and next week you’ll find her here as she is my guest next week. And what great inspiring stories she has about her unusual journey and finding opportunities for community, which she has done in spades. So you can look forward to that. But thank you for your support, Megan. I will get you back again and thank you all for your comments. The last couple of weeks they’ve been really uplifting for me to hear what these podcasts are doing for you. Especially funny enough, the multiple comments I’ve been getting about how you like my voice because like, who likes your own voice, right? So it’s kind of hard for me to understand this. In fact, when I started the podcast, I worried that my voice would actually be a detriment and how was I going to make it better so people wouldn’t get annoyed listening to me. But the fact that these comments came in primarily in regard to the perfection episode, where I didn’t do a lot of polishing as a way to show you, you know, to be an example for you, right? But I didn’t polish it very much and people were like, Oh, I really like your voice, which just goes to show the point that I was putting across in the episode that a lot of what we think needs to be fixed and needs to be polished aren’t the things that other people notice or care about. And maybe we just get a little too wrapped up in that fine tuning of our work sometimes, and we need to step back and maybe get an outside opinion and just be careful with where we’re putting our time. I thought that was just very interesting and thank you all for those comments. Please do keep those comments coming in. You can reach me through the website at the Sage Arts dot com. Just go to the contact page and there’s an email form there of course, and a button for leaving me a voice message. You can also comment on posts on social media or send me messages there to find the podcast related content on Instagram and Facebook. Just search for the Sage Arts podcast. All one word Also hit that follow button on your podcast player if you’re listening in one so you don’t miss out on the episodes, or if you’d like, email reminders, which will give you a link to listen to it through a browser. You can get those by signing up for the newsletter on the home page of the Sage Arts dot com website. Just look for the Teal News and Notices button. You can also leave a message with a donation if you want to give back and you’ll find those buttons also on the home page just a little ways down from the news and notices. There’s a Buy me a coffee and PayPal donation button as well as links to 10th Muse Arts website where you can buy a feed you Muse stickers or, if interested in the arts, books or magazines are there as well. T A.H. Muse Arts dot com. Okay, let’s get into this unfocused downtime thing. If you’d like to keep questions in your mind as you listen, which I really do suggest, because I think that focus is you and I think you can get more out of the episode that way. So I’d probably suggest for this one to ask yourself, what do I do for downtime and how much of it is focused versus unfocused? And I’ll define that for you here as we go along. And how comfortable are you just doing nothing? Because the fact is doing nothing isn’t really natural for us anymore. It’s kind of gone out of style, right? I think we are actually losing that skill and for creatives it is so super important that we have that unfocused time in our day, preferably every day, as it’s really key to a healthy and active imagination. So Brett often tells me that I need to relax more, which is probably true. I’m very driven to do things, to accomplish things, to be productive and active. Coz yeah, I’m a doer and that means that sometimes I don’t stop and do the thinking that I need to do. On top of that, we have literally at our fingertips so much information, so much entertainment, so much contact and connection to the outside world that it’s hard not to turn to our phones. Not to mention the fact that elsewhere in the house there’s computers with software to play with and websites to browse, and then there’s TVs with shows and movies and videos of every imaginable kind. We actually never have to be without something to occupy our minds, which means we will never be bored. Right? And that sounds like a great thing, but unfortunately it’s not very good for the brain as it turns out. Now, I actually knew this, but nonetheless, I still often feel my quiet moments with distractions. Like when I’m eating lunch, I often listen to podcasts or I catch up on social media, or when I go to sleep, I listen to audiobooks because my brain doesn’t turn off very well. And I think that’s in large part because I just don’t give it much practice turning off. Now, why is this so prevalent, this constant desire to be getting input and to be entertained? I think it’s because it’s addictive. Literally, these easy forms of entertainment or learning or whatnot increases the release of dopamine in our brain. Dopamine is a feel good hormone. And as you can imagine, we’re wired to go after those good feelings right now. Thing is, back in the day, we used to have to wait on those moments, wait on our shows because they only came on at a particular time of the day and maybe even only once a week. If we wanted to look up something or learn