The Unmistakable Creative Podcast

Life of Purpose: Srini Pillay | The Power of the Unfocused Mind

Join us for our Life of Purpose series this month as we revisit some of our most impactful episodes. Dive deep into expert insights and practical strategies on health, performance, and community, helping you achieve personal and professional fulfillment.

Explore the counterintuitive benefits of an unfocused mind with Dr. Srini Pillay. In this episode, Dr. Pillay, an Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, unpacks how harnessing unfocused thinking can enhance creativity, decision-making, and productivity. Learn to leverage the power of your unconscious mind to achieve greater success and fulfillment in life and work.

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Duration:: 1h 3m
Broadcast on:: 06 Jul 2024
Audio Format:: mp3

As you probably noticed this month, we're bringing you our "Life of Purpose" series and revisiting some of our most transformative episodes, tune in to explore expert insights and practical strategies on help, performance, and community well-being, all aimed at helping you achieve personal and professional fulfillment. If you sign up for the newsletter, you'll not only get recaps of the key ideas in each interview, but at the end of the series, you'll receive our free "Life of Purpose" ebook. What you have to do is go to UnmistakeableCreative.com/Lifepurpose again. So often, I will ask people, do you want to live in exceptional lives? And most people will say yes, but an exception by definition is low probability. And if you want to live a normative life, you'll be in the middle of the bell curve. But if you want an exceptional life, it's going to be low probability. So one of the questions you want to ask yourself, anyone who wants an amazing life, is probably going to go for a low probability life, which means you have to activate some sense of possibility. So when you ask yourself, what is the possibility of doing something in that situation, you would say, rather than saying, how do I recover from this trauma, or how do I recover from this grief, what you say, what do people who recover from these situations amazingly do? And so there, what you're looking for is the exception, right? You're basically saying, I want to know what the exception does. Like most people go through this situation, they have a pretty hard time, and they sort of get through. But what about that person who is actually able to do this and do this amazing? So the very first principle is think like the exception and knock like the rule. I'm Srini Rao, and this is the UnmistakeableCreative podcast, where you get a window into the stories and insights of the most innovative and creative minds who've started movements, built driving businesses, written best-selling books, and created insanely interesting art. For more, check out our 500 episode archive at UnmistakeableCreative.com. Srini, welcome to the UnmistakeableCreative, thanks so much for taking the time to join us. Thanks so much for having me. I always love talking to you. Yeah, well, you know, it's funny because we actually have you back, and it's very rare that we will put, you know, somebody who we've just had recently with in the last few months back so soon. But I had a chance to read your book, and right after reading your book, I thought, yeah, this is a no-brainer. There's so much here for us to talk about. Before we get into, you know, the ideas in the book, I want to ask, what was the very first job that you ever have? What did you learn from it, and what impact has that had on your life going forward? I'm trying to think, I think I actually worked at a family store selling fireworks during a Diwali celebration. I had an uncle who got all the cousins together to try to gather stuff to give to people who are at the concert. So I remember at the time, sort of looking at the cash register, which was kind of manual cash register, and there was something of a sound of it that sounded so awesome. And I think just the whole idea of the transaction was sort of fascinating to me because you could be nice to people. They were happy because you were giving them something that they wanted. And then they gave you money in exchange for that. I think, I don't think I had that profound thought at the time. Sure. You think at the time, you know, and the sort of weird as a child, every time I did anything, I actually thought I wanted to do it. Like, I thought I wanted to be an infant class teacher when I was at that stage. And at that point, I was like, wow, this would be really great to be a shopkeeper. It'd be like really amazing. People come. They get really happy. I think one of the things in retrospect, as you asked me this, is that I think to the extent that you can get engaged in something, you can really enjoy it maximally. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So I know so many parents who have kids who are telling them things like, oh, I want to be this. You know, I have a cousin who has told his nephew, who's told his mother that he wants to be in the military. And to look at him, like, this guy can't be in the military. He's scrawny as hell. I'm just curious, you know, when parents are dealing with kids who are saying, you know, that they want to be these things, things that seem, you know, really out there, what would you say to them? I think I would say that it's important to explore that because I think whether or not they are capable of doing that, why not try to understand what's underneath that? And when you explore that, when you explore that, you might actually come to some kind of understanding about what's fueling that. So for example, if somebody wanted to be in the military and they were really not physically disposed to being in the military, you know, they might be able to be in the military as a doctor. Well, they might be able to make military movies, you know, there's a school that I particularly love called Bright Works, which is in San Francisco that that actually have this kind of education where they choose themes like nails and one person will make a chair and the other person will write a screenplay about nails. So, you know, the whole idea of tinkering around with an idea is something that's close to my heart. And so I feel like the first response is let's explore this, let's see what's making you want to do that. Yeah. You know, I remember the Bright Works part very distinctly because, you know, I've always had questions about education, especially for people who, you know, work with on our education system or people like you. So I'm curious, you know, why do you think it is that we have not made the changes and the transitions in our education system for sort of the world that we're headed to and in this world in which we tinker because, you know, it seems like we're still living by this very standardized model of, you know, memorized information and regurgitated on tests in order to get good grades. Yeah, I think in part because