Running in the background of your awareness is what neuroscientists call the “default mode network,” a collection of linked brain areas that function as a kind of low-grade dreaming when your attention is not focused on a task.5 When your mind is “wandering,” your default mode network is online. It assesses your present state and it plans for the future, a little like a chess-playing computer, rapidly scanning the board and running simulations to see what would happen if you made a particular move. And it’s doing it without active intervention from you.
