Obviously, this is not taught everywhere. At a minimum, they focus not on this skill, but on individual methods and disciplines. Although, for the latter, and for making decisions at work and at home, basic “mental hygiene” definitely won’t hurt. Let's talk about it in our material and discuss the “material parts”, flexible “optics” and auxiliary tools .
Photo: Roman Bilik. Source: Unsplash.com
How to start thinking?
Do you think I was born thinking?
I just recently learned to work with my head, before I just didn’t know that I had a treasure and a gold mine - this is my mind.
Most likely you don't know this either.
Now I have a scattering of options in front of me. I have freedom of choice. I learned to see more options, more ideas, than before.
Yes, you will have to adjust your lifestyle a little. You won't be a leader and the life of the party while you're upgrading your brain. You will become a black sheep, on your own. You will not communicate with people who clog other people's brains.
You will start avoiding everyone. And look for the same ones.
You will be bored by the idleness of others.
If you already have this condition, then you are in the right place. If you haven’t yet and you just received this article in the mail or decided to read it because you had nothing better to do, then you’ll probably have new food for thought...
Introduction
You don't think with your head. YOU! But other people can think with your head. Did not know? Someone knows how to do this and I bet it's not you...
It hangs on your shoulders, spins in all directions, and inside is empty, like in a cold room from which the owner, who has lost all meaning, has long since moved out.
Hey, what do you need your head for?
For what?
For example, we all think what we think. But if we think carefully, we will understand that we are not thinking at all.
We often attribute other people's successes to their talents, luck, or something else. Or maybe they just learned to use their brains?
He who knows how to think owns the world. He works for results. These are not just words - they are a fact. And this is not an accident or a strong gene. This is achievable even for a lazy person like you!
I described this process in my book Mind Explosion. That people often confuse thinking with thinking. If you're interested, read it.
So here it is. If you start thinking, then suddenly something will go as it should. The result will trample out of the cracks of your life.
Well, to be honest, I don’t want to tell you the advantages of the fact that sometimes you need to think in order to...
Still, I’m not writing for monkeys, but for sensible people. Who are interested in this article... This blog... Its development...
Signs of dogmatic zombification by someone else's opinion
Everyone partially lives in a “zombie world”. From birth we were instilled with certain concepts. If you try to leave the “system” or break it, a lot of misunderstanding and protests can follow.
“Zombification” includes:
- - blindly “eating” information from the outside, without having one’s own opinion.
- - daily “existence”, “survival”, “dragging”, “floundering” without specific goals or plans.
- - “life in a cage” - a feeling of lack of freedom, a lot of responsibilities, slavery to one’s own life.
- - lack of feeling of happiness and flight.
Often people in everyday life get bogged down in routine and a huge number of everyday problems.
Therefore, there is no time left for yourself, your desires and dreams. And if you want to do what you like, then everything is put off until later.
When it becomes easier, when there is more free time, then they will think about how to get closer to harmony and happiness.
The reality is that it will never get easier, with this attitude, this mindset and this way of life.
How to force yourself to think?
If you have a question mark in your head with an elegantly arched back after the words - how to FORCE yourself to think? Exactly FORCE!
That's cool. It's cool that you want to force yourself to work with your head. Mental and intellectual buzz! I applaud you while sitting!
Uh, for example, a camel can’t bring itself to think. And neither can the giraffe. And some people can't. They can't even ask themselves that question. They have a billion other but ineffective questions...
Look around your axis.
Do you see people like this?
I know what you see. I know there are a lot...
Therefore, the question of how to force YOURSELF to think is effective for effective people. And the ineffective ones don’t think about it.
And by the way, there is usually a whole logical chain of brain events.
- First, the question is how to force YOURSELF to think.
- Then - how to make HIM (or HER) think.
- Next - how to make OTHER PEOPLE think?
Do you feel how one question in life provokes the development of others?
Often owners of large businesses, big bosses who have already achieved a lot, but understand that their brains are not enough for them. They begin to think - how to use other people's brains? How to use the collective brain.
And some people can’t even take care of their brain... Am I talking about you? Or do you think that your B's in school are a great result in life?
Well, this is a cool manipulation. After all, you can make someone else think about anything that is primarily beneficial to you.
Bottom line
Critical thinking can be compared to a trial. A judge cannot pass a sentence just because he likes the defendant or not. He must see evidence and evidence, listen to witnesses, weigh the arguments of the lawyer and the prosecutor. And only then can he make his impartial verdict. If a judge listens to only one side and immediately makes a decision, this is clearly a defective judge, don’t you agree?
My introduction to critical thinking happened back in school. My history teacher Evgeniy Viktorovich believed that understanding the material is more important than simply memorizing names and dates. Therefore, each of his lessons was like a discussion. We voiced our assumptions about the actions of various princes and kings. Then Evgeniy Viktorovich told us what they actually did, and we again discussed their decisions and consequences. It was terribly interesting, I tell you. Today, critical thinking methods are used in Western educational institutions.
This article was hard for me. I collected so much material that I couldn’t fit it into a light blog article. I had to discard several options that I liked and rewrite the final result several times. I even managed to write several other articles along the way: about perfectionism, frustration, the comfort zone, remembering information and waking up without an alarm clock.