something, we had to go to the library or call someone to go to a class. And before all that even say 100 years ago, 150 years ago, even more, whatever, we had to wait until the evening to enjoy time with their families, exchange stories, that kind of entertainment, or we had to wait till the end the month for the town dance. I can’t imagine what cavemen looked forward to, but I can pretty much guarantee it wasn’t something that was constantly hitting those dopamine releases. But now here we are with dopamine release opportunities at every moment. So we do pick up the phone. We play a game, we watch a video, we scroll through social media. Any time we have 5 seconds that aren’t filled otherwise to get that dopamine hit, it’s kind of a shame and a detriment that we are doing this to ourselves because we didn’t evolve to have so much constant input. And I think we will, in the long run, suffer for it. The evidence right now points to problems with attention, which I think a lot of us are aware of, but also irritability. And strangely enough, when our minds are constantly occupied, it actually reduces our productivity because it doesn’t have the time to rest up. Just like when you work, you generally take breaks at work. We’re not giving our brains a break and so it becomes less productive. I know a lot of people do take downtime, but downtime for most of us is still getting input, right? We watch a show, we call up a friend, we read a book. These are all great things to do, but it’s not enough to give our brains a real break. What we need is unfocused time and what that is may actually surprise you. So let’s talk about what unfocused time isn’t. With a previous conversation, you probably guessed a couple of these. Watching a show is not unfocused. Time zoning out on social media is not unfocused time. Things like working out is not on focus time, bike riding with a tracker and pacing yourself. That’s not on focus time. And here’s one that you probably wouldn’t expect. Meditation is not unfocused. Time. And the reason why all of these things, everything from watching a show to meditation, does not give your brain the kind of unfocused time you need is because they all involve a goal. So you need to be doing something with no goal and no focused attention. And that’s the key. Your brain needs time without expectations, without something to keep an eye on. So our usual definition of downtime is us relaxing and doing something that we enjoy. But even in that there is an objective, it’s to be entertained or to work on our wellbeing or whatnot. But that’s kind of like your boss telling you to clock out while handing you some light reading to take home and have done by the morning. Your brain needs to completely step away from the usual high functioning, analytical, results oriented thinking. Without a goal, without an objective, your mind is just going to play. It’s going to play around with ideas. It’s going to come up with stories. It’s going to muddle through all the things you’ve seen or done recently. That’s when imagination literally your muse, will step in. And I think this is why some people have a hard time getting their muse to show up because it just hasn’t had time to play. However, getting into the state of unconsciously productive nothingness is super hard these days, right? I mean, when was the last time that you can identify that you were wholly unfocused, doing nothing that took a smidge of thought? Have you done that today? Did you do it yesterday? If you did, how many times and for how long? I think for most of us we’d find that the unfocused time that we have is just the tiniest fraction of our day, and the majority of our day is long periods of focus time. There is probably one time of day, though, that I would say the majority of us get completely unfocused. And it is also the experience that I think will sell you on this idea that unfocused time is necessary and a wonderful thing. So for many people, this one place is in the shower. Unless you have a shower with a speaker in it or a really loud device sitting in the bathroom with you that you listen to, you are probably not being entertained or informed or anything in your shower. And you might have found in the past that you get some of the best ideas in the shower or you’ve heard people say that. Yeah, and we’re all amazed by this, aren’t we? Were wondering what is it about this small space? We’re surrounded by tile and glass and hot water’s pouring on us and that just makes all these great ideas pop up, right? Well, big hints. It’s not the shower. It’s because the brain has nothing else to do. We can all shower practically like in our sleep. And if you’re like me in the morning, you’re not very lucid for the first couple hours. You take that morning shower? Yeah, You’re. You’re pretty sleepy the whole time. The thing is, is you have an objective getting clean, but it’s not one that you need to put any thought into because you do it every day or every other day or whatever your routine is. So your brain goes wandering off in those moments and starts working on things it wants to work on. And the function most commonly in place during that is creativity. It’s your muse coming out to play all those brilliant ideas that you get in the shower. They’re actually at your fingertips