there's something about that whole system that seems like it's very exploratory and I think exploration creates some sense of uncertainty and I think uncertainty makes the brain sort of feel like there's going to be doom and gloom, like 75% of people mispredict when bad things are going to happen under uncertain conditions. So I think to a large extent, uncertainty keeps us from that. But I also think part of the reason we haven't really explored education differently is that we're caught up in this old model. And even though our brain is wide for change, the brain doesn't really like to change. And so I think to a large extent, this is also about resistance to change and not wanting to be in this unfamiliar space, which I think is really too bad because whether you like it or not, the world is becoming increasingly unfamiliar as things begin to change as artificial intelligence begins to move into the workplace as technology basically starts to transform our work environment. So my feeling is that the people who will win are the people who are most adaptive and learning the competencies related to adaptation is really where it's at. So this feeling of uncertainty, I know that I wrestle with it on a daily basis as somebody who's a business owner and entrepreneur, like I know there are some months that are good. Sometimes I don't know if a month is going to be bad. I'm curious how a person adjusts to being able to navigate life with uncertainty. Are there things that we can do so that our brain doesn't go into this sort of freakout mode when we encounter uncertainty? Yeah, I think, I mean, I think there are a couple of things you can do. The first thing is you can actually set particular times or particular things in your life that are not uncertain. So to a large extent, for certain people who have entrepreneurial lives, the stability in their relationship provides the certainty that they want, but for other people, relationships maybe just complete hell. And so for them, just going to the gym, you know, X times a week, maybe the certainty that they want. So I think the first thing would be set aside a certain amount of time for that certainty. I think the second thing is since you know that the brain is biased and that 75% of the time, the brain is actually going to tell you that something bad is going to happen when in fact, all it means is you don't know, learning to use self-talk to reframe that. The moment you start to have this freakout, if you say, okay, I know my brain is in biased mode and that's because the conflict detector and the discuss center and the gut feeling detector are all activated. And if you just say to yourself, well, okay, I'm just going to go back into neutral, which is uncertainty means I don't know, it doesn't mean something bad is going to happen. I think that kind of self-talk can really help. And I think the third piece just try to consider is what is this going with the flow idea? And to what extent can going with the flow serve me? And you know, it relates to the first question you asked about the child and the parent. And what do you say to a child who wants to do something? One of the big things that I think is important is what I call possibility thinking. And possibility thinking essentially means that rather than telling your brain that something is just not possible because you're limited, you ask yourself, how can I make this possible? And when you believe in something, this actually can increase opioids in the brain. So it causes you to be in a more relaxed state. It can increase dopamine. So you feel more motivated and it activates the reward system in the brain, which actually makes you feel more rewarded. So there was a study that was done that actually looked at, they gave people three tubes of cream. And I'm not sure if I talked to you about this particular study before, but the one tube was essentially labeled lidocaine. The other one was labeled capsaicin and the third one was just labeled neutral. And the reality was that it was the same neutral cream in all three tubes. So when people saw lidocaine, which is so pain relief, they were like, wow, this feels really great. When they saw capsaicin, which is the active ingredient in chili, they're like, wow, this really stings, and when they saw neutral, they actually said, you know, this feels like nothing. And so the first thing was that it was remarkable that just by seeing a label, your brain can believe something. But the second thing was that when you believed it was going to cause pain relief, when you saw lidocaine, it actually activated the centers in your brain that are the reward pathway. And when you believed it was going to cause pain, which is the capsaicin tube, it activated some of the anxiety pathways, indicating that our beliefs can change brain activation and can thereby change the motivation. And as a result of that, I think possibility thinking is something that can inform you in all states of uncertainty, because you can use a kind of detective modality, which is like, yeah, sure, I don't know what's happening, but the next step is exciting because I'm just waiting to figure out what's going to happen so my brain can have more data. So those three things, I think, firstly, just really trying to have a sense of possibility of thinking, I think trying to correct to neutral. And then I think also having some level of acceptance or surrender to that uncertainty is important. Hi, this is Jonathan Fields, host of The Good Life Project, where each week I talk to listeners about investing in the future by increasing their own vitality. But when it comes to those financial goals, whether it be saving for a home renovation, growing your child's college fund or travel, life can make it difficult to stay the course. By working with a dedicated Merrill Advisor, you get a personalized plan and a clear path forward. Having the bullet your back helps your whole financial life move with you. So when your plans change, Merrill's with you every step of the way. Go to ml.com/bullish to learn more. Merrill, a bank of America company, what would you like the power to do? 