Flirting with Breaks

Jonah Lehrer wrote in Music Patterns, and Sine Waves:

“music is defined by its flirtation with—but not submission to—our expectations of order.”

Structure is a love/hate thing. It’s an ordering tool we resist. The further we are into a project, the firmer the shape of it becomes and the less we can change without breaking it and turning into a different object.

It is easy to have a similar reaction to the patterns of our work habits. We like the malleability of a loose structure but as we move further along, things begin to harden, and we start wanting to break the system.

On his blog, Jack Cheng wrote, “One of the biggest advantages of having routines is what comes out of breaking them…But having no routine is really the worst routine of all.”

Not submitting to expectations of order can excite our brain in unexpected ways but taking a break in routine for too long, and you might find yourself no long writing.