I like the research but think I would choose the nap over the idea.

 I feel that I run at full speed or I want a nap. I fear that I sleep too many hours a week.

So the possibility of using sleep to find creative insight was encouraging to me. Do something I am nearly addicted to and get a benefit from sounded too good to be true. ... And it is.

Salvador Dali and brief, uh, 'naps' to find creative solutions.

That link is to a Scientific American review and interview with the researchers. Their actual work is here (the quotes in my post are from Scientific American).

“You must seat yourself in a bony armchair, preferably of Spanish style,” he wrote. In your left hand, you were to clench a heavy key, suspended above a plate. Then, he continued, “you will have merely to let yourself be progressively invaded by a serene afternoon sleep, like the spiritual drop of anisette of your soul rising in the cube of sugar of your body.”

As you drifted off, the key would slip from your fingers and clang on the plate, awakening you. He claimed the brief moment spent between wake and sleep would revive your physical and psychic being. And he cautioned that “a mere second is infinitely too long.”

So an important point here is that it is not sleep nor dreams exactly that Dali was trying to access but the unfocused thoughts of a person nearly asleep.

I want to try this technique but also trying to put yourself to sleep and then not sleeping sounds like taking sex almost to orgasm and then stopping to get back to some more mundane activity. Yes, I may have a problem if my analogy for sex is sleep.

Anyway, if there is a way to strongly encourage creative thought, this seems to be it. It is not magic and in the experiment described at the link, it only made the participants more likely to solve the problem; not certain to do it.

From the article:

 Those who slept for longer periods actually did worse than both those who briefly slept and those who stayed awake.

TWIC: online class, design, research, scheming, night vale

The university of Iowa has an online class on How Writers Write Fiction.

How Writers Write Fiction 2016: Storied Women will bring together beginning and experienced writers for the study and practice of writing fiction. Class videos, readings, and writing assignments will invite new writers to experiment with the creation of fictional characters, scenes, and stories. Advanced writers will be challenged to examine their convictions and to refine and expand their craft. Centering on character - the characters created by women writers and the female characters created by all writers - this MOOC will lead participants through a progressive study of how authors from around the world approach each aspect of writing fiction.
October 12, 2016 - November 22, 2016

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Another class is offered The Open University and starts (well started) on October 3.

Start Writing Fiction focuses on a skill which is central to the writing of all stories and novels – creating characters.
You will listen to established writers, such as Louis de Bernières, Patricia Duncker, Alex Garland, Abdulrazak Gurnah, Tim Pears, Michèle Roberts and Monique Roffey, talk about how they started writing. You’ll consider the rituals of writing and the importance of keeping a journal.


You’ll learn how to develop your ideas and the importance of reflecting on writing and editing, and you’ll hear other writers talking about their approaches to research and consider ways of turning events into a plot.

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From Boingboing, Designing the Future of Work and Design Fiction. The latter appears to be a Gedankenexperiment, an attempt to imagine what effects a new technology will have.
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Grammar Snobbery and why you shouldn't engage in it.
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The following are not strongly related to creativity but do share some characteristics.

Some of the history of free/open software. I use OBS and Audacity and am grateful to have powerful tools at my disposal.
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One free/open piece of software that seems interesting is Cryptpad, which attempts to make a sahred word processor similar to Google Docs but with the text fully encrypted.
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I have discussed my lack of productivity as connected to a lack of creative stuff. Maybe I need to sleep less. An article on those who don't need as much sleep.
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A dissection of a scheme to scam millions from Amazon. I think, though it is unclear to me, that the person used various Amazon Prime (is that the name of the account that allows you do download unlimited books?) accounts to download 'books' - terrible messes similar to a cat walking across the keyboard - for which he received royalties.
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Doctorow on the success of Welcome to Night vale.

Stories become great by hacking your brain. Nothing that happens in fictionmatters. The people in fiction are fictional so their triumphs and tragedies have literally no consequence. The death of the yogurt you doomed to a fiery death in your gut-acid this morning is infinitely more tragic than the "deaths" of Romeo and Juliette. The yogurt was a alive and then it died. Romeo and Juliette never lived in the first place.
Stories trick your naive, empathic mind into resonating in sympathy (literally) with the plight of their imaginary people. Usually they do this by scrupulously avoiding any reminder that these are imaginary people. That "willing suspension of disbelief" is a bargain between the creator and the audience: the creator tells the tale and hews to something that is plausible (or at least consistent) and the audience member doesn't pinch herself and say, "Cut it out with the quickened heart, the leaking tears, the smiles of triumph, you dope, this is all made up!"

I have been satisfied with Welcome to Night Vale, but not thrilled. Well, I have some long drives coming up, maybe it is time to dive in and binge listen. Their website is here.

How do you make it stop?

I hope the person asking this is healthy and not suffering from mental illness. The title, below, is the link to the Quora post where one other (at the time of writing this) has posted as well.

After a very busy, successful day of creativity, how do you make it stop so you can sleep?

Brian Dean, studied creativiti for 7 years and counting - some day I'll have it figured out

1 View

I have the opposite problem. My final paragraph directly responds to the question but I ramble a bit getting there.

I have trouble with the motivation to write. I want to but ‘wanting’ doesn’t put me in the seat, tapping the keys. During NaNoWriMo (an international writing festival) I get motivated enough to really write. The urge to write and the ideas needed flow the entire time.

Yes, I have trouble sleeping. Yes, I keep a notepad by my bed and that eases the pressure a little. I don’t entirely like it. I feel pressured. The ideas distract me. but I am grateful because I feel I am doing something.

This pressure is identical, by the way, to the stress and nonstop internal dialog I experienced as a competitive swimmer at a big swim meet. I went to sleep in the hotel room thinking about swimming and woke up three times thinking I was late for the competition or that I had already swam it. I would finally wake up near the proper time thinking about nothing but swimming. I suspect I was selfishly focused and my parents were tolerant.

Entrepreneurs talk about the long hours they put in and how they feel exhausted…and great! I have a bit of that feeling as the work is mine and I am creating something meaningful.

I’m a lazy man who is lucky to have a satisfactory job but it is difficult to make myself write. I am too comfortable so when I am a little discomforted by many new ideas, I make the most of it.

There are people who legitimately could be diagnosed as obsessive and I hope such people can find peace.

For the rest of us, I find a notepad beside the bed and a few minutes at the end of the day writing or mind-mapping my ideas for the next day and beyond relaxed me. That way, I don’t worry that I will forget them. And I am grateful for the pressure and, well, colour, in a life that is a little too gray sometimes.