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So I get the sense just from appearing this that this notion of possibility thinking is something that is habitual and the more you do it, the better that you get at it. So in the midst of a situation that is incredibly traumatic or at the moment seems like it's going to just overload you with grief like a breakup or the death of a parent or something like losing a job, how do you maintain possibility thinking in those scenarios? So there's a general principle. So often I will add people do you want to live an exceptional life? Yeah. And most people will say yes, but an exception by definition is low probability. And if you want to live a normative life, you'll be in the middle of the bell curve. But if you want an exceptional life, it's going to be low probability. So one of the questions you want to ask yourself, anyone who wants an amazing life is probably going to go for a low probability life, which means you have to activate some sense of possibility. So when you ask yourself, what is the possibility of doing something in that situation, you would say rather than saying, how do I recover from this trauma or how do I recover from this grief? What you say, what do people who recover from these situations amazingly do? And so there what you're looking for is the exception, right? You're basically saying, I want to know what the exception does. Like most people go through these situations, they have a pretty hard time and they sort of get through. But what about that person who is actually able to do this and do this amazing? So the very first principle is think like the exception and knock like the rule. The second thing I'll say, which a lot of people don't realize is that under situations that are difficult. So where there's a loss or something traumatic, we tend to want to vent. But by and large, most of the research actually shows that if you're deep grief after a situation, if you go over the situation, you just cut the trauma and you talk about it over and over again, you may think that you are being relieved, but in reality, you are cementing that thought into your brain. And so deep briefing of going over that trauma over and over again is not helpful. Rather what is really helpful is focusing on your resilience. What makes me a survivor? What will make me feel stronger? When I do recover from this, how will I move forward? The one thing I would say is I think a lot of people feel that they've got to do this in a chill eating kind of way, and I'm not really in favor of that at all. I think that it's normal to be grieving when it would be absolutely absurd if you actually started getting happy when something negative happened. Like I'm literally thinking about an experience I had at an airline counter recently where they mistakenly can't put my flight. And I was angry and I said, "Look, you're not going to do anything about this." And the person was like, "You don't have to be angry." I said, "Well, what do you think would be a more normal response? Do you want to be happy?" And he looked at me and he was so surprised, I said, "Well, somehow you're living with sterilized world where you feel like all anger is bad and inappropriate, but I would think you would think I was insane if I was like, "Well, I'm so happy you canceled my flight. Thank you so much." So I feel like to a certain extent, if there's a trauma, accept the fact that you're going to go through with a touch base for yourself, obviously, if at some point there's an extreme depression or anxiety, you're going to have to address that. But the two basic principles are really try to, when you are in that traumatic situation, not be brief and focus on your resilience. You've had a depression and anxiety and I had to ask, given that you're a psychiatrist and a neuroscientist, what has your research shown about depression and anxiety and more importantly pulling out of it? Well, I think depression and anxiety depends a little bit on the extent of the depression and what's causing the depression. So I would say by and large, there are biological causes, there are psychological causes and social causes. So there are actual illnesses, things like certain tumors, certain thyroid diseases, certain heart conditions that can lead to all of these things. So whenever anybody comes to me with any of those things, I first make sure that they have a proper medical examination to exclude any of those medical things that are easily treatable. And once those things are excluded, then you go on to thinking about psychological sort of ideas around this. And I think my philosophy around this is over the years has grown to where I used to direct the anxiety to sort of center at McLean Hospital at Harvard. And I started out feeling like really empowered about the fact that I could treat anxiety because I was like, wow, this is really cool. All I have to do is use a benzoyl and SSRI and people's anxiety goes away. I feel good. Everybody feels good. But I realized after a while that there was certain situation in which I was medicating out the transcendence, that certain kinds of anxiety, certain kinds of stress can actually be helpful. We call this use stress and in which it's EU stress. And so when there's use stress rather than distress, you want to encourage it. And so over time, I recognized that none of these things, depression or anxiety, are all good or all bad. You really have to look at the context in which they're occurring and you have to look at what they're doing for the person. So in an entrepreneur, for example, an entrepreneur was like, you know, I'm totally calm every day. I don't think about it, but make me wonder like what kind of risks is this person taking? And to what extent can this anxiety? Can we channel this anxiety so that they increase their strategic speed? Need a little bit like a tailwind. So I wouldn't want to completely remove that. But I think when depression or anxiety cause sort of huge obstacle in social functioning, in occupational functioning at work, that's when you want to start to sort of figure that out and give people choices that range all the way from medications to cognitive therapy and also to psychodynamic therapy. And there are lots of alternative ways of managing those conditions as well. Yeah. Well, let's do this. Let's get into the ideas into the book. One of the things that really struck me was this notion of the subtitle, unlock the power of the unfocused mind. And you know, that struck me as really odd given that I'm writing a book about creative habits, talking a lot about focus and flow. And you know, we've spent a great deal of time in the modern world writing up life hacks, productivity hacks, and building all sorts of tools to, you know, avoid distractions. So, you know, what prompted this notion of unlocking the power of the unfocused mind? Well, you know, for a lot of people who I've seen in my practice, what I see is that there are a ton of people both in my corporate work and with people who I've been seeing for a long time as patients, they have goals. And just because you write out a goal and you have a strategy doesn't actually guarantee that you're going to get to that goal. And so it started to occur to me that we were oversimplifying something about the way in which the brain worked. And the more I learned about the brain, the more I recognized that both focus and unfocused work together in the brain to get people to their goals. Now, people may say, well, what exactly do you mean by that? And just to answer your question, literally, the reason I wanted to write this book was because I sat down with my agent and said, I want to talk for one hour nonstop. And I want to see what you're thinking about. And then we can figure out what the topic of your book should be. And I was like, well, you know, I did a lot of things. I trained as a doctor. As a brain scientist, I'm