Making art can pop your brain out of habitual ways of seeing and thinking. Here are three accessible, no-talent-required art activities — to do alone or in a group – to help your brain notice what it has been ignoring.

Most museum advice tells you to plan ahead, pace yourself, and hit the highlights. This post offers something different: what actually happens in the brain when we look at art, and how artists — and one fictional grandfather with an urgent mission — approach the experience of seeing.

A visit to the Uffizi left me less interested in the paintings than in the people looking at them. What I noticed got me thinking about how the brain actually sees, what happens when we stop observing, and why it matters beyond the walls of a museum.

In a San Francisco bead shop many years ago, my friend and I learned first hand about the paradox of choice and how going for “good enough” rather than the “best” – a strategy called satisficing – can be a way forward in the face of overwhelming information and choice.

Muddling may sound like a poor way to make decisions or live a life. But the art of muddling through – in the sense of taking incremental experimental steps based on experience, intuition, and opportunity – can serve us well when journeying through a complex and uncertain world.

A chance remark by a painter I admire sent me down a rabbit hole from which I am only just emerging. And now that I think about it, that is exactly what this post is about. What is the difference between meaningful exploration and creative procrastination? How can we resolve the tension between chasing the new and buckling down to work? Is there a magic allocation of time or is there perhaps something better?

Supportive Environments for a New Year, Part 3
When we think of environment, “time” is not usually something that comes to mind. And yet our temporal environment – the way we structure, manage, and collectively define time – has a huge impact on what we do and how effective we are doing it. How can we think about shaping our temporal environment to better support ourselves?

Supportive Environments for a New Year, Part 2
As part of my ongoing exploration of how to reshape my environments to support my 2026 resolutions and intentions, I consider the formidable power of the information environment. What does my world of information look like? How might I reshape it to better support my needs and intentions?

Supportive Environments for a New Year, Part 1
Resolutions and intentions are easy to make but hard to convert into action and change. So, I’m starting the year off by going back to basics which, as an environmental psychologist and artist, means taking a hard look at my studio environment and pondering how I can get it to better support me in doing the things I want to do.

I have just finished a year of small writing experiments and you, dear reader, were part of my laboratory. What are small experiments and what can they teach us? My own experiments have been instrumental in helping me incrementally find my way in the world of blog writing.

As I head into this next decade of my life, I am reminded of the powerful physical, mental, and creative benefits of taking the time to invite in everyday moments of awe and wonder.

Understanding is good medicine. When we know what’s going on we are less stressed, less likely to become mentally fatigued, and better able to make decisions. Our brains are generally good at building the mental maps that support understanding, but it helps immensely if the environment or information itself is organized to make map-making easier. What does this look like?