First off, incubation is not of pretending to think about something while you post on twitter, download from iTunes, update your Facebook status and try the new voice recognition Google search.
Incubation is: letting it sit in your head, while you do some other things and finding an idea or a solution by stuff just moving around in your brain while you don't think about it.
Incubation is hard. My proof of this is that most of the time someone says they're just letting it sit, or thinking about it while they do something else the don't come up with anything. Me included. I'm really good at "incubating" problems until they go cold and die.
As incubation is not my strong point, I offer the following with whatever caution you think appropriate:
- Don't incubate if there are time pressures. You need to try another strategy for that.
- If you incubate, get *all the information* into your head. Everything. You can't think of a solution without all the information, so you must have a grasp on it.
- Get all the information into your head. Close your eyes and think about it. Open then when you've worked it out.
Incubation is good for systems that you understand completely, but very, very bad for those that you don't understand very well. The reason is simple: you are hoping that your brain will come up with an idea all by itself with its own little unconscious effort. It can't do this unless it knows and understands the information.
To reiterate: this is not an alias of putting it off. Incubation involves getting everything into your head and doing something with it until you have an answer.
Finally, once you’ve got your epiphany, don’t act too quickly. Check that the idea is probably true. Check that your idea doesn’t assume too much. Check that it agrees with the evidence. Talk to someone about it.