a musician, I also work in biotechnology and now starting a technology on the company and all of this is working and it's happening. And she said, well, it sounds like the stuff is working for you. And to most people, it would sound overwhelming, but you seem to just be going with the flow or taking it near stride. And I said, yeah, I am. She said, well, why don't you start writing about this so you can help people because it sounds like most people do have a lot of diverse interests, but they're intimidated by their own complexity. And it was that particular idea that I feel that most human beings are compromising their lives by oversimplifying their lives and that by denying their complexity, they're not able to tap into the richest parts of their being. That's actually what prompted me to want to write that book. And just to make the meant to make that a little simpler, I believe strategies are absolutely important. Like I believe that in order to complete something, you do need a strategy. But the strategy is more like a plant and that that plant has to have its roots in something so that it can grow. And in the brain, what we know is that somewhere between 90% and 98% of mental activity is unconscious. So if there's that much unconscious activity, and we know that at rest, 20% of the energy of the body is being used by this kind of almost silent part of the brain by the unconscious shuttling around memories and shuttling making new associations, shouldn't we learn how to hone that part of the brain because it's so much of the brain so that the soil in which those plants of strategy grow is actually strong enough to be able to hold those roots. So when there are blocks in the unconscious, it's a little bit like stopping the roots of your strategy from spreading, or if there's a shaking of that soil, then your strategy becomes shaky. And I can tell you every business person I've talked to who's managed to scale their company to either sell it to Google or to do something amazing and large with it always talks about the fact that the real work that was done was not in the strategy and in the articulation of what the steps were, but in going to the very basis and the origins of why am I running this business, who am I as a person and how can I stabilize who I am so that the strategy can come from somewhere much deeper. And so in the book, I talk about the fact that there are people who prototypically, you know, people like Steve Jobs or more like Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg, who had transition points in their lives, took time off in order to wonder and in order to connect with these deeper parts of themselves and then came back to the world with a strategy that seemed to have worked out. And when you engage your unfocused mind, you are essentially giving your brain permission to become much smarter so that it can make a so that it has the time and space to make associations that are new associations from which your strategy can grow. So while I think the focus mind is essential for strategy, I think that the un that the unfocused mind is essential for the substrate in which that strategy is placed. Wow. Okay. So many questions come from this. So you mentioned the Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg thing and I knew about, you know, the taking time away. I'm curious. Why is it, you know, this is also for very personal reasons. Why is it that, for example, I get some of my best ideas and my best insights from my time surfing in the ocean? Or why is it in particular that we seem to draw these kinds of breakthrough ideas when we're in nature? Yeah. So here's a, here's a, here's a, I think a nice metaphor. I think that the breakthrough ideas are essentially new ideas and original ideas that come from a unique and novel recombination of material in your brain. So when your brain is simply focused, then metaphorically you have a fork and the fork is picking up all the solid pieces of your identity. But when your brain is unfocused or in some kind of flow state, the default mode network, the DMN, well, if you can't remember this, so think of it as the do mostly nothing network, invites a bunch of other silverware to the table. So all of a sudden you have a spoon that can pick up this delicious melange of flavors of your identity. There are things like the smell of apple pie in the fall or the scent of your grandmother when you leaned over the kisser, these are very important part of identity that can actually be scooped up by this metaphoric spoon element. And then there are chopsticks, which basically connect ideas across the brain to all of a sudden in this unfocused state, you have a whole new set of silverware in addition to the spoon, you have these chopsticks and then depending on your diet, you have this narrow spoon or melon spoon that goes into all the nooks and crannies in your brain and picks up all these puzzle pieces and fragments that come together. So all of a sudden your identity goes from being fork-based to being based on having a fork, a spoon, chopsticks and a marrow spoon, all of which then create a much more complex picture of who you are and bring puzzle pieces to the fore that ordinary focus could not break. So it's really the fact that this brain circuit does much harder work when you are in an unfocused state that makes us want to do that. And in fact, I was just thinking about this today and I was thinking about how people often, when they think about science, think about science as a very rational and sequential and logical process. And of course, there's a huge part of science that is that way. And many, many thinkers like Koon, the philosopher, for example, would say that the real revolutions in science came from very unfocused moments where people made these sudden connections and realizations and so amazing things were discovered. And there are a ton of examples all the way from Velcro to Viagra, where people stumbled across an idea because they made connections. And so I think that in general, when you are in a state that is promoting this unfocused brain circuit, you are stimulating a very different kind of intelligence that can allow you to be focused in a very different way. So a couple of questions come from this. One, what is the difference between being unfocused and being distracted? Because I think there's a very big difference between my time in the water being unfocused and my time being distracted, twiddling with every app on my smartphone. The other thing is knowing this, why do we still have an eight-hour workday that requires so many people to be in an office sitting in front of a computer? Yes, absolutely. So firstly, I think that unfocused is a bit of a provocative term because I think the first thing people think about is distraction, and of course, I'm not prescribing distraction. I think distraction is annoying. And to a large extent, it's about getting caught up in some other kind of calming habit, like scrolling through your email or not working in