any time you want them, even if you live in a drought ridden area and you have to do time showers like we did last year, you can do this because there are so many other times in your day that you’ll be doing things that don’t require much thought. But especially in recent years, we have been filling these with easily available entertainment. Right? So first thing would be to turn that stuff off. Let your brain just hang out with you. If you are kind of addicted to social media and all the input from online, you may feel immediately bored because you’re not getting the input you used to. You’re not getting that dopamine hit. But don’t worry, we’re going to talk about how to get past some of that kind of slowly. Get yourself into this before this whole talk is over. The other times you might have found your brain storming away pretty well would be on things like maybe road trips and long commutes to work. I mean, have you ever gotten somewhere and, like, literally not remembered any of the drive or the commute or ride getting there? That’s because your brain was off playing because you didn’t need it to drive a familiar route or because someone else was driving the train or something. Right. Same goes for things like brushing your teeth or washing the dishes or pulling weeds, which is strangely enough, one of my favorite things to do. And I know I’m a weirdo, but it’s so Zen for me. Also things like walking a dog, eating breakfast, pretty much any meal. All of these things are huge opportunities to turn everything off and let your mind rest and goof off. Okay, now that you have some idea of what this unfocused time thing is, let’s talk about why this goof off time is so important for you as an artist. First of all, we know from various studies that creativity uses multiple cognitive processes, some of which are unconscious, which may seem like an impossible feat to access while you’re awake. But as it turns out, the unconscious mind is accessible by the conscious mind. If the brain isn’t busy focusing on a task, if it’s got room in the unconscious mind to be pulled in. Luckily, the mind is actually very adept at making mental room. It’s quite practiced at tuning out information that isn’t relevant in the moment, like the predictable act of putting shampoo in your hair or turning on the same streets every morning on your way to your day job. We don’t need to be consciously aware of these steps since we already knew they would happen, So the brain just ignores them and the more can ignore, the more room the mind has to play. So the general consensus of the stuff that I read about when I did the research for this episode is that the brain works best when it toggles back and forth between focus time and unfocused time throughout the day. The problem with too much focus is that it exhausts what these brain scientists cleverly call the focused circuits of your brain. Now, when this happens, it’s a kind of energy drain, which in turn makes you tired and you don’t care about things so much. And that can make you more compulsive and less willing to be helpful or to work hard at what you’re doing, which is why it’s less productive. In other words, you just get tired and grumpy, right? So when you’re unfocused, you engage in what they call the default mode network. The demand circuits used to be thought of as do mostly nothing circuits because they came on when you were doing, you know, mostly nothing. But then they found these circuits can use as much as 20% of the body’s energy. In those moments when it seems like other brain tasks use something like 5%. So we’re using like so much more energy in what is like this downtime, this nothingness time. In other words, these circuits get super busy when the conscious mind seems to be just like kicking back, right? These circuits are active. They’re bringing up old memories or jumping back and forth between the past and the present and the future. They’re checking out different variations on ideas and generally using otherwise inaccessible data to work through things kind of in the background. But then it rises to the surface during these unfocused times and into your conscious mind. So all this meddling around with memories and ideas, this is the realm of imagination. It is literally the act of creative thought. And it’s so natural and necessary when you allow the brain some room to do it. I mean, they do call it the default mode network for a reason, and it might feel like nothing, but you are actually very active brain wise. I think of things like daydreaming, which is kind of the epitome of unfocused time, although apparently it’s not the exact definition because a lot of daydreaming involves worrying about things sometimes or wishing for certain things in the future. You know, imagine yourself as a superstar or whatnot, but the kind of daydreaming where you’re thinking about your artwork or you’re just letting images and ideas and little stories pop up your mind, that’s fantastic. Really great, unfocused time. Now, the problem with daydreaming for a lot of us is that it’s historically been kind of frowned upon right now. I know I had a problem with this in 2021. I decided to stop production for the magazines in the books, and I want to work on my novels full time. And one of the biggest changes I