I’ve always been a doodler. In high school, I color-coded my notes and drew little symbols and added fun arrows and circles and patterns all over the pages. I loved taking notes. It was so fun to organize the information on the page. I had an AP English teacher who made us write our book reports on giant notecards in a very specific format, and I absolutely LOVED decorating them with fun hand drawn details. Most of my friends (and even my teachers) thought I was just extra and didn’t see much value in my artistic embellishments, but according to science, I wasn’t just wasting time doodling—I was improving my learning by up to four hundred percent.
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The human brain loves visuals. Think about it. Humans have relied on pattern processing to survive for thousands of years. We learn how to recognize threats by encoding countless images from the world around us. Because of this, our prefrontal cortexes and regions involving the processing of images are highly evolved. Our brains can recognize a pattern in a split second and assess what it means.
It should be no surprise then, that our brains can process visuals 60,000 times faster than text. Our brains think better in pictures. Please note: I didn’t say that we require PRETTY pictures. We just like pictures. Any pictures. This is a nearly irrefutable argument for incorporating visuals into every aspect of our lives, and yet so much of what we do is rooted in text alone, or in spoken words. But people don’t recall what they hear nearly as well as they recall a single visual image. And that is why we all need to doodle more. Even if it’s ugly.
I drew this cat during a lateral thinking exercise at NerdcampNJ many years ago. I was working with Olugbemisola Ruhday-Perkovich and Audrey Vernick in a session on Imagination Exercises, and during this exercise we were making up a story about a cat. While someone else wrote the words on the white board, I added some doodles, including this very neckless cat. This is NOT a masterful expression of a cat’s form, but it is instantly recognizable. It communicates. It’s perfect.
Ugly drawings were an everyday part of my work as a product designer. When you’re trying to figure out how to design the world’s first truly portable, rechargable, full-power breast pump, it takes a lot of drawings to figure things out. You can’t be precious with them. You just have to knock the sketches out in whatever way communicates your ideas. I think that’s one of the most valuable things that my design career taught me. Drawing is a skill, and anyone can learn it. It’s also not necessary to draw well. All that’s necessary is to DRAW.
Whenever I go to writing conferences, I spend the whole time drawing. Sketchnotes make learning easier and more enjoyable. Again, it does not matter how pretty your sketch notes are! What matters is allowing yourself to capture information with visual markers that will encode the information into your brain more easily.
The next time you’re taking notes or brainstorming or writing down a recipe or a to-do list, try adding emojis for how you feel along with the text. Try adding simple symbols like hearts, stars, or exclamation points. Allow yourself to go nuts and draw whatever pops into your head. We are visual creatures. Allow your experience of life to be as visual as it can be. And if anyone dismisses your doodles as a cute waste of time, you can smile smugly to yourself, knowing that your brain will reap the benefits.
Creativity is not a talent. It is a skill, and a skill can be learned. Everyone—and I mean EVERYONE—can doodle. The key is allowing yourself to do it regularly, and without self judgement. Just the act of doodling is a victory. Over time, your skills can and will improve, and you can even learn how to draw very intentionally from a few hours spent on Youtube with tutorials. Do you resist expressing yourself visually? Are there opportunities for you to embrace visual expression more often in your life? How might that energy fuel your creative work? I’d love to hear in the comments! :)
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Love this and I love doodling!