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August 2019 | REDONLINE.CO.UKcareers
L
ast summer, I was on a flight home from Turkey
on my own. I concluded an unfinished podcast,
ordered a watery coffee, ate a Borrower-sized
packet of free crisps, then wondered what to
do for the next three-and-a-half hours.
Soon, ideas for the novel that had been percolating
for months flooded my brain; I wrote lists of plot points,
questions that needed answering before I could start
writing, people to speak to for advice. It was the most
productive I’d been – in or out of the office – in a long time.
Following the tributaries of a creative idea isn’t as easy as
it once was: as we rush from one task or place to the next,
distracting ourselves with our phones in-between, we leave no
headspace for the work of imagination. Tedium is rare, and the
solo flight is one such occasion where my brain truly disengages
from the minutiae of modern life and begins exploring ideas and
plans that have been simmering, yet to boil, in my subconscious.
This idea isn’t entirely without precedent. While reading
Manoush Zomorodi’s book Bored And Brilliant: How Time
Spent Doing Nothing Changes Everything last year, I
experienced one of life’s true light-bulb moments. The theory- that our brains are at their most creative and agile when we’re
bored – spoke to me: I have my best ideas when I’m in the
shower, half-asleep, or cooking. That is to say, when I’m doing
tasks so routine that my brain doesn’t need to focus and I can’t
Make every moment of your holiday matter because, as Cyan Turan
discovered, your best ideas come when you least expect themdistract myself with my phone. With the best will in the
world, my thoughts don’t meander to their destination (name:
Eureka!) in the office or while ensconced in the velvet cushions
of a co-working club. Solo flights, however, do the trick.
Aeroplanes aren’t inspirational spaces, but that’s entirely
the point – you need a dull, blank canvas on which to paint
your next masterpiece. Of course, the conditions have to
be right: the ideal flight is with a budget airline (no frills
or hours of movies) to a middle-distance destination, such
as the Canary Islands, Turkey, or Estonia (enough time
to let your mind wander into a labyrinth and start working
its way out). Ideally, you’ll be on your own – anyone who
has ever travelled with a toddler will tell you that – and
able to ignore the onset of on-board wi-fi, which threatens
to fill precious empty time with clicks and scrolls.
My theory does not apply to airports. Airports, with their
beer-sodden stags and Day-Glo lighting, are hellish. Unlike
the late, great writer AA Gill, who found joy in the ‘departures
and arrivals, the most ancient saga of travelling and returning’,
I prefer to arrive for my flights as late as possible and sprint
to the front of the passport queue upon returning, such is
my desperation to get on with whichever leg of the journey
is next. The plane is the place, though, to do some deep,
difficult thinking. So, this summer, when you take flight,
allow your dreams to do the same.D
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