Book Review — MINDWANDERING: How Your Constant Mental Drift Can Improve and Boost Your Creativity by Moshe Bar

Our brains are noisy; certain regions are always grinding away at involuntary activities like daydreaming, worrying about the future, and self-chatter, taking up to forty-seven percent of our waking time. This is mindwandering—and while it can tug your attention away from the present and contribute to anxiety and depression, cognitive neuroscientist Moshe Bar is here to tell you about the method behind this apparent madness.

Mindwandering is the first popular book to explore this multi-faceted phenomenon of your wandering mind and introduces you to the new, exciting research behind it. Bar combines his decades of research to explain the benefits and the possible cost of mindwandering within the broader context of psychology, neuroscience, psychiatry and philosophy, providing you with practical knowledge that can help you:

Develop your sense of self, better relate to others, and make associations that help you understand the world around youIncrease your ability to focus by understanding when to wander—and when not toMagnify and enrich your experiences by learning about full immersionStimulate your creativity by combing through the past and making predictions about the futureBoost your mood by unleashing your mind.

Published: February 8, 2022

Amazon | Goodreads

My Thoughts

Mindwandering is an interesting look at the neuroscience and psychology behind our brain’s insistence on constantly wandering away, seemingly of its own accord.

Stylistically, the writing is more pop culture than in-depth exploration, with a good mix of personal anecdotes and neuroscience research. It’s an easy read, perfect for people who want the basics.

I was disappointed in Bar’s brief paragraph on the issue of the mind and pain perception. Bar acknowledges that being fully immersed in a single activity could, theoretically, help us cope with pain. He says that, while this “could be true,” he’s not aware of scientific findings and personally believes that pain always takes priority. I’m surprised that a neuroscientist would be so uninformed on this topic in regards to chronic pain conditions. Anyone like myself who lives with autoimmune disease and/or chronic illness (for me: late-stage Lyme disease, fibromyalgia, neuropathy, and the list goes on) knows that losing ourselves in an activity is often the only time we forget the pain.

Aside from this, I found Mindwandering an entertaining reminder to live in the moment, and not worry so much about where my mind takes me.

*I received an ARC from Hachette Go.*

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