Expand the Mind | Mind
Practices beyond "just" staying mentally healthy
In the last posts we focused on mental health, emotional regulation and cultivating positive mindsets. But what if we push further? Not focusing on “just” feeling well but living up to the full potential of our mind?
Top three things you can do
Cultivate a “beginner’s mind”
The beginner’s mind is a concept from Buddhism and it maps well on recent research in cognitive science about three core factors that make for a resilient mind. As with most factors, they are partly determined by genetics and early environment but remain highly malleable throughout your life:
Cognitive Flexibility: Allows you to dynamically adapt to changing environments and is correlated with superior performance and less sick days. Practice this by learning new skills regularly. For example by trying something from this newsletter every week.
Openness to Experience: Reduces your prejudice and increases social skills. Practice this by exposing yourself to new things regularly, for example by travel, different social circles, a movie you wouldn’t watch otherwise, a political gathering you otherwise wouldn’t visit. When you come across ideas you don’t agree with, try to “steel-man” them - try to make the best case for them.
Intellectual humility: Leads to better decision making and is necessary for continuous learning. Practice this with engaging in self-transcendent experiences where you feel small, e.g., visiting a planetarium, hiking through mountains, exploring a new field of knowledge. Search for "disconfirmation” - evidence against your beliefs and celebrate when you change them. You are not your beliefs.
Good news: one of the most effective ways to influence these traits is something you’re probably doing already: physical exercise and mindfulness exercises.
Shape your input
So how to apply this beginner’s mind? We have a tendency to seek out what we know, it’s comfortable, we don’t have to engage with difficult or annoying views. But that’s where we expand our mind the most. Some ideas:
Media: Listen to podcasts, read news, or watch shows from the opposite political spectrum. Tell an AI what you’re currently consuming and ask it to suggest “the opposite” that you’d still enjoy.
Friends: “We don’t discuss politics and religion here” is a bit boring. Try to have open conversations by genuinely trying to understand the other person. Attend social events outside of your comfort zone. Try to picture in your mind the person who is most different from you and try to seek them out. Make some new friends.
Experiences: What are things other people seem to enjoy that you never tried? Going hiking maybe? Watching a sports game? Babysitting children? Playing Dungeons & Dragons? Farming? Try some with the mind of a child. What’s exciting about them?
I personally have taken up a habit here of obsessively assimilating people’s reading lists on Goodreads, because often they will have a completely different subset of interests or areas they are looking into or reading about, and I often find something I really enjoy but would never normally read, the last example being Annapurna, which an excellent!
Cameron
Learn continuously
You can passively consume content and never change. Save yourself the time, watch Netflix instead. If you actually want to expand your mind, follow these heuristics:
Active consumption: When reading start by scanning table of contents and conclusion, build a map before you dive in. Before you read, have a hypothesis of what they will say and watch out for evidence against your hypothesis. Go deep in that. When listening, try to predict what people will say and put speed at maybe 1.2-1.5x to keep your brain focused.
Active recall: The best way to learn: Once you consumed content, try to explain to to others. Either your imaginary friend, or your journal, or an actual friend. You’ll notice that you forgot half of it. Go back and revise.
Spaced repetition: This has been originally developed for vocabulary and flashcards but it applies to any knowledge. The idea is to regularly go back to things you learnt and practice active recall. If you were good at it - come back to it at a longer time. If bad, come back to it soon.
I used to be the guy who read nonfiction books cover to cover and would feel guilty skipping chapters or not finishing a book. I remember my dad telling me “one day you’ll learn that that’s not how you read books” I thought he was wrong hahaha.
These days I scan and skip chapters in books, use the chapter marks in podcasts to skip around. I’ll try giving the active prediction and recall more focus with the next book and podcast.
Christoph
Do something now
Go through the section on inputs and see what speaks to you the most. Make a plan for that right now.
Who is the friend you have that is furthest away from your usual circle? Ask them for suggestions on what you’d enjoy reading/doing.
Ask yourself: What did you change your mind about recently? It’s surprisingly hard to answer.
Want to learn something new? Check out our guide on change.
Want to start doing something? Reply to this post, and we will check in on you in a week.
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