Thinking optimization
Thinking is the most mysterious and ambiguous thing that a person has. There are many ways to describe thinking. Therefore, a variety of adjectives can be observed as a companion of the word “thinking”: systemic, creative, conscious, logical, rational, positive, critical, etc. Scientists spend their lives studying human thinking. I definitely can’t compete with them. Therefore, we will talk about thinking “amateurishly”. I understand thinking as a fundamental skill that defines our picture of the world and helps us solve problems. Wikipedia says this:
Thinking is a cognitive activity of a person. Cognitive activity is a set of processes, procedures and methods of acquiring knowledge about the phenomena and laws of the objective world.
All people are born with thinking, but speaking about the development of thinking, everyone achieves different results. Surely, you have seen people who can be said to have a “narrow” mindset. They do not see the whole picture, do not understand the cause-and-effect relationships and the consequences of their decisions. It’s like they don’t understand what’s going on. You have also seen people whose thinking inspired you or raised the question: “So it WAS possible?”.
I used to think that the difference between such people is in the presence of analytical thinking. I was wrong, since this is only a person’s ability to make decisions based on logic and analysis. Everything is much more complicated. This is often a difference in the level of system, abstract, critical and creative thinking. If we take into account the entire typology of thinking, then there are about 30 types of thinking. We will not disassemble all types. Our task is to optimize thinking to help it work more efficiently. When you can quickly and objectively draw conclusions in order to make decisions based on logic, facts, and not be subjected to cognitive distortions and misconceptions. Knowledge and optimization methods help to optimize thinking.
Knowledge is the foundation. It allows you to learn about the enemies of thinking. Mindset, stereotypes, emotions, cognitive distortions, information overload, and so on are all examples of hindrances to thinking. If this is the first time you hear about cognitive distortions, you don’t even realize that you are already exposed to them. For example, “frequent repetition of lies makes deception plausible for a person” or “people tend to positively evaluate their choice, even if it was wrong.”
These are cognitive distortions, or, in another way, errors of thinking. Knowing that they are there, the probability of noticing them increases. If you think that you will easily remember a couple of cognitive distortions, then I will disappoint you. There are a lot of them. Look for articles on the query “176 cognitive distortions”. You will find beautiful infographics, descriptions and examples from life.
Yes, we were sitting, reading a book, and there are 176 incomprehensible things that interfere with our life and make thinking ineffective. By the way, brands and marketing successfully use this so that you carry money where you need it. To start observing basic safety precautions against cognitive distortion, read the book “Think Slowly… Decide Quickly” by Daniel Kahneman. He examines in detail the processes of thinking and decision-making, as well as the resulting illusions, distortions and errors. After reading it, you will become much more conscious.
The blind spot effect — the inability to recognize that you have cognitive distortions — is also a cognitive distortion. People are more likely to notice erroneous behavior and driving motives in others than in themselves.
To protect themselves from cognitive distortions, stereotypes and psychological inertia, people have come up with many methods for solving problems, making decisions and generating ideas. You already know many of them from goal setting and time management. For example, SMART, GROW, Descartes square and others.
These are templates that guide you through the script and keep your thoughts from flying apart. All of them are aimed at activating and strengthening one or more types of thinking. Most often at logical, critical, creative, system and strategic thinking. Note, that we’re talking about activating and strengthening.
By themselves, methods will not replace thinking. To increase the effectiveness of thinking, you need to develop basic skills of logical, critical, creative, strategic and systems thinking. How all kinds of thinking work effectively together are already a topic of intelligence. It is better to delve into such details with professionals in their field. Such as the author of courses on systems thinking, engineering and management Anatoly Levenchuk.
“Thinking is the behavior of the intellect”
Anatoly Levenchuk
The topic is boundless and multifaceted, but I will try to describe the starting point in improving the basic types of thinking so that you understand which way to develop and start thinking more effectively.