noticed is that I kept constantly stopping in, staring out windows, thinking about the book. So creative projects can take a lot of thinking, right? But after a decade of publishing and being constantly under looming deadlines, I rarely did this kind of thing. And so it felt really weird and I kind of felt guilty about it. And it kind of freaked me out because when I was younger, I’d get in trouble for staring out windows. I would do it in classes, I would do it at the dinner table, I would do it at church, whatever. So teachers would give me a hard time because they thought I wasn’t listening. And my parents would tell me to stop daydreaming and eat my dinner or pay attention in church. So some of us who did this naturally when we were young, were taught that it was a bad thing and it was kind of undone for us, right? We stopped doing it. And on top of this, we live in a society that’s all about being productive and we have this like stupid thing called multitasking, and we’re all supposed to be able to do this like multiple things all at the same time. Even though it’s been proven the brain can’t actually multitask at best, it can kind of go back and forth somewhat rapidly, maybe between two or more tasks, but every time it switches, it has to recalibrate the thinking to whatever this other task is, which means it can’t do as good a job or it ends up taking longer overall. In addition, everything we’re being told and everything we’re being sold is about doing things faster, doing things more efficiently, saving time. You’re supposed to be able to learn a language in 30 days or get super fit and just 10 minutes a day, or you buy this gadget to save more time when you’re cleaning an aisle or cookbooks are titled like 15 minute meals and just everything’s about hurrying up when what we need to do is slow down and just waste some time. But our society has put high value on productivity and we mistakenly now think it means stuffing every second of the day with productive activities. I think it was Albert Einstein who once said that creativity is the residue of wasted time. Now I don’t like the use of the word wasted, but yeah, the best ideas come from slowing down and just doing nothing. So the next question is how do you do that? Well, in the same article that I pulled all those stats about how much energy the brain uses, that it was an article in the Harvard Business Review, and I’ll leave a link to that if you want to read it. It was really interesting stuff. I found suggested ways to activate these kind of behind the scenes creative storms and giving yourself unfocused time. So the first thing they brought up was this thing called positive, constructive daydreaming. So yeah, daydreaming. Now this is that productive nothingness time I mentioned that I chair at the beginning for you. Workaholics apparently picked the positive constructive daydreaming. Is it kind of mind wandering that you deliberately set up for yourself so you choose a mindless activity like gardening or cleaning or even a repetitive craft like knitting, or maybe you can do mass production of elements for your jewelry or for your mosaics, or you can stretch canvases or whatever in other words, you can get things done, but it takes no real thought and then you just don’t play anything in the background. You put out any music or podcasts or audiobooks or anything, right? You then imagine yourself doing something playful or enjoyable as you’re working away on this stuff, then let your mind run off as it will. You want to keep it, at least initially, in the vein of something enjoyable so you don’t wander off into the kind of minutia of your day to day and your outside concerns. You know, like if you’ve tried to meditate, it’s you just start going to your to do list and worrying about this phone call you have to make. So you want to kind of do the same thing in terms of like not heading off in that direction. But once you’ve kind of gone into this idea of and you’ve turned all your intention inward, you should be able to just let go and let your mind run free. This should then unconsciously, I believe if I read this article correctly, pull out tidbits of your identity, of your memories of nostalgia while engaging connections across different parts of your brain, which is been shown to be key for innovation, being able to integrate different parts of your brain’s networks. Basically you wake up your imagination and you get these creative thoughts stirring. Now, when you do this, don’t analyze what’s going on or be looking for those memories or those cross connections. You just want to let your mind play. So the only intentional thing you do is you start with a pleasant image or idea. Then let your brain run around like a like a dog off leash in an open field. You know, it’s going to find all kinds of things, good and bad, but it will make the most of it. It will tromp through the mud. It will dig up some worms. It’ll get lost in the grass until you’re worried it won’t come back. But it will also flush out all the pretty birds. It will find some cool sticks and generally show you what joy is about, right? You could actually replace Dog with Muse in this scenario because that’s exactly what you’re doing. You’re letting your muse play around to see what it can find. And then you