Productivity grows with rest, imagination

Here’s yet another reason to enjoy the long Easter weekend: research reveals rest is good for us. It even boosts our productivity. Like imagination, it gifts us a break from the ‘real’ world and when we return to our everyday, we might be rejuvenated, better able to find novel solutions to those challenging problems. Or perhaps, come up with a brand new idea, one that can help us all.

So use your rest well; when you lay down your tools of work, don’t imagine for a moment that your brain goes to sleep. It’s always on and when you focus on positive imaginings, it can take you to the most amazing places where everything seems possible.

Writer Ferris Jabr, in a Scientific American article, wrote our brains are still active when we relax or daydream, that downtime replenishes the brain’s stores of attention and motivation while encouraging productivity and creativity.

Meanwhile, a Forbes article, ‘How to unplug in a busy world’, suggests breaks are needed to “promote mental health, boost creativity, increase productivity, promote well-being, reduce stress, improve mood, and strengthen relationships.”

Imagination, too, is a way to build wellbeing resilience and reduce stress while providing the source of all ideas, all innovation.

My wish for you this long weekend, that you enjoy a blissful few days filled with rest and imaginings.

• Dawn Adams founded Imagination Session® to encourage us all to imagine. She runs experiential sessions that demonstrate how imagination can lead us to hope, optimism and joy while helping us to build life and professional skills. Also suitable as a team building exercise