I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious.
—ALBERT EINSTEIN
• Curiosity activates the reward centers deep within the brain.
• Curiosity is a whole brain exercise that integrates the knowledge circuits of the left brain with the pattern-seeking circuits of the right brain.
• Curiosity reboots the brain, keeping it fresh and vital by balancing knowing with a hunger to know more.
• People who find ways to express curiosity in their daily lives tend to have longer, healthier, and more fulfilling lives.
Here is a challenge for you. Read through the following word list and determine what mental characteristic they all suggest in common: Restless. Distractible. Intelligent. Easily awed. Easily bored. Bold. Hungry. Daring. Mischief-making. Adventurous. Reckless. Content. Impulsive. Knowledge-seeking. Easily addicted. Socially gifted.
All these words describe personal characteristics that are strongly linked to the mind state we call curiosity. If you noticed a slight quickening of your pulse, if you felt compelled to solve this word puzzle, you probably rank high on the scale of this mental quality yourself.
Curiosity often involves a mild sense of uneasiness. When doing the word challenge above, for example, parts of your brain may experience it as unpleasant. But it is also a powerful motivator that can get us to pursue something, and we may experience great pleasure when we obtain it. Curiosity can also be quite fickle, leading us to explore something that grabs our attention in one moment, but then impulsively moving on to something else that glistens brighter in the next moment. Without the benefit of sustained attention, curiosity can be a source of distraction or mischief (think of the adventures of Curious George) or even danger. After all, didn’t curiosity kill the proverbial cat?
Curiosity is related to an experience of dissatisfaction and discontent. Brain imaging studies confirm that mental states of curiosity may even share circuits with the mental state of depression!1,2 But the same feeling of discontentment that can be paralyzing to a person with depression may instead drive a curious person to explore new horizons. The brain’s right hemisphere—so good at identifying new patterns of sensing, feeling, thinking, and behaving—links up with the brain’s reward centers to convert an unpleasant experience into something deeply pleasurable.
That’s what may have driven some of history’s most famous curiosity seekers to such dramatic discoveries. Christopher Columbus, for example, was believed to have suffered from depression. But because there was such a strong activation of his brain’s reward centers, his curiosity led him across the vast ocean to the discovery of a new world. Studies of present-day adventurers and risk takers show a similar mix of dissatisfaction with the status quo coupled with a motivated urge to find something better. Dissatisfaction, risk, and reward—these brain-based traits may drive the engines of curiosity, sometimes for the betterment of all.
You can probably guess at the evolutionary purpose of curiosity. As with most evolutionary trends, it had a lot to do with survival. The simplest of organisms had little need for curiosity. When one’s whole world is the ocean current that runs past your tentacles, like the enchanting sea anemone attached to coral reefs, there is little need for curiosity. The anemone only needs to sense whether there is food floating by in the current or whether the current is carrying something toward it that is dangerous. But as organisms got more complex, the development of curiosity became important. When they had to go forth and physically explore the world, to hunt or gather their food, animals needed a more sophisticated means of sensing and signaling what was happening in the world around them. Curiosity then became essential to survival.
It is worth remembering that curiosity sometimes does kill the cat. Too much curiosity can have devastating results, as many vivid examples from the animal kingdom illustrate. A baby hippopotamus wanders too far from its mother in a river also inhabited by crocodiles. The calf’s curiosity borders on recklessness, and a river croc takes full advantage of it. He grabs the calf and holds her underwater long enough to drown her. The rest, as they say, is history.
Remember the tug-of-war between approach and avoidance that we discussed in chapter 2? This tension comes strongly into play in determining which people are driven by curiosity. At one end of the spectrum are those who avoid risk at all costs. At the other end are those fearless few who thrive on the excitement that comes from thrill seeking.
