Any time you encounter "meaning threat"—that unsettling feeling you get when something makes no sense—your
brain starts to work harder, says Travis Proulx, a researcher at the University of California at Santa Barbara. Test-takers were almost
twice as accurate in analyzing data and learning patterns after Proulx and his colleague made them read bizarre, nonsensical stories by Kafka and David Lynch.
Try this: Expose yourself to unusual experiences that may surprise or confuse you. There's no surefire prescription for "meaning threat," but experiment with immersive avant-garde theater (like
Sleep No More) or
David Lynch-style surrealist shorts (humanoid rabbits muttering non sequiturs—chew on
that)...or hightail it to a country where you don't know the language or customs. (Other research has found that
people are 20 percent more likely to solve difficult problems after thinking back to culture-shock experiences they had when living abroad.)
