Today is June 18 and the Navigate the Chaos question to consider is “How often do you use rest as a catalyst in the pursuit of your dreams?”
Successful people who navigate the chaos understand how to use rest as they go about translating their dreams into reality.
Researcher Alex Soojung-Kim Pang published his results in a March 2017 article entitled “Darwin Was a Slacker and You Should Be Too” in which he declares “Many famous scientists have something in common—they didn’t work long hours. In fact, some of the greatest geniuses ‘worked’ only four hours a day.
They rested in-between bouts of creative transformation, generally operating in 90-120 minute bursts. Implicitly they recognized what science now demonstrates—that the body as information system always rebuilds and renews.
Human "downtime” is not like the "rest" of a car or a computer.
In human downtime, the body is continually learning, especially when asleep.
Rest is not only necessary for life and survival, but for the creative capacities that will power knowledge industries of the future. Biological intelligence can do more than make individuals smarter; it can enhance the performance of communities and societies.
Darwin split his day into morning and evening work, doing about four hours total.
G.H. Hardy, one of the greatest mathematicians of the twentieth century and author of a celebrated autobiography worked in a four hour stint in the morning, but with breaks.
The great novelist Anthony Trollope wrote his 2500 words a day between 5:30 and 8:30 a.m. before rushing off to help run the British Postal Service; to him we also owe a version of the post box.
According to Alex Soojung-Kim Pang “scientists who spent 25 hours in the workplace were no more productive than those who spent five. The 60-plus-hour-a-week researchers were the least productive of all. The best students generally followed a pattern of practicing hardest and longest in the morning, taking a nap in the afternoon, and then having a second practice.” English romantic poet William Wordsworth noted "rest and be thankful."
How often do you use rest as a catalyst in the pursuit of your dreams?