Studies of thrill seekers have shown that their brains are indeed different from other people’s. In response to arousing images, their brains show much higher levels of activation by dopamine, often referred to as the pleasure chemical. Dopamine pours into their insula, a brain region where emotional signals from the body are processed and interpreted. At the same time their anterior cingulate cortex, an area involved with emotional self-regulation, is inhibited.3 The accelerator is working, but the brakes are not!
This is the opposite of what happens for most of us, who steer clear of such experiences in favor of what is more safe, familiar, and predictable. The study concludes that people who crave high-risk, thrill-providing experiences have much stronger brain-based approach systems, while at the same time lacking the fear signals that would cause most of us to stop, turn, and run in the other direction.4 They focus on what is exciting, intriguing, or attractive without being tipped off that with all the excitement comes inherent danger as well.
Returning to evolution for a moment, it makes sense that there is such a wide range in the degree of curiosity or thrill seeking among human beings. It would have been a big advantage for a tribal group to have some members who were willing to explore beyond their known world. That trait allowed ancient humans to gradually spread over the earth and survive in so many different habitats. But while you might want to have a few such individuals in your tribe, you would not want too many! Too much curiosity, too little braking power in the face of danger, and too little wisdom about risk versus reward would probably not be good for any group. As usual, nature has found a balance between extremes.
Evolution has devoted millions of years to finding the balance between survival-enhancing exploration and survival-threatening risk taking. The result is that modern humans exhibit a bell-shaped curve in their degree of curiosity. Some of us show just a bit, some an abundance, and most of us fall somewhere in the middle. There is no right or wrong, no good or bad in your own degree of curiosity. But there are some advantages to cultivating more curiosity as we age, and we hope to show how you can nudge your curiosity level just a bit higher to obtain the mental, physical, and social rewards that it offers.5 By the way, you can do that without becoming a thrill seeker!
“I’ve never felt like this, but it’s like I’m claustrophobic about my whole life.” Up until that moment, at age fifty-two, Susan’s life had followed a predictable routine established when her children were young. Now that they had moved on to college, and with her husband still highly engaged at work, she struggled. Rather than feeling free to explore opportunities she had postponed for twenty-five years, she felt stuck. Like many people who have not actively cultivated the curious side of their nature, Susan was gripped with fear of letting go of the familiar when curiosity came calling.
Curiosity is the state of mind in which we are driven to go beyond what we already know and to seek what is novel, new, and unexplored. Without regular activation of the brain’s curiosity circuits, we can subtly settle into what is overly familiar, routine, and predictable—as Susan did. These are not bad things, but excessively predictable lives can lead to stagnation, a kind a mental stalemate that can leave you falling behind in the evolving adventure of your own life. Indeed, this may be one of the reasons so many people struggle early in their retirement. While it can be nice to leave the stress of work behind, the lack of challenge, stimulation, or novelty is sometimes a high price to pay.
Curiosity has many dimensions. One of the most important is external or internal. Is your curiosity evoked by something external, like the challenges you might find in your workplace, or is it an internal trait that does not depend on what is happening around you? Our focus is on helping you to cultivate an internally generated sense of curiosity, which is the kind of curiosity more strongly associated with positive health benefits throughout life.
Many people seek predictability because it brings them a sense of control over the uncertain world in which we live. Of course, there is nothing wrong with wanting a sense of control over your life. But research suggests that the growth of new brain cells is stimulated best by being exposed to what is new, unpredictable, and uncertain. Exposure to what we don’t know or haven’t faced before compels us to come up with new strategies and new solutions—and promotes a more adaptable and flexible brain.
There are many advantages that can come from intentionally stretching ourselves in this way. People with higher degrees of curiosity tend to have
• a longer life expectancy.
• reduced rates of dementia.
• more fulfilling and purpose-driven lives.
• more satisfying relationships.
• greater ability to form new friendships throughout life.
• a sense of themselves as being happier and more content.
