Yesterday, at our weekly Dad and Daughter get together, Daughter mentioned to Dad, “The problem with kids today is they don’t appreciate boredom. They don’t know how creative that time can be. I used to stand in the line at the grocery store waiting for you to check out reading the headlines on the magazines thinking I can write a better line than that.”

Wise words from a 30-something, and yes, she did end up writing better lines than those come-on headlines, now running her own copywriting business. And it all started because when she was parked in the seat of a shopping cart during the weekly grocery runs instead of staying home with her child’s-app-loaded iPad in heavy duty protective case. It was after she dropped her adult appreciated iPad that she spouted this wisdom, noting the colorful protective covers sold to minimize damage to the children’s themed tablets would certainly have inflicted more damage than a mere week’s long bruise that her lightly protected covered unit inflicted upon her toe. And thus, we were off on to an hour’s long discussion of the things your mind can do when it seemingly is doing nothing, and of which we are robbed because parents would rather perpetually occupy their children’s time with electronic babysitters rather than risk answering a question like, “What’s that word?” several times while waiting to unload their haul onto the conveyor belt for the cashier to total the bounty.

We decided that although creatives intentionally turn their brains on when they write, or paint, or film, the ideas that lead to those compositions are often born from idleness. Filling up every moment of a mind’s time is actually a great way to suppress moments of mental creativity and might have led to the loss of some of the world’s greatest creative works.

When are you at your creative best? Something to think about the next time your child or grandchild or strange child looks to you and asks, “What’s that?” and how you choose to answer.

Valentine’s Day was celebrated by lovers around the world last week. We celebrate love for everyone everyday. Read about why we say All We Need is Love in the latest Uplift!