the task it had. So distraction is clearly not helpful. I think that in terms of why we have this eight-hour workday, I think that's a great question. I actually created together with this book an app, which I call the Tinker Table, which is right now it's a desktop app, but it's basically automatically blocked off your day with 10 to 15-minute intervals for as long as you want it to, as many times as you want it to, because I really think that when you look at the lifestyles of productive and creative people, this kind of breakthrough thinking requires these frequent breaks that are built into a day. And to your point about distraction, let's take one particular kind of distraction experience like daydreaming. I would just say daydreaming people are like, "Oh my God, I hate daydreaming." And suddenly Matthew Killingsworth and colleagues actually looked at daydreaming and found that if you just slip into a daydream, you become really depressed and you become sort of, you become unsettled. And so slipping into a daydream is a bit like falling off a cliff. It's not that helpful. But if, however, and also guilty, ruminative daydreaming going to a party and maybe having a bit too much to drink and then the next day being like, "Oh my God, I was so just inhibited. What did I actually do?" That kind of guilty stuff is not that helpful. But what is helpful is what we call positive constructive daydreaming, which was studied by Jerome Singer and his colleagues in the 1950s and since then there have been a lot of different studies that have shown that positive constructive daydreaming can be really helpful. Now, one of the ways, a couple of ways in which positive constructive daydreaming differs from just slipping into a daydream. And I would say the best way to do it, the metaphor that describes the difference is that slipping into a daydream is like falling off a cliff. Whereas when you clan your daydream, it's like skydive or putting on a parachute. So the first thing you do, and just a lot of research has shown is that you should have some kind of playful, volitional imagery. So think of yourself, something that really makes you feel playful and relaxed. So lying on a yacht or running through a par or just anything that makes you cooking, like whatever you want to imagine that makes you feel relaxed. The second thing is what they call perceptual decoupling, which is that we spend most of our days, most of our waking hours are spent with our sense organs engaging the world, as if the only way of collecting information is by collecting information with our perceptions. But the truth is perceptions touch and vision and hearing are all prone to a tremendous number of illusions and they have definitive limit. And it is really inward travel that can allow you to develop a completely different kind of experience. So the way you do that, close your eyes. And you close your eyes for just 30 seconds so that you take the flashlight of attention instead of pointing it outwards, you point it inwards. And then open your eyes again because studies show that this positive constructive daydreaming is best done when you are doing an undemanding activity, not nothing and not a hugely demanding activity. So something like nitty or something like gardening can actually help facilitate this daydream. So start with the imagery, close your eyes, turn your attention inward and then open your eyes again and do something undemanding. And that form of daydreaming can actually increase creativity. And what it does when you withdraw your perception from the environment is that it actually also allows you to be to cycle attention. So it's like re-energizing your brain because you're giving the focus up, it's time to rest. And most people when they go through their days, their usual pattern is focus, focus, focus, fatigue going to bed and down. And I think what people don't realize is that if you take care of your brain in a different way, if you do focus and then some little piece of unfocused activity, you know, maybe you could go for a walk, maybe you could do use a possibility thinking, maybe you could use positive constructive daydreaming. You come back, you do some focused activity and then you take a lunch break. And after your lunch break, you feel a little tired. So you try something else, you maybe take a 10 minute nap for clarity or a 90 minute nap for creativity. And all of a sudden your whole day, you're giving yourself a chance to work with the brain that is much more energized. Otherwise, your energy goes from high to low and you're still forcing your brain by the time you get to mid-afternoon and you go really in a slump. You're still forcing this tired brain to work with something. Why not energize it in between so that the entire day you're working with an optimally energized brain? I have a secret. 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And to provide Colorado with energy that's affordable, reliable, and ever cleaner. So everyone can get to where they want to be. You've arrived. That's energy and progress. Visit chevron.com/tankless. Hi, this is Jonathan Fields, host of The Good Life Project, where each week I talk to listeners about investing in their future by increasing their own vitality. But when it comes to those financial goals, whether it be saving for home renovation, growing your child's college fund, or travel, life can make it difficult to stay the course. By working with a dedicated Merrill Advisor, you get a personalized plan and a clear path forward. Having the bullet your back helps your whole financial life move with you. So when your plans change, Merrill's with you every step of the way. Go to ml.com/bullish to learn more. Merrill a Bank of America company. What would you like the power to do? Investing involves risk. 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It's interesting because I just published an article and a medium about how I managed to produce what I do despite having an incredibly short attention span. And a good amount of it was the fact that I've optimized the days based on what times of day I know my attention span is at its peak. Because for me, not all hours of the day are created equal. And I think not probably consciously being aware of it. I've done many of the things that you're talking about, which has allowed me to actually do all the things that I do. That makes total sense to me because I think if you're in touch with that, then you know after lunch, I'm not going to be productive. So I'm not going to do that. Or at three o'clock, I'm going to feel like I need a cup of coffee. And actually studies show that in many instances, naps are even superior to coffee. So I think if you know your body well and you know your own sleep patterns well, you're much likely to be more productive. And I will say as well that there's an element, as you were saying that, I was thinking about a recent study that was done that looked at when you were saying your attention span was well, I was thinking you can even