Our goal is to show how you too can cultivate this mental flexibility in your life with a few simple activities. While we accrue knowledge and experience simply by virtue of growing older, curiosity does not increase automatically with the passage of time. The wise cultivation of curiosity requires practice, focused attention, and a willingness to seek out uncertainty and pursue the mystery of what it means to be fully alive.
As we age, the brain retains a great capacity for curiosity, but that capacity has to be exercised. Curiosity gives you a whole-brain workout. When you expose yourself to what is new and unexpected, you have to weave together what you already know (centered in the left brain) with the integration of this new experience (centered in the right brain). If your mind is curiosity-driven, then your brain is continuously expanding, modifying, and reconstituting its network of neural connections. In short, the commitment to becoming a lifelong learner is an important factor in keeping the brain young and flexible.
Cultivating the Curiosity Garden
Researchers have found that people’s curiosity varies in terms of the following characteristics.6 Look over this list and rate yourself on a 5-point scale where 1 means you rarely if ever experience that aspect of curiosity and 5 means it is like the air you breathe, that you are perpetually curious:
• How intensely do you experience curiosity?
• How frequently do you experience curiosity?
• How long does the experience last?
• How broadly or widely do you experience curiosity across different settings?
• How deep does your curiosity go? Is it sustained even as you learn more about what made you curious?
Add up your scores. Do you fall in the highly curious range (18–25); a modest range (10–17); or in the minimally curious, easily satisfied range (less than 9)? This is not a scientific measure, but it can give you a sense as to whether curiosity is a core internal aspect of your identity, and it can help you to decide whether you’d like to plant more curiosity seeds in your garden and more actively cultivate them as you grow older.
A gentle reminder: the learning that is driven by curiosity is not necessarily the type found in books or taught in classrooms! A curious mind pursues sensual learning—in other words, learning that involves regular stimulation of one or more of our five senses (smell, taste, touch, sight, and sound). A walk through a flower garden or along an ocean shore; indulging in a new cuisine composed of aromatic spices and foreign tastes; attending a musical concert or theater production; listening to a comedian’s edgy act; taking an art class or learning to throw clay; or simply driving to a friend’s house by following a different route with unfamiliar visual landmarks: all these are examples of sensual learning that flow from curiosity. And while they give you a whole-brain workout, they are in a sense effortless.
What happens in the brain when we cultivate curiosity? There are several interesting studies that link curiosity to physical hunger, to the pleasure we get from good humor, and even to an appreciation of beauty. The connections among these three seemingly disconnected phenomena are not as far-fetched as they might first appear. Within our brains there is a powerful reward center, one that lights up with activity whenever we enter a new situation that is similar to one that rewarded us with pleasure in the past.
We all know physical hunger. When our blood sugar levels drop, sensors in our blood vessels signal the brain that it is time to eat. We call this signal hunger, and it activates areas deep within the brain as well as higher brain centers within the cortex. Together those centers create an emotional motivation that becomes impossible to ignore. The feelings get louder and more urgent until they eventually force us to seek food to satisfy our hunger. When we do, we are filled with great pleasure.
Physical hunger is just one of many hungers that we are driven to satisfy. The brain is hungry too, but what it craves is something new and interesting to feed its curiosity. Our pleasure center is activated when we eat a great meal. And it’s also activated when we experience novelty, challenge, and the thrill of triumph in the face of uncertainty.7 A lifestyle diet rich in such curiosity-driven experiences satisfies the brain’s cravings.
It makes sense that we are driven to repeat that which has rewarded us in the past. But it is surprising to learn that these same reward centers become active when we think that we are going to be rewarded by something but that guess proves to be wrong! Being surprised by an unexpected result grabs the brain’s attention even more quickly than being correct and getting the results we expected.
When the mind is caught off guard by something it didn’t expect, the fact quickly catches our attention. We don’t like to be disappointed, after all! The brain’s attention and memory centers become active in order to figure out how to actually reach the promised reward. In effect, the brain shows a hunger to learn, especially when its power to predict a result gets teased, such as when your guess gets you “close but no cigar.” When the correct solution to the mystery is finally revealed, such as through delivery of the unexpected punch line of a good joke, the experience is usually pleasurable.
