Dolphins and their sleep

Did you know how Dolphins get to sleep?

Apparently they don’t entirely switch off.

They can’t. Their breathing isn’t automatic.

So instead they have to turn off half of their brain one part at a time.

So the first half sleeps while the other is awake and then they switch.

Quite cool isn’t it?

Also, I thought to myself, a funny metaphor for creativity.

Creativity – the ultimate battle between two halves of the brain.

Convergent thinking and divergent thinking battling it out. Both need each other but they can’t operate at the same time.

Like the Dolphin it helps to give one side of the brain the night off.

That’s why we have code names like ‘Brainstorming’, ‘shitty first drafts’, and ‘morning pages’. They tell our judgemental sides ‘you don’t need to worry about this’. Likewise ‘editing’ let’s the child know playtime is not welcome here.

If we didn’t rest one side at a time it would be overwhelming.

You would have your pen hovering over the blank page paralysed whilst war wages inside you.

‘Start with the title’

‘No, start with the date!’

‘Should we include the year?’

‘No, nobody needs to know the year’

‘It could be interesting’

‘It would look odd’