I’ll add to this for cases where the problem is motivation for reading and spending time “non-productively.”

Many life and work problems have relevant fiction books that cover similar or loosely related situations. Reading these can create a perfect “mental sandbox” for problem solving, where your brain unconsciously plays around with a topic in a safe and fun way, all while you’re following a fictional narrative.

This is an alternative to more “rational” methods, like reading non-fiction, prompting an LLM for possible approaches, or problem-solving explicitly. Brains work in weird ways, and they often need lots of unstructured time, lateral thinking, and play. Reading fiction provides all three.