The link between pleasure and new learning is important to help us understand the central role curiosity can play throughout life, and how it can even help us to survive to later life. Tucked away inside our discussion is the point that curiosity is future-oriented. Curiosity is always looking forward to our having an experience that hasn’t happened yet. We may be curious as to whether something that happened in the past will happen again, or we may be drawn to something simply because it is entirely new and we want to discover what is going to happen. The essential value of curiosity is that since we can’t fully understand or predict just how things will turn out, we need something to help us deal with all that uncertainty.
High levels of curiosity also enhance our ability to notice and appreciate beauty. But why should we care about that when it comes to maintaining a youthful mind? It turns out there is a biological advantage that comes from an experience of beauty, and the ability to recognize and cultivate beauty in our lives can actually help us as we age.
If you want to have a vital, healthy brain, nothing but good comes from encounters with that which we perceive as beautiful. Beauty activates our attention centers in a powerful way, and it encourages us to remain focused on the object of beauty for a long period of time. We might literally find it hard to turn away, as though the beautiful thing has temporarily captured us. As we stare (or listen, or focus on an aroma), our brain is heavily engaged in processing all the information coming our way. What we find beautiful is often a mix of what is vaguely familiar and what is new, but it is often perceived as though it were being seen “for the very first time.” When we perceive beauty, dopamine’s release in the brain’s reward center keeps us focused, captivated, and engaged.
In fact, perceiving beauty activates the same circuits that are active when we are highly curious. In effect, perceiving beauty may be a biochemical correlate of curiosity. From that perspective, the practice of play and the experience of beauty exercise critically important brain circuits involving the capacity to sustain attention, to engage in problem solving, and to come alive in a world full of wonder.
Leonard Shlain was a surgeon whose curiosity led him to explore the relationship between the world of art and the world of physics.8 Could there be two stranger bedfellows? But in fact, Shlain’s research backed up the idea that the beauty we perceive in both art and science stimulates curiosity that keeps our brain vibrant. Shlain says, “Revolutionary art and visionary physics are both investigations into the nature of reality.”9 In the hands of a curious artist, art seems to go beyond old forms and peeks into the future for what can be but isn’t just yet. Perhaps that is why cutting-edge art forms often create tension in the viewer. In other words, beauty is a form of curiosity that drives us to ask questions, to explore the unfamiliar, and to examine what isn’t known or understood. In that way, beauty, like hunger, is future-oriented and serves as an important motivator to create our future by engaging it more deeply.
There is another, often neglected dimension to the relationship of beauty and curiosity that seems particularly relevant to aging well. We are all too aware that time is passing and that the end of our own time is coming. We have all heard the saying that it is important to “stop and smell the roses.” But as we age, it seems to us that time accelerates, and we ask with sincerity, “Where did all the time go?” As the composer Hector Berlioz wrote, “Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately it kills all its pupils.”
The perception that time accelerates is a consequence of our growing life experience. More and more of what we encounter each day seems like variations on what we have encountered before, meaning that it takes less mental energy to make sense of it. But as we begin to perceive our lives through the lens of habit, our actual life experience falls out of conscious attention. The particular experience we are having collapses into and merges with prior similar experiences. It no longer stands out on its own as a separate and unique experience linked to a particular place and moment in time.
Curiosity can help us counter the tendency for time to collapse into undifferentiated sameness. Curiosity keeps us fresh in part because it keeps twisting the old into something new and vital. Children can play the same game with each other day after day because to them, it is never the same game twice. The rules and experiences keep changing. Beauty too is a game changer. It exposes us to what we may have seen before but never in quite the same way. Beauty gives us feelings of vibrancy, vitality, and renewal. Who among us wouldn’t want to experience those feelings on a regular basis, especially as we age?
