Solve Creative Problems While You Sleep

Back in 2010, I was working on my documentary, Beard Club, and I was stuck. My edit wasn’t working and I didn’t know what to do next. I felt like I was at an impasse and it was frustrating because I had interviewed over 80 people, had traveled to twelve cities in six countries and I couldn’t figure out how to move forward with the film. 

Not being able to move forward brought up stress, guilt, and shame.

Fast forward to 2020 and I was launching a new course, Find Your Authentic Voice. I had invited over 200 people to a free beta program, I had my course outline, but I had to write the course and I was feeling overwhelmed and on the edge of being stuck. Again I felt stress and risk of guilt and shame.

MY EXPERIENCE WITH SLEEP AND CREATIVE PROBLEM SOLVING

The first time I did this was when I was editing my film. I felt like I was at the end of my creative capacity. One night before going to bed I asked myself, what should I do next?

The very next morning I woke up with a new creative direction. I can’t remember if I used the idea but it broke my inability to move forward.

When working on my course I intuitively tried the same technique. This time I would look at the course outline and more specifically the section I was working on. I wouldn’t even ask a question. I would just look at the section, empty my mind of expectations, and go to bed.

Nine times out of ten I would wake up, usually, around 4 am, with ideas flooding into my head. I would end up writing for one or two hours before going back to bed and then waking up a few hours later.

BREAKS AND CREATIVE PROBLEM SOLVING

In addition to my sleep solution, when I was writing the course material I was often stressed during the day. The course material felt very close to me and the act of writing made me feel vulnerable. I felt like every day I was bathed in stress hormones.

To manage the stress I began taking frequent breaks, most often in the form of walking and chopping vegetables. Before each break I would look at the section of the course I wanted to write, I would look at the words on my post-in note, then I would try to empty my mind.

Each time I took a break, which I call ‘the pause.’ I came up with interesting solutions, ways to communicate the information I wanted to share that I couldn’t come up with when sitting in front of my computer.

THE RESEARCH–TAKING YOUR THINKING BRAIN OFFLINE

When doing research for my new book, about rekindling a dream when one’s dream disappears, I was again chopping vegetables during a break and decided to listen to a podcast to let my thinking brain rest. Apple Podcast suggested a podcast titled “What your dreams are trying to tell you.”

For some reason, I thought this was a motivational podcast that would talk about the goal type of dream, as that was on my mind. I was wrong. They were talking about the dreams you have when sleeping.

I was about to switch to another podcast but being busy stirring my veggies at the stove I let it run. I’m so happy I did because therapist and dream expert Leslie Ellis shared some insights about our neural pathways during sleep that helped me realize why sleeping and pauses help the creative process. She then shared a book about sleep and creativity that made me almost jump.

SLEEP, DREAMS AND THE PREFRONTAL CORTEX

First, Ellis said that researchers have found that when we are dreaming our prefrontal cortex, our logical functioning brain is resting. In my research into my creative process, I have found that my creative sweet spot is when both my prefrontal cortex and ancient brain (limbic system) are calm.

Then she said we dream in emotional pictures and this emotional space is hyper associative. “Dreams will piece together stuff from different times and places.”

This is the heart of creativity, communication and storytelling. Stories are a place to share emotions. And much of storytelling is about metaphor. We use one set of ideas and experiences to explain another idea or experience. We create mashups of known experiences to explain unknown experiences to others.

As Ellis says, “There’s a lot of intelligence in what our dreaming mind is doing. A lot of emotional regulation. A lot of figuring out what matters. And this stuff happens when we give our minds a break. If we’re too focused all the time I think we lose some important skills or time for processing things that matter.”

Yes! This is what I experienced with my creative process. It is not just a putting words to paper process, it is an emotional process. And it requires me to sift through ideas and emotions and figure out what matters.

THE RESEARCH BEHIND SLEEP AND CREATIVE PROBLEM-SOLVING

If that wasn’t enough, Ellis shared insights from a book written by Dierdre Barrett from the Harvard Medical School called The Committee of Sleep: How Artists, Scientists and Athletes Use Sleep for Creative Problem-Solving–And How You Can, Too. In this book, Barrett documents how top artists, scientists and athletes have used sleep to solve problems they can’t solve with their waking minds. They look to sleep to help them find answers when they get stuck. Sleep problem-solvers include the likes of Einstein, the Beetles, Ludwig van Beethoven, Robert Lewis Stevenson, Stephen King and Salvador Dali.

The book was named after a quote by John Steinbeck, "It is a common experience that a problem difficult at night is resolved in the morning after the committee of sleep has worked on it."

Thank you to the Mind Body Green podcast and Leslie Ellis for sharing your conversation. 

THE POWER OF DAYDREAMING

Ellis also went on to talk about the benefits of letting one’s mind wander in the form of daydreaming.

I imagine that the same power of hyper association is happening during these work breaks when I am walking or chopping vegetables with an idea in the back of my head and letting my frontal cortex rest.

DO THE WORK

This is not a panacea. You have to have done the initial work including research, writing, thinking about a subject. Once you have the raw materials your resting mind can do the associative work.

For this reason, it is important to curate your input so you have a broad perspective of the question in terms of research and/or experiences or both.

The sleep question method requires you do the work upfront. But if you have done the work, it is an amazing tool to help you find creative solutions to creative problems. Once you have, you might feel like during the breaks your mind is at a playground. It keeps showing up and making associations. You might feel like you have to run to catch all the ideas your mind has discovered.

GET UP AND GET CREATIVE

I hear people talking about ‘butt in chair’ time and think, ‘No, not for me!’

I need to cycle through chair and non-chair time in order to let my mind work.

How about you? Try this out and let me know if taking breaks helps you with your creative process.

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If you want some guidance on how to work with THE PAUSE, check out my 2-week email series that will help you practice and integrate this work into your own creative process.