leverage that kind of distraction for having a particular job in life. So you know, for example, a study that was done recently looked at adults and children and they gave them the shapes that they had to focus on. And then they had to match it with other shades later on. And what they found was that adults were much better at remembering how to match these things when they were asked to focus on something. But when they were not asked to focus on something, the kids were actually superior at recollecting and making this matching, telling us that children, when their minds are fixed on a particular thing, their minds will wander and when their minds wander, they collect information. So when someone tells me that they have a short attention span, my first thought is not like, oh, that's terrible. It's like, let's figure out how you want to use that in the world because maybe your short attention span can be used to an advantage on some kind of creative endeavor. And if we put you on a team with someone who likes being super focused, then maybe you can contribute something, they can contribute something and together, you can come up with an incredible, you can actually sort of execute on a very creative idea. So by using your inattentiveness to your advantage, and there have been studies that have shown that people with ADHD can be more creative as well. So I wouldn't throw that, I wouldn't throw the baby out for the back. Yeah. I mean, I noticed that the one thing that it's forced me to do is when I do have the ability to focus, it's an intensity of focus that allows me to get far more done in less time than maybe somebody who doesn't have a short attention span. Yes. I mean, absolutely, because in that intensity, there is, I mean, there's so much that happens, right? I mean, if you actually get down to the subtlety of what we're talking about, focus and unfocused do eventually work together. So I'm thinking about, you know, just think about writing, right? First you start, you're right, and you're focusing on the idea. But the more you focus, the more you lose yourself in the idea, and the more you start to feel when you are actually lost in that idea is where you find that the idea comes to life. And you see this a large in sport as well, where people like antennas, for example, might be tight initially because they're focusing and they're over focusing. But then they focus just enough to be able to get lost in the game and all of a sudden they're not tight anymore. So I think that one of the things we're writing this book on on focus is that it's sort of artificial to separate our focus and unfocused because I think one feeds the other. That out of an incredibly unfocused time, you know, for example, you could have a brainstorming session, you can then have a convergent time where you're like, "Okay, let's pull our thoughts together." Or out of a very focused time, like playing music for a long period of time, or really concentrating on writing, you can lose yourself in that moment of focus and explore an entirely unfocused world. I think you speak to any meditator about this and any meditator will attest to the fact that even when you have your mind focused on your breath, it starts off as a focused meditation, but then your state of consciousness changes and you start to feel like you're in a more unfocused universe. So I think that the real complexity about focus and unfocused is that they work together and by over focusing, which is really the point of this book, you deny yourself a lot of your own intrinsic intelligence. So I have to ask, what is the role of technology and devices in all of this? Do, you know, I mean, I seem to keep coming across a pattern that we really need time away from this stuff, and I'm curious what your own research is showing about this. So I think there's two things here. Probably one of the things that most intrigued me about this is that, you know, the more you look at the marketplace and you realize, you know, all of these things about robots taking over our jobs, there is some truth to it. I mean, when I last looked at the robot literature, I saw things like there were robots that were delivering food on Yelp. There were robots that were acting as hotel bellhops. There were robots that were actually doing sports writing to some TV station. And you know, there were robots that were doing the premium, and the robots that were making health food. So I was thinking, what is going on? And I think what's going on is that there's some kind of commoditization of linear intelligence, that the more we're able to program, the more we are able to develop machines that can replace more linear thinking. And so to me, one of the big opportunities here with unfocused is to activate this unfocused circuit, this DMN, learn all these different ways to basically promote brain plasticity and change so that we become the masters of the human universe. The robots will almost definitely be better than we are at number crunching and at linear processes. But I think humans are really good at being human, we've just lost the time and information to do that. So I really believe that these unfocused techniques are particularly important because as we seek to be relevant in a world that is getting taken over by machines and robots, these unfocused techniques will place up at an advantage. The second thing, which I think relates to this idea of digital distraction, aren't we a little bit too distracted, absolutely. I think that what technology does is it gets us absorbed in a kind of hamster wheel kind of pattern. I notice this in myself sometimes, we'll be checking email and it's a purely addictive phenomenon. It's a little like playing Russian roulette, but you're like, "Okay, bad email, bad email." And suddenly it's like one good email and it's like, "Oh my God, I can't stop going through the emails because you just want to find one good email every time you go back." And so I feel like this kind of habitual behavior, it's not helpful, it's actually, it is like an addiction and you can really get addicted to this and your mind can get caught in what I call habit hell. So I think that learning to unplug can be really protective to our brains. And I think, I don't think there's a hard and fast rule. I, for example, at this stage of my life, I don't think there's any way I could go somewhere where there's like zero excess gene now, but that's it. Like, you know, some of my friends will be like, "Oh, we had such a great long weekend. We went up to somewhere in Upstate New York and the great thing was that there was no TV and no, I think I would be just completely, I would be an anxious wreck. Because I'd have to be thinking about what I was coming back to, but I think, you know, you can find what's right. See, I think if you say to yourself, okay, I'm overdoing it with the email checking. I'm overdoing it with the multitasking. Let me try to figure out how I can, how I can do this differently. Like sometimes I'll just realize that I don't tell