“ ‘Curiouser and curiouser,’ cried Alice . . . ‘Oh, my poor little feet, I wonder who will put on your shoes and stockings for you now, dears?’ ”10 While in Wonderland, where nothing was as it was expected to be, Alice found her body growing upward and becoming taller, leaving her feet far below her hands. Her comment, reflected in the very title of the book (Alice in Wonderland), highlights the link between curiosity and those aspects of our lives that have yet to completely reveal themselves. Alice knew she was facing a predicament that was strange, to say the least, but her thoughts already turned toward figuring out what she might do given the uncertain situation she found herself in.
This orientation toward the future is at the very core of what our brains are designed to do. Intelligence has been found to be less about what we know, our mastery of facts and figures, than about how effectively we are able to predict what will happen based on the information available to us. When we know just enough about something new to engage our attention and focus, curiosity provides the motivational drive to explore our environment (or ourselves!) so we can learn if we were right or wrong. When something is vaguely familiar or partially recognizable, studies show, brain areas involved in focusing attention and encoding new learning become more active at the same time that subjects in these studies report a feeling of curiosity.11,12 Perhaps that is why there is such a strong correlation between intelligence and curiosity: an intelligent mind is often a curious mind, and a curious mind gathers new experiences that add to our storehouse of accumulated knowledge and wisdom.
When our clients come to us, it is often because certain problems in their lives have become so routine, so automatic, and so apt to occur without thinking, that the odds of coming up with a new solution to an old problem are quite low. Part of our therapeutic approach is to engage and activate our clients’ curiosity to discover new solutions. It is often a hugely rewarding experience for people to discover a new resource within themselves or a new way of addressing a problem that has long resisted change.
We have already discussed the association between curiosity and reward. Obtaining a reward is often pleasurable. Our brain gets flooded with dopamine when we anticipate the reward we are about to obtain. It pushes us to work harder, to explore longer, to stay focused on the goal, and to strain to provide that last bit of effort to secure the reward. As soon as the reward is actually obtained, serotonin (dopamine’s companion chemical in the brain’s pleasure center) floods the brain. The feeling we experience is of being full and satisfied.
Serotonin is the safety and satiety molecule. It leaves us content and calm. As we said earlier, the feeling of satiety isn’t restricted to satisfying food-related hunger. Curiosity drives us to satisfy many forms of mental and emotional hunger, and our primary reward—regardless of how long it lasts—is the chemically induced brain state of contented relaxation and comfort. Temporarily, we can curl up and enjoy a few moments under the calming influence of serotonin.
Unfortunately, this future orientation of the brain can get us into all sorts of trouble, as any compulsive gambler will attest. Compulsive gambling is an example of curiosity run amok. A compulsive gambler intellectually knows the odds of winning are small. But the gambler’s rational mind is overcome by the combination of overstimulation of the brain’s approach circuits and the understimulation of the inhibitory circuits. This push can lead to distortions in thoughts and emotions so that the gambler fails to recognize the danger of gambling beyond what he (or she) can afford. The line between entertainment and addiction gets crossed. Gamblers anticipate the possibility—or in their mind the inevitability—of winning, while any hope of applying their behavioral brakes fades until it is too late. Their financial losses may mount, but any wins along the way reinforce the conviction that the big score is in the next hand or the next spin of the roulette wheel. When the financial crash finally comes, as it almost invariably does, feelings of shock, remorse, shame, and despair explode. But for the compulsive gambler, those negative feelings soon fade and are replaced by excitement at the possibility of winning even more next time.
People who have a normal degree of curiosity can anticipate those negative consequences, enjoy some time at the casino, and stop before significant problems arise. For such people, gambling is an entertaining, enjoyable pastime, not an addictive and self-destructive habit. Their pleasure center still drives them toward something (that’s the approach system working), but it also activates their avoidance system, and they can exercise better judgment by comparing current circumstances with memories of past experiences.