have a bunch of ideas and images to work off of when you sit down to create. Another thing this article brought up and is something I’ve been suggesting for years is take a nap. It’s great for artistic blocks and just great for generally helping your creativity. It’s why I have a lounge slash twin bed in my studio because even just a ten minute nap can help you become much clearer in the head and much more alert. And I think it really helps generate ideas. Now, if you do have a creative task that you’re struggling with or that you have to start on, they do suggest getting a full 90 minute nap if you can, because this longer period gives your brain time to make more associations and dig up ideas that are kind of stuck in the crevices that your conscious mind can’t reach. He also suggests pretending to be someone else. So she thought was really interesting because that totally alters your brain. It’s kind of daydreaming, but it’s funny. The primary suggestion was, Oh, pretend you’re an eccentric poet. Basically, I think they think you need to pretend you’re a crazy creative. But of course, if you’re already one, then maybe that’s not so helpful. But you can try to pretend to be a different kind of creative or channel your best Warhol or Frida Kahlo or anyone that’s unlike you. They also refer to this, I think jokingly, but I love it. They call it psychological. Halloween ism. I love that so much. So more psychological Halloween ism. But the bottom line of this article and these things that we’re talking about is that these kind of disengaged mind moments can help us focus when we need to, and our brains should work more efficiently because of them. But most importantly, and focus time should allow your brain the time to update information, kind of open up the hallways to access deeper parts of yourself and enhance your mental agility and your creativity. Now, there are other small things that you can do to help create time and space for this kind of unfocused activity, right? Here’s a bunch of ideas on how to get your brain some downtime, and we’ll talk a little bit about some small starts that you can do If you think it’s going to be hard for you to get into it. So first of all, don’t always pull out entertainment of any sort when you’re doing mindless things that you could do without thinking. So driving to work, doing the dishes, folding laundry, weeding, walking the dog, all those things that we talked about. And then when you’re somewhere waiting like a doctor’s office or in line at the bank or whatever, don’t pick up your phone. Just stare off into space. Let your mind do its thing. If nothing else, you can enjoy freaking out people because you’re sitting there not needing to look at your phone. Is it? Where they get joy out of that? I don’t know. I just like to do things that kind of shake up people’s idea about how things should be. I don’t know. Two other things that you can do to find and focus time during your day. When you take a walk or a hike or a bike ride, do it, preferably without a phone or with your notices off. Don’t have a fitness tracker, don’t have an objective, and preferably go to a place that you already know or that has some level of predictability so your brain can easily ignore it. Then also, like mentioned, stare out windows, you know, get yourself a warm cup of something wonderful and let your mind ponder your latest work. Your newest design ideas, or close your eyes and see what images just naturally pop up. You can also and I do this a lot lie in bed for as long as you can after you wake up just doing nothing. Your mind is in this really different place. When you wake up and you can just let your brain wander wherever it wants. As long as it’s positive. That’s when I do most of my thinking about my books and about my artwork. And I just let my mind go because it’s super, super creative at that point of time and then eat in silence. If you’re alone. Because yeah, that could get a little awkward with other people at the table. And let’s face it, other people can be very entertaining and distracting. So these are all kind of small things that you can start with. And if you start small, I think it’ll be easier for you because our brains don’t want to shift and it’s going to be hard to get away from wanting to do these usual things like picking up your phone. So if you’re interested in the whole concept of your brain not wanting to shift gears because that also affects productivity and motivation, that kind of thing, you want to check out the Feed Your Muse episode on going out and doing innovative things that your brain doesn’t really want you to do initially. And then, yeah, so start out small. Commit to unfocused time in those small things like brushing your teeth or time on the toilet. In fact, you could just like ban your screens from the bathroom all together. Also, keep in mind, studies have found that 52 minutes very odd number 52 minutes is our max useful focus time. So try to take breaks at least every 50 minutes when you’re working and do something mindless for a few minutes. I actually have this timer on my computer that goes off after 50 minutes. That’s what I’ve set it for. And then I do something else for 5 to 10 minutes. A lot of times I get up and I dance because it plays music for the alarm, and