my notifications off. And so if I'm talking to someone, you know, on the right hand screen on my computer, I keep on seeing these emails and, and sometimes you see these subject lines and they make you feel sick to your stomach. And you're talking to someone and you're like, "Oh my God, this is, I've been in such a mixed emotion experience." And so I just turn the notifications off. So I think that without a doubt, I think that digital distraction is real. I think that there are studies coming out now that show that it's not all bad, that actually, there's something about this fast evolution of technology that's also stimulating creativity. So people looking for images on Facebook, all to put on Twitter or trying to make Insta stories that, that these are, that there are also creative moments associated with this. My sense is we need to be active and dynamic in evaluating our relationship with social media. And I think as long as we stay connected to our core and we realize that we are leading this, this whole engagement, we will feel better. But if we start feeling like social media is pulling us off or that our email is pulling us off, then we're going to start to feel out of control. And I think that that kind of loss of control can lead to burnout. So like everything, the most things that I believe, I believe there are pros and cons to technology, I think the biggest opportunity is in developing the ultimate human brain. Because I think that the default mode network is going to be much more difficult to replicate in robot than a linear, cortical processing centers. But I also think that the other piece that is unrelated is the way we interact with our technology needs to be on our terms and not having this technology control our lives. So you know, I want to ask you, you know, so I'm in the process of learning a new skill, which is to how to play the guitar, which I literally bought yesterday. And as like, you know, like I started just playing chords and looking at YouTube videos and it got me thinking, you know, when I knew I was talking to you this morning, I wanted to ask, okay, how can I take the ideas from this book and the ideas that you've researched and how can I apply that to the skill of learning something like learning how to play the guitar. You know, and I'm not trying to become, you know, John Mayer, but just to the point where I could play a few pop songs fairly easily and, you know, amuse myself. So that's an interesting set of thoughts that you just expressed. So firstly, I mean, maybe you could be better than John Mayer. And the concept that we talk about here is self-handicapping versus, and then there's another set of ideas called self-esteem, maintenance versus self-esteem optimization. So self-handicapping is where we lower the bar because we don't want to be disappointed. Now, while at some level it's, it may be it's true because of the amount of time you would give to the guitar, you may not reach the level of proficiency of John Mayer. It's also true that if you actually allowed yourself to engage a more freakish side of you, you may actually suddenly surprise yourself. So is it possible, is it likely? No. Sure. Yeah. You know, so if it's possible, why handicap yourself with something lower? I think a good example of this is, actually, I sort of fool around my trainer about this. I always tell him, okay, you know, we're going for the five rings, like Olympics. And, you know, he laughs and he's like, come on, you know, I mean, I like to try to be physically fit, but like the Olympics is not, it's probably even further less likely than you're being like John Mayer. So he looked at me and I said, you know what, I don't like setting low goal. Like, and I don't mind if I don't reach these goals. Yeah. But if I don't have like some amazing goal, then what's the point, like the only reason to have a lower goal is to not be disappointed. And all that a higher goal can do is inspire you to reach it. So as long as I'm aware, I'm not wanting to hurt myself and I don't push myself beyond a particular point, why not have that higher goal? So that would be number one. I think number two, which is an interesting thing related to self handicapping, is that we live our lives in the self esteem maintenance mode. We do whatever we need to do to keep up to keep our lives sort of level. But self esteem optimization, which is SEO for humans is actually a state in which you can say, you know what, I want to play incredibly well. Now, let's go back to the essence of your question, which is, what can I use it of these techniques that can help me do this? Well, the first is possibility thinking, right, possibility thing would be, is it possible for me to play better than anyone's ever played with my circumstances? Yes, because maybe you're not John Mayer, but in a range of people who can play like you, maybe there is something that you can do. Now, I think the second thing is refraining and refocusing. So the reframing would be, it's not about whether I want to play like John Mayer or not. It's about trying to see whatever your goal is. If your goal is to learn two songs in six months, then you'll learn two songs in six months. If your goal is to get better and better all the time and you want to do something in six months and then double that in the next three months and then triple that in the next three months, then you can reframe that like that. So the John Mayer idea may turn your brain off completely because your brain is like, whatever, you're not John Mayer, it's never going to happen. You don't practice as much, but if you said to your brain, what that is symbolic of is I want to get better using that kind of reframe can be really helpful. The third thing I think relates to maybe the essence of what you're asking, which is how do you get into some kind of creative flow? And I think that's a really beautiful example of focus and unfocused working together. So I'm a trained musician and I came from a very classical tradition. So I learned the hard way, meaning it's interesting because in the UK, for example, there's a South Africa where I'm from, it has the technique that's similar to the UK, which is you learn all the painful scales first and once you've done all of that, you can start to improvise. But there are teaching methods in America, but I think they're pretty awesome, which are like, no, let's just start with the piece. And somebody who's what's additional would be like, that's impossible, but you've got to learn the basics. But a lot of people who use this, this more American method have actually found that that's not necessary. You can indirectly learn the scales as you're learning how to play pieces. So I wouldn't limit that experience. I would say the idea is just to play, but I would invite you to try one particular thing. I would say, so first learn the stuff very rigidly the way you would ordinarily learn. And then I would ask you to just play anything, just like allow your fingers to move however they want to move. And