Curiosity, like every other capacity in the brain, has an upside and a downside. We need to practice moderation, exercising our judgment and wisdom while expanding our curiosity. Without curiosity, the brain as we age settles into sameness and allows the avoidance system to become dominant. The result is a life out of touch with novelty, growth, and the brain-enhancing benefits that come with being regularly challenged to adjust and adapt to an ever-changing world.
We have seen how curiosity can be dangerous when it is not balanced with caution. Curiosity also needs to be balanced with a tolerance for boredom. As we age, it might seem as though we naturally move from youthful curiosity to boring routine. Studies distinguish between a state of temporary boredom and a chronic trait of boredom that is closely linked to depression.13 No one wants to feel dulled or bored all the time, but transient feelings of boredom are an important counterpoint to unbridled curiosity. Developing a tolerance for sameness, the ability to take a mental, physical, and emotional pause, can protect us from perpetually chasing after what is new and appealing.
As the mind extracts the information from a new experience, there will come a point at which we will have gotten all the most useful morsels out of it. At that point, a feeling of emotional fullness sets in. That is the moment when transient boredom arises. We typically have one of two responses to that feeling of boredom. We can mentally push ourselves away from the table, refusing another bite no matter how tempting, because we want to digest what we have just taken in. That process of digesting what we have just consumed is critically important for encoding and consolidating experience. That processing makes the experience available in a useful way when we need to draw upon it in the future.
The alternative response is to shift our focus. Transient boredom tells us that there seems to be little more of value in the situation and it is time to move on to greener pastures. Either way, transient boredom cues our curiosity to turn inward as we absorb what just transpired, or to turn outward, with motivated desire, to explore new environments in the search for novel experience. A little boredom can be a good thing! Let’s learn to tolerate and even embrace it.
How do you learn the dance of curiosity? What are the basic steps? Based upon what we have looked at in this chapter, you may have guessed the basics. You may be right, or maybe you’re not. You’ll have to read on to discover how well your mind’s prediction circuits are currently working.
Remember that we want curiosity to become something your mind brings to your world each day, not simply a short-lived reaction to something new. The goal is for curiosity to become your habitual outlook on life, a natural feature of your worldview. To achieve that takes practice. You can start by deliberately planning activities that promise uncertainty and surprise. Think of curiosity as what leads you away from comfort through some temporary discomfort to an increased capacity for pleasure. What follows are suggestions for using curiosity to move outside your current comfort zones.
How many of you have said about an upcoming vacation that you are looking forward to “doing nothing except relaxing”? That may have been your innate wisdom telling you that you desperately need to get off the treadmill or risk burnout.
We are at risk of burnout when the pace and number of our daily activities have been too much for too long. Signs of burnout include physical exhaustion, loss of motivation, a loss of purpose or meaning, a growing cynicism or negative outlook toward others, and an inability to feel satisfaction or pleasure in what you do. When in a state of burnout, it is hard to generate curiosity because that involves seeking out even more stimulation. A vacation is designed to clear out the mental/sensory logjam, allowing you to once again take in new experiences. Of course, a weeklong vacation once every year or two is simply not enough time for people to fully restore their capacity for healthy curiosity.
The second half of life invites us to ask questions designed to prevent burnout. What is my true purpose? What to me has the most meaning? What do I need to live a life that is fulfilling and joyous? To answer those questions requires a pace of life that allows for taking in the new and learning from the old. Look at the pace of your life. Does it allow time for this rhythm?
Finding the Rhythms of Life
Consider participating in the kinds of activities each week that provide you with the rhythm of doing and nondoing:
• Take a nightly walk after dinner.
• Start a journal to record thoughts about the day.
• Record your dreams; gradually, themes from your deeper mind will come to light.
• Develop a meditation practice.
• Attend a yoga class.