dancing is actually a really good, mindless, unfocused thing to do. If you like to dance and you don’t have to think about it, right? If you’re not trying to do a specific dance. But things like dancing is good, mindless stuff for the brain as well as being great for the body, it helps you avoid stiff necks and get your joints moving. So I suggest dancing. I use an app, by the way, called Cool Timer that I set up on my computer for this, but there’s tons of options out there. You can have something that’s actually on your phone, sits with you no matter what kind of work that you’re doing. There’s also the Pomodoro thing. You find a lot of apps for that. It’s super popular. It goes off on I think it’s a 25 minute interval because someone determined that was ideal for studying. I think that’s what it was set up for. But in any case, lots of stuff out there. Give your brain unfocused time, like at least once an hour and you should see an increase in how readily you can call up your muse in your creativity and probably in your general enjoyment of the kind of art work you do. Mind you, I’m not saying you need tons and tons of unfocused time. The input we get from these things that we’re looking online at, the shows that we watch or whatnot are wonderful. We thrive on new information and new points of view. So absolutely get in your shows and your audiobooks and your podcasts and your social media chats, but maybe weigh the quality of that time as well. So like podcasts are super informative of course, and shows can transport you elsewhere in ways that give you nearly tangible experiences that are often translated into our work. But I question the quality of like TikTok videos. Maybe it’s just me, but it’s up to you to decide what’s worthwhile or not, Of course, But like anything, moderation is key. So moderate input, moderate mindlessness, moderate, unfocused time. We need it all. But this unfocused time is going to allow your muse to take all the things that you’ve been feeding it and do something with it. You do a bit of that when you sleep. You do a bit of that when you get into your flow states. But the unfocused time is going to really kind of pump that up. It’s really going to give some serious space and time to work out ideas and come up with color combinations and come up with shapes and forms and textures and compositions and the things that you want to say. It helps feed your intention, you know. So from everything that I’ve read, this is really, really essential for creatives to have unfocused time, to let the muse do its thing instead of using all these tricks to come up with new ideas and browsing through everybody else’s work and just trying to work off what other people are doing, this will reach a really authentic part of your imagination because you’re just letting your mind do its own thing. You’re processing the things that are important to you in your life. You’re processing in the things that have struck you as interesting or beautiful or important to you. So when you’re done here, shut off all the noise. Go get a cup of tea, sit under trees, soak up some sunshine if available, and just go stare off into space or take a long shower. If you’re not in a drought region, just go get unfocused for at least a few minutes and see what comes to the surface. Now, don’t expect anything in particular. And keep in mind it may take a bit of practice for your brain to really trust that this is wholly free time for it. But it’ll get there because as those brain scientists said, it’s our default mode network, right? So go out, do that. But maybe one last thing or two before you wander off. If you’re up for it, hop over to my website and write me about the ways you get unfocused time. If that’s something you already do or ways you can see employing this idea, I’d love to share additional thoughts, especially if they’re things I hadn’t brought up. So people will have more ideas about how to approach this thing. You can do that by going to the contact page at the Sage Arts dot com, or find me on Instagram or Facebook and leave a message on any of the posts or direct message me there as well. And those social media pages can be found under the Sage Arts podcast. All one word. If you find these episodes hitting those deep chords for you and you want to give back, you’ll find buy me a coffee and PayPal donation buttons halfway down the home page. You can hit those right now. You can also find links in the show notes on the page you’re playing this from. There’s also links in those same places to buy Feed your Muse stickers or pick up polymer related books and magazines at 10th Muse Ask.com. If you’re interested. That’s t A.H. Muse, Ask.com. That all goes to help me keep the lights burning bright over here. Also, don’t forget to hit that follow button. A new podcast player and share anything you find about the podcasts, posts, newsletters, whatever else with other curious visual artists so they can join us here. So you get whatever business you need done there and then give yourself some real full, unfocused downtime. I’m going to do that myself, so enjoy until next time, feed your muse. Let it out into those fields of your mind to play. Stay true to your particular brand of weirdness and I’ll see you here next time on the Sage Arts Podcast.
