At Page Design where I work, we have a staff meeting every Monday morning. We go over all of the currently open jobs to make sure everything is being taken care of and on track to meet deadlines. It takes about 30 to 40 minutes. During these meetings, I have plenty of time to doodle in my job book.
I'm a lifelong doodler. In school, all my papers and homework assignments had doodles in the margins. A few teachers saw creativity. Most just saw messiness and lack of discipline. But despite the efforts of these dogmatic, meddlesome academic bureaucrats to squelch creative expression, I've continued to doodle.
This site is both a repository and an ongoing "blog" in which I will post a new doodle each week created Monday mornings in my job book during our staff meetings. I do this purely for the amusement of my friends and coworkers who seem to get a kick out of these little sketches.
There are several elements that define a doodle
1. A doodle is unplanned. You just pick up a pen or pencil and start to draw. You may have some thoughts floating around that lend content to the doodle, but you don't go in with a preconceived composition or story. Sometimes I just start drawing shapes and let them become what they will. Other times whatever I've been thinking about lately, (e.g. drumming, sailing) immediately drive the direction of my pen.
2. A doodle isn't overworked or revised. If you make a mistake you just keep drawing, or use the mistake as a catalyst to drive your creativity in a new direction.
3. A doodle is executed while the doodlers attention is divided. In my staff meetings, I'm listening to what's being said about the jobs, listening for my own jobs so I'll know when to speak, noting my coworker's reactions to things being said, all this while doodling away. A great time to doodle is while speaking on the phone. In fact, I really can't speak on the phone at all without a pen in my hand and some paper handy.
Because the doodle is an unplanned, spontaneous, and semi-distracted form of expression, it may provide a glimpse into the deeper layers of the doodlers mind. I've abstained from being over-analytic with my own doodles. I prefer just to draw and leave the analysis to others. Feel free to read into them what you will. And you can post your findings in the comments area. Or leave the name of a good psychiatrist.
-Kurt Kland