Why does the solution to a problem you’ve been stuck with, sometimes come to mind all of a sudden? Is my mind working on it “behind the scenes” without me “knowing”?

Question

I like to develop games as a hobby, and therefore usually encounter a lot of programming challenges, in other words: features i want to implement but dont really know how.

Ocasionally i spend a lot of time try to solve it, without success, and then, usually in the next couple of days, the thought containing the correct solution will suddenly appear in my mind, without me consciously focusing or even thinking about that topic.

What happened? Did my mind keep working on it, without me even “knowing” and then presented the solution?

Thanks!

In: Biology

Answer 1

Yes, your brain *is* working behind the scenes. Barbara Oakley talks about this in her book *A Mind for Numbers*. Essentially, when we are focused on a thing, we are stuck in a rut of the possibilities of that thing. We are used to certain patterns and so try to get whatever the thing is to fit what we know and what patterns we know.

When we are doing something else, like when we’re in the shower or taking a walk, and our brain has the freedom to, essentially daydream, it is still thinking about the problem, but is no longer fixed on the small patterns we know and can instead consider weird connections we have not yet consciously made.

Stepping away from problems is actually an effective and helpful way to solve those problems because it gives our brains the flexibility to work on it while we’re not thinking.