you will notice that it's actually harder to be random than you think. Your brain will go back to things that you knew. And we actually know this, like I've done this, I play the piano. So when I have improvisation lessons, which is a lot of like, sounds like a contradiction, but when I would say, okay, I just want to improvise for five minutes. Let me think of a pattern around which I'm going to improvise. It's actually very difficult to escape that pattern and to be completely mad. So I think to learn more of the skill, you want to play around with surrender. I mean, if you look at Jimi Hendrix, for example, and you look at how Hendrix plays, it's really hard to imagine that that comes just from working hard, right? I mean, there's some other quality of surrender that occurs when you play the guitar in that way. But there's something where you've learned the technical skills, but you're not afraid to let your mind go. And so I think you should use the guitar to explore what it's like to let your mind go. And I have a complete example of that, actually, I decided in this last year, I was playing piano with my piano teacher and all of a sudden I was like, this is so painful. Because I trained at music and I used to play really well. I didn't feel like I had that competency, even though I switched to jazz. I was like, this is still not good enough. And then I thought, I want to be in some state that doesn't require that degree of talent. And so I got up from the piano stool and then I said, you know what, I want to sing. And I said, well, what do you want to say? And so I don't know. He said, well, do you have any idea? I said, no, I have no idea, but we're going to start now and I want you to play anything. And I just started singing and he just started playing. And over three months, I actually had enough songs that I thought, why don't I write a musical? And I'm going to just use the next year and a half to go back to those songs. And what that taught me was that it wasn't about being brilliant, it wasn't about just knowing every single piece of music. It was about trusting that within every one of us, there is some kind of idea, some kind of competency that wants to come out and that music is a way of translating that. So why not have a more open and exploratory attitude to that, the exactly the same kind of attitude as you would have, inquiring about someone's job choices instead of being sort of too tense and too taught and preventing this fast progress. So my general feeling is if you move between focus and unfocused, learning the focus stuff of the piece, but making sure you set aside at least one or two times a week where you go a little crazy or maybe you sing on top of what you're playing and you just, you just see what happens. Like, when I did this musical thing, I actually said to my teacher, I just want to confront the ugly parts of my voice. And I just want to hear them come out and see what happens. And that was kind of amazing to do that because you learn so much about yourself just by being curious and not holding yourself to some level of perfection. I always feel like excellence comes out when you explore and discover and then you can repeat and originally learn to pattern by yourself as opposed to just following instruction, which makes it very difficult to liberate yourself to the state of excellence. Wow, well, this has been mind-blowing and profound as I expected it would be. So I have one last question, which I know you've heard me ask as I've asked it to you before. It'd be interesting to see how you answer it six months later. What do you think it is that makes somebody or something unmistakable? I think to be unmistakable means that you are in possession of something that is original. And I think that probably the most amazing quality that exists in every human being is the capacity to change. And so I think what makes you unmistakable is when you have a fearless inclination to explore the next level of your own existence and when you use yourself as a barometer for that change so that you can feel your own evolution. Wow, well, this has been amazing. Where can people learn more about the book and your work? So the book and work are both on my website, which is DrSreniPalei.com, D-R-S-R-I-N-I-P-I-L-L-A-Y.com. And the book "Tinker Dabble Doodle Try" unlocked the power of the unfocused mind and can be found on any major cell or books, Amazon, Barnes and Noble. And on my website, there's a whole list of places where the book is being sold. And I really hope that people will join this. And I hope it will be some kind of resurgence of curiosity and ingenuity and a Tinko revolution. I'd really love to see that in education and I'd love to see that in the workplace. And I would love to see that in the ways in which people construct meaning in their lives. Well, I think that makes a fitting end to our conversation. And for everybody listening, we will wrap the show with that. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Unmistakable Creative Podcast. While you're listening, were there any moments you found fascinating, inspiring, instructive, maybe even heartwarming? Can you think of anyone, a friend or a family member who would appreciate this moment? If so, take a second and share today's episode with that one person because good ideas and messages are meant to be shared. Drive into summer with a new Honda. Make an impression with the unmistakable style of the HRV or turn heads in the Sporty Civic. From Honda, the 2024 Kelly Blue Book's KBB.com Best Value Brand. For a limited time, well-qualified buyers can get a 3.9% APR on a 2025 HRV or a 4.9% APR on a 2025 Civic. CDL, if you're financing details, exclusive to Gessai and Type R based on 2024 Consumer Choice Awards from Kelly Blue Book visit kbb.com for more information. Hi, this is Jonathan Fields, a host of The Good Life Project, where each week I talk to listeners about investing in their future by increasing their own vitality. But when it comes to those financial goals, whether it be saving for a home renovation, growing your child's college fund or travel, life can make it difficult to stay the course. By working with a dedicated Merrill Advisor, you get a personalized plan and a clear path forward. Having the bullet your back helps your whole financial life move with you. So when your plans change, Merrill's with you every step of the way. Go to ml.com/bullish to learn more. Merrill, a Bank of America company, what would you like the power to do? Everything involves risk, Merrill Lynch, Pierce Fender, Smith Inc., registered broker dealer, registered investment advisor, member S.I.P.C. We all have somewhere we're trying to get to. As the largest energy producer in Colorado, Chevron is helping meet rising demand, and we're working to do it responsibly. Our next-gen, tankless facilities reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of our operations by more than 90% compared to our older designs. 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