Doodle!

The "simple art" of being present

Thanks for reading J ROBERT CLARK - Makes. Enjoy your weekend ahead. ~JRC

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Do you doodle? No, not that annoying online polling software. I mean drawing random things in the margins of notes, on the back of napkins, or perhaps on the desk when no one is looking.

I doodle. And if you do too, you know what a compulsion it is. Like fidgeters tap a foot, doodlers are always scribbling patterns, shapes, and ideas all over any open space they can find.

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Doodling is not the same as daydreaming. In the latter, our thoughts drift away from the present moment, often when faced with boring and repetitive tasks - like meetings. But doodling appears to focus the mind, improving concentration and memory. 

Doodling helps us through the monotony and can make the worst lectures tolerable.

In numerous investigations, researchers compared recall in test subjects who were either doodling or not. In almost all of these studies, doodlers exhibited a significantly greater ability to remember things than non-doodlers. Why? Doodling keeps people from daydreaming (mostly) and helps them focus.

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Growing up, I always doodled.

I'd draw elaborate scenes in all the margins of my grade school notebooks. Sure, I also daydreamed back then - a lot. My doodles were often about my fantasies, so I was fully disengaged (and my grades suffered). But with time, my doodling matured into the more productive kind, like that described in all those studies. And by the time I reached college, my doodle-filled notebooks were at their best.

Unfortunately, when I left school for the "real world," my doodles became less and less common. Over the years of trying to be more professional, I shamed myself away from this seemingly childish behavior. And by the time I was a lowly administrator at the top (a.k.a., a boss), I had almost completely stopped my marginal scribblings. 

By then, I not only lost the doodles, but I had also lost interest. So I quit. And I started doodling again.

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Today, I still attend meetings, although thankfully fewer. Occasionally I meet with clients, and I'm a trustee for a regional botanic garden where I live. Both are far more fun than my old almost-daily meetings, and I can easily engage without doodling these days - but I doodle all the time anyway. I know how beneficial it is for me, so I do it to make the fun even more fun.

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The great thing about doodling is anyone can benefit from it, even if you're not a natural doodler like me.

Those scientific studies I mentioned use random participants, not grouped by their propensity to doodle. Even when participants only shaded small boxes on their note sheets (instead of randomly drawing), doodling was a positive. The more you doodle - and the simpler the better - the more you remember.

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It appears that having something physical but mostly mindless to engage with during meetings (and other daydream-inducing activities) can have positive outcomes for anyone. It's the same rationale behind "walking meetings" where people roam about while convening. Similarly, consultants and facilitators make participants play random games that keep everyone engaged. But these are all so, well, annoying. Instead, I say give everyone a sheet of paper and a sharp No.2 pencil. Then have at it.

If you doodle, your next meeting might end up being, well, memorable.

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Until next time.

JRC