Daydreaming, promenading and zoning out pay rich dividends
Save time by listening to our audio articles as you multitaskA bias towards the familiar shows up at work, too. One such prejudice is about what exactly constitutes work. Being at a desk counts as work, as does looking at a screen above a certain size. Responding to email and being in a meeting are indubitably forms of work. So is any activity that might elicit sympathy if performed on the weekend—typing, taking a phone call from the boss, opening any type of spreadsheet.
But these familiar forms of work can deceive, for two reasons. The first is that what looks like a Stakhanovite effort may be no such thing. Keyboard-tappers may just be updating their LinkedIn profiles. Attendees at a meeting are often present in body but not in spirit. Even when actual work is being done, it may not be the most productive use of people’s time.
Albert Einstein’s breakthrough moments often came via thought experiments in which he let his imagination drift. What would it be like to travel as fast as a light beam? What happens if double lightning strikes are observed from different perspectives? Einstein is admittedly a pretty high bar, but zoning out can help mere mortals, too.
Loafing has clear limits. If you miss a deadline because you were staring soulfully out of the window, you still missed a deadline. Not every problem requires a backpack and a journey into the countryside. If you don’t much like your work in the first place, you are likely to daydream about other things.
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