Don’t stop daydreaming – it sets your mind to work

Tips on “resting your mind” are increasingly prominent in western culture’s non-stop barrage of lifestyle instructions. We are exhorted to give our brains downtime, and reminded of the benefits of yoga, mindfulness and transcendental meditation. In an economic system preoccupied with squeezing value from employees’ minds as well as bodies, rest, we are told, can promote creative insights rather than be purely a sign of lost productivity. But what are the criteria for judging if a mind is at rest? What accounts for the unevenness in people’s experiences of mental “rest”? And can we broaden the repertoire of practices that people use – beyond mindfulness training and yoga – to find rest in their everyday lives? Read more.