In the back of your mind

Sometimes when you get stuck trying to solve a problem, the best thing to do is to put it aside and come back to it later. After a while, you often find that the answer just comes to you.

But what is actually going on here? Is a part of your mind continuing to work on the problem?

And if so, how come you’re not aware of it? Are there entire regions of your brain which are working away on things that you care about, without bothering to tell you?

Think about it. While you are reading this, do you really know what your brain is actually up to? What sorts of things might it be doing that it’s not telling you about?

2 thoughts on “In the back of your mind”

  1. On the other hand, maybe just the change in context between setting the problem aside and revisiting it is enough to nudge the solution in place.

    I can imagine the state of your brain is very different between, say, your desk at 1am and with morning coffee eight hours later. The new situation may afford the solution without any background processing in between.

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