The Sweetness of Doing Nothing
At the beach last weekend, I saw a greyhound chilling nearby. His owner called out across the beach, “Lionel! It’s time to go, honey!” Lionel did not move or acknowledge them. He closed his eyes and let the morning sun indulge in his presence, as though the sun worships him. I could only imagine the heat underneath his fur.
Lionel reminded me of the Italian phrase il dolce far niente, meaning the sweetness of doing nothing. The phrase itself is paradoxical since doing nothing also implies effort. Perhaps there are several ways to interpret dolce far niente, like how literal should we take it. From a psychological perspective, the paradox is symbolic of just letting life be. In a more concrete sense, dolce far niente represents actions without a particular schedule, goal, or outcome. It invites us to accept the two different sides of things. That life could be driven by goals, and it could be driven without goals. The contradiction is simply frustrating.
I like to think of dolce far niente as the activation of the default mode network (DMN). The DMN is conceptualized by neuroscientists as a group of interconnected brain structures that are activated when our brain is in a resting state, i.e. we are not engaging in any particular activity. The paradox here is that how can the brain be active when it is at rest? Neuroimaging research found that the DMN supports internal psychological processes, including mentalizing (i.e. thinking about thinking), autobiographical memories, empathy, daydreaming, imagining the future. In fact, DMN brain regions are known to be responsible for social cognition and disrupted activation is commonly seen among individuals with neuropsychiatric disorders, including autism, schizophrenia, and Alzheimer’s disease. This tells us that the DMN must have an adaptive role.
There is one question left to answer: What could doing nothing in particular possibly be useful for? Scientists believed that this helps us to construct, explore, and evaluate past events to better cope in our future. It seems more adaptive to capitalize on our idle brain activity in this way, than to let it pass fruitlessly. Perhaps sitting back a little is a better use of our time than frantically doing something to ameliorate a situation. The next time you daydream about someone or something, remember il dolce far niente and the default mode network.