Imagine hearing that someone or other often sits around doing nothing. You would probably jump to the conclusion that that’s a lazy person, someone who lets others do the necessary work, a ne’er-do-well. Certainly it’s someone unsuccessful. Right?
Maybe not. Doing nothing can actually boost your mental and physical health, improve memory, enhance self-awareness and foster creative thinking. It can also feel deliciously restorative. Here’s the science – and why intentional disengagement from the whirl of busyness has special relevance for introverts.
The Special State of Doing Nothing
Neuroscientists have discovered that a brain at rest enters a distinctive condition called the Default Mode Network, or DMN. This is an autopilot system that facilitates the consolidation of memories, the processing of emotions and integration of new information. With even a brief timeout from stimulation, you allow your brain to form less obvious connections and recover the ability to focus.
In addition, by taking a break from constant arousal, your nervous system resets with a lower heart rate, healthier blood pressure and a reduced level of stress hormones. This helps prevent burnout, irritability and reactive conflicts. Being alone with your thoughts while not trying to do anything in particular helps you tune into yourself for firmer self-identity and to understand others with greater empathy. It also helps you integrate your past, present and future into a coherent narrative about yourself in the world.
Note that the DMN differs from the concept that listening to music, playing video games or checking piled-up emails all count as “rest.” Even meditation, which many people consider to be a break from productivity, is too purposeful for dropping into the DMN. Instead, envision receptive daydreaming, idle drifting, woolgathering or mind wandering.
Even five or ten minutes of disengaged, unfocused spacing out will begin to bring on the benefits above.
Not convinced yet? One of the most celebrated investors in the world, Warren Buffett, is a huge proponent of undirected reverie. Several articles and videos sum up his philosophy and habits in the headline, “Doing Nothing Can Make You Rich.” In his words, “I insist on a lot of time being spent, almost every day, to just sit and think. That is very uncommon in American business. I read and think. So I do more reading and thinking, and make less impulse decisions than most people in business.”
Fears about falling behind may keep many people from welcoming do-nothing intervals. There may also be something scary for some about the experience of pure idleness. In a famous 2014 experiment by psychologists from the University of Virginia and Harvard, almost half of the participants preferred giving themselves mild electrical shocks to sitting quietly alone. “Simply being alone with their thoughts was apparently so aversive that it drove many participants to self-administer an electric shock that they had earlier said they would pay to avoid,” the researchers reflected.
Where Introverts Come In
Surprisingly, the psychologists in the self-shocking experiment didn’t find a correlation between the ability to tolerate 15 silent minutes alone and introversion/extroversion. However, when other scientists wired up both introverts and extroverts and studied their responses to high and low stimulation settings, they found that introverts’ brains tended to remain in the DMN mode even in a high stimulation environment. That is, their mind wandering did not ever shut down completely, whereas extroverts’ brains did shift out of DMN when external stimulation increased. In addition, introverts show a more internal focus when our brains relax into DMN mode.
Because of the DMN, introverts’ brains tend to excel at spotting subtle patterns, synthesizing complex information, expressing ideas creatively and overlaying our inner and outer worlds with meaning.
And here’s one recommendation for daily life from the research in this post: When someone in front of you in the checkout line dawdles annoyingly, take that as a gift. Chill. Let your mind downshift into idle and enjoy the opportunity for a life-enhancing break outside of normal time.
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ISFJ here. Thanks for your great report.