Improvisation

How do we learn to improvise? How does our mind work? Often, it seems that our brain is analogous to a computer: you put in some instructions or factual information and out pops a product. Instruction manuals, which try to be useful to everyone, often seem (in my opinion) to treat subjects like computers. However, the experience of engaging in any activity is often far from logical, involving our memories, our emotions, and indeed all our senses to make up a varied and personal experience. That we should not conceptually separate the brain from the body is shown in this beautiful and revealing description from Floyd Bloom and Arlyne Lazerson's (1996) book Brain, Mind, and Behaviour:

Our brain and body create a history together. An odour experienced in childhood and suddenly reexpereienced in middle age can cause our brain to call up a flood of memories: details of the place where the experience ocurred, such as the quality of sunlight, the colours of a patterned carpet, the arrangement of furniture. We might recall how our skin felt against the fabric covering a chair we were sitting on at the time. We usually remember the other people there and the quality of the emotional interaction taking place, and most important, how we felt at that moment, whether our emotion was contenment or fear or anger.