• Take dancing lessons.
These are slower, patient, mostly gentle activities that involve lots of repeated practice. This repeated pattern generates the mental room for creativity to grow. By the way, sitting in front of the television for hours each night is not on the list. It has been shown to overstimulate the brain, contribute to sleep problems, and ultimately make living a healthier-paced life more difficult!
Seek Novelty
Commit to regularly pursuing activities that take you out of your comfort zone of familiarity. Search for surprise. Do something unexpected and spontaneous. You will find that your comfort zone is likely to keep expanding. Do things with which you have little prior experience. The goal isn’t to find something you’ll necessarily fall in love with. Rather, it is for you to stimulate your senses by experiencing something that you hadn’t even considered experiencing before.
Grow Your Novelty Skills
Think about expanding your comfort zone of competence. By engaging in activities that are just a bit beyond your current skill level, you will see your competence grow. The brain never loses its appetite for growth, and providing mental and physical challenges is an important way to satisfy the brain’s hunger for continued growth. Passion and curiosity are effective counterweights to anxiety, worry, and fear. Curiosity expands the boundaries of your life, while anxiety and fear lead to mental, physical, and emotional constriction and confinement.
Here is a simple practice, a curiosity-building exercise that you can develop fairly easily. Get your hands on a copy of your community’s paper that publishes upcoming events—free shows, art fairs, movie or theater premieres, restaurant openings, or other events new on the scene. Make the commitment to pursue two new events per month for the next three months. Following your participation in each event, ask yourself the following questions and keep a journal of your responses. The result will be a curiously expanded mind and an enriched life.
• In what ways was the activity similar to what I’ve done in the past?
• In what ways did the activity expose me to something new?
• What is something new I learned that I didn’t expect?
• What did I discover about myself that I didn’t recognize before?
• How can I apply this learning to other parts of my life?
Strike a balance between those activities that you do on your own and other enjoyable activities that you can do with your friends. Doing things independently improves your relationship with yourself. You are an amazingly complex being and there is much about you to discover—an example of curiosity turned inward. As you become better acquainted with and more accepting of who you are, you can bring a more contented self to your interactions with others. In turn, this can make for deeper and more meaningful connections with them. If you are of a certain age and means, consider joining an Elderhostel program either alone or with a spouse/partner.
More about the importance of play will be found in chapter 11. For now, let’s simply say that it is hard to find a more potent curiosity builder than free, unadulterated play. One of the characteristics of true play is that it is open-ended and not rule-bound. In fact, to watch children at play is to observe how the “rules” of their games keep changing any time they begin to become bored and lose interest. They instantly improvise new rules. Continuously modifying an experience so that the mind remains engaged is certainly good for the developing brains of children. And research has shown that the same holds true for the evolving brain of an aging adult.14
How do you have fun? When is the last time you did something for the sheer pleasure of it? Who or what makes you laugh the most? Answer those questions for yourself and then commit to obtaining a regular dose of play in your life.
There is an irony to closing out this chapter. A conclusion involves something coming to an end, whereas curiosity, as we’ve said, is very much about looking forward to new beginnings. So to review (which literally means to re-view or to look at once again), we will look back so you can look ahead to what comes next.
We have described curiosity as an outgrowth of our internal unrest. For some, that unrest generates the motivation to pursue new opportunities and new challenges. It is a potent and creative force. It can be a healthy blessing that helps to keep the brain vitally alive as it is continuously bathed in new experiences.
For others, curiosity represents a kind of perpetual discontent that has something in common with depression. It can be a feature of an unsettled mind and a disorganized life. We wish to strike a balance between healthy seeking and constant distraction, recklessness, or disillusionment.
Clearly, our bias is to learn how to harness the creative potential of a curious mind. Doing so involves embracing internal unrest and channeling it in new directions as you begin to forge a curious new path in your evolving life. As poet Robert Frost wrote,
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.15