<story><title>A Wandering Mind Is an Unhappy Mind (2010) [pdf]</title><url>https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/images/application_uploads/KILLINGSWORTH-WanderingMind.pdf</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>dschuetz</author><text>There&amp;#x27;s a plenty of occasions, causes and distractions to make your mind wander. To me personally the most prominent ones are when reading a book (which is also the most infuriating) and while riding some sort of public transport.&lt;p&gt;The latter one helps me to reduce head buzz which is generated by randomly reading HN posts or working on a demanding task.&lt;p&gt;Reading a book, where I actually &lt;i&gt;need&lt;/i&gt; to concentrate on the book, some contents generate occasional &lt;i&gt;mind branches&lt;/i&gt;. That means, I continue reading, but I think about something else triggered by what&amp;#x27;s in the book. Then I switch back to the book realizing &amp;quot;Wait, where was I? I have no idea why I&amp;#x27;m reading this, and now I skipped a whole page.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;When I make a long trip I also have &lt;i&gt;a lot&lt;/i&gt; of time to think. So, my scope of thoughts grows and my mind wanders. Basically that&amp;#x27;s the mode which potentially might make me very happy or deeply unhappy. Because the scope expands from decisions made in the past to decisions to make in the future. And that&amp;#x27;s where it hurts most.&lt;p&gt;Can anyone relate?</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Regardsyjc</author><text>I could be wrong but your mind wandering off on a tangent while you&amp;#x27;re reading might be a sign of creativity. Creativity could be when you find relationships between two things that might not have been initially connected in your head. Your mind wandering could be your brain literally making new connections between the new material you&amp;#x27;re reading and existing material in your brain. Also, I think comparing and contrasting information is a way of learning. I&amp;#x27;m basing this from a book I read, A Mind for Numbers, and they have a chapter that explains how the brain works and thus how people learn.</text></comment>
<story><title>A Wandering Mind Is an Unhappy Mind (2010) [pdf]</title><url>https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/images/application_uploads/KILLINGSWORTH-WanderingMind.pdf</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>dschuetz</author><text>There&amp;#x27;s a plenty of occasions, causes and distractions to make your mind wander. To me personally the most prominent ones are when reading a book (which is also the most infuriating) and while riding some sort of public transport.&lt;p&gt;The latter one helps me to reduce head buzz which is generated by randomly reading HN posts or working on a demanding task.&lt;p&gt;Reading a book, where I actually &lt;i&gt;need&lt;/i&gt; to concentrate on the book, some contents generate occasional &lt;i&gt;mind branches&lt;/i&gt;. That means, I continue reading, but I think about something else triggered by what&amp;#x27;s in the book. Then I switch back to the book realizing &amp;quot;Wait, where was I? I have no idea why I&amp;#x27;m reading this, and now I skipped a whole page.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;When I make a long trip I also have &lt;i&gt;a lot&lt;/i&gt; of time to think. So, my scope of thoughts grows and my mind wanders. Basically that&amp;#x27;s the mode which potentially might make me very happy or deeply unhappy. Because the scope expands from decisions made in the past to decisions to make in the future. And that&amp;#x27;s where it hurts most.&lt;p&gt;Can anyone relate?</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>acorkery</author><text>I can relate with the reading issue. I&amp;#x27;ve occasionally read 2 pages of a book while thinking of something else entirely, then realise I didn&amp;#x27;t absorb any of what I read. Not just tuning in and out - nothing..&lt;p&gt;I also can&amp;#x27;t skim text - need to almost pronounce all the phrases in my head, which is a pain when reading long books. I do read a lot, and have no literacy or comprehension issues - just seems like there&amp;#x27;s interference somewhere..</text></comment>