Initially, I planned to tell what critical thinking is using the example of flat earthers. But in the end I decided to write about the flat Earth in a separate article. In order not to miss out, subscribe to blog updates, so you will receive an announcement of a new entry by email.
See you again! Yours Alexander Gorokhov
A few tricks to think about that successful people use
Complete disconnection from all matters and focusing only on your problem.
Stay alone with yourself, turn off your phone and start thinking. Think in such a way that at the same time you don’t start thinking about the fact that you still need to make an important call or need to buy something for dinner in the evening.
If some thoughts creep in and prevent you from concentrating, you don’t think. You pretend.
Only in the context of your problem.
- How to solve a problem?
- How to reach your goal faster?
- How to continue to live?
- How to make a profit?
- Am I setting too small goals?
- Where to find additional clients?
- How to make clients look for me themselves?
- What will I be like in 10 years?
- What you need to do to achieve your goal.
- What? What! What the hell do I need to do?
Rev up your brain. Teach him to think!
Some people find it better to sit, others walk around the office or room (like me), or you can even do something unconsciously and at the same time actively think.
Think for a few days.
Take a day off or a week off.
Lock your house or go to some quiet place where no one will disturb your mortal body and your sinful soul.
Your task is to make these days days of thinking.
This is what one of the richest men in the world does. Bill Gates.
He leaves for a few days, leaving his deputies in charge. Moves away from family, business, and colleagues. He thinks for a few days and comes up with a new decision. A solution that costs several million dollars.
I have a friend who rents a hotel room for a day every last day of the month and always leaves the next day with a full diary and a bunch of crazy and interesting ideas. Or a ready-made solution.
Why don't we do the same?
The fact is that in this situation, you force yourself into a framework, you begin to force yourself to think.
Well, you have to be a complete idiot, go to a quiet place or rent a hotel for a day in order to think and instead sit on social networks. Although the world is full of idiots. What most people do is not think!
Think on the move.
Everyone has their own comfort for the brain.
You can go for a run and think while you run. For example, when I need to calm down and make an important decision or come up with something, I do it on the run.
If I run a marathon, then dozens of amazing ideas come to me that make me richer, stronger, more successful.
You can just take a walk and think.
Go to your favorite cafe, order a kettle, look out the window and not think about the eternal, giving your brain swollen from rest a rest, but think.
What is our gap?
Modern Russian schoolchildren are not much different from their European peers: they do not know how to read geographical maps, have difficulty connecting different events into one logical chain and do not know how to ask questions correctly. According to Lyudmila Petrovna, a teacher at the Association of Tutors, this is often to blame for the Russian school curriculum, which does not involve the development of critical thinking skills:
- “The school must engage in the development of critical thinking in order to teach children to navigate the life around them. But children are not taught this: schoolchildren concentrate more on memorization because teachers demand it. As for the program itself, this task - to teach schoolchildren critical thinking - is not clearly stated. By the way, this differs little from the old Soviet system.”
The old Soviet system, in turn, did not, in principle, involve the development of critical thinking. Her main task was different: the formation of a Soviet citizen, maintaining his communist views and faith in the mandatory triumph of the socialist system. Accordingly, the entire development of the education sector corresponded to this ideological orientation.
- After the October Revolution, the main obstacle to the formation of a Soviet citizen was illiteracy.
- Having conquered illiteracy, in the 30s and 40s the state already emphasized the education of professional workers and the creation of technical schools.
- After World War II, the main challenge was the restoration of the economy and production, and in parallel with this, the retraining of the military.
- And in the early 80s, the main goal was to improve the quality of education to increase the country's competitiveness at the global level. Among other things, primary school was extended to 4 classes, the teaching of computer science and “the basics of production and choice of profession” was introduced, and the first of September was officially called “Knowledge Day.”
- The departure from ideology and the transition to the secular nature of education occurred only after the collapse of the USSR and with the adoption of the law “On Education” in the early 90s.
The assembly line spirit of education had a corresponding impact on the school curriculum and the skills it developed. Thus, in his commentary on the socio-cultural project “The Last 30,” the scientific director of the Eureka Institute of Educational Policy, Alexander Adamsky, notes:
- “Due to the isolation of the country, education was intended for domestic consumption. But the rules of economics, politics, culture, and the social sphere in the USSR were clearly formulated and changed very slowly. Therefore, the school fostered an engineering type of thinking - they gave you an algorithm, memorize it and work according to it.”
Come up with exercises for yourself
There are many other answers to the question of how to learn to think for yourself. Use your imagination and come up with tasks for yourself that will help you perceive ordinary things and situations in a completely new way. For example, experts advise taking new routes to work each time, going to different stores, and replacing your everyday phrases with new ones that are unusual for you. Studying a foreign language and reading books improves mental abilities. Try to periodically change the format of your usual films and music - introduce something new into your life.
Don't immediately believe everything they tell you. Research the issue yourself, ask those who know more about it, and then, having a sufficient number of facts, draw your own conclusions. This may take some effort and time, but it will definitely add wisdom and experience. Always try to have your own fact-based opinion.
