|
Five excellent mind habits to develop
Thursday, 15 September 2005
Want a more useful mind? Your mind is like a muscle, it can be trained to be stronger and more efficient. Here are some good ways to help you develop your brain into a better tool. I'm not saying they're easy, but they're definitely worthwhile.
Never let a word pass you by
From a university professor to a janitor, we all hear words that we don't understand. Building up a strong vocabulary is one of the best ways to increase your thinking power. Words are more than just symbols for objects, they often describe concepts. The more concepts we have available to us, the stronger our understanding of the world becomes.
An excellent habit to develop is to look up the meaning of any word you don't understand immediately that you hear or read it. Either invest in a good dictionary or use online dictionaries such as Google's define function. There are also books specifically written to improve your vocabulary.
Try doing everyday sums in your head
We live in a world dominated by numbers. They're everywhere - from prices to speed readings to medicine doses to the amount of memory in our computers. A high level of numeracy often equals a high level of success in many areas of life. You have opportunities every day to improve your numeracy by training your mind.
Next time you are presented with a simple math problem that needs solving, try solving it in your head. It may be how much each person has to pay splitting a bill at a restaurant, figuring out how much those six boxes of Cornflakes are going to cost you, or how many hours of overtime you'll have to work in order to buy that gift for your mother. Whatever it is, try to do the sum in your head.
If you are out of practice at this, you'll likely find it very difficult at first. Persist, and as with everything, you'll soon find it becomes easier.
Learn about something you wouldn't normally bother with
If you're into politics, pick up a magazine providing a point of view you don't subscribe to. If you've never had much interest in science, history, money matters, art, or literature, watch a television show about them. If there's something or someone you think is stupid, boring or not relevant to you, give that source another chance. Too many people expose themselves to the same old ideas again and again. It is the variety of ideas available in memory, rather than the opinion of those ideas, that makes a strong thinker.
Read non-fiction rather than fiction
Fiction is great. It's fun and entertaining, but generally it doesn't have much to teach us - or rather, it doesn't have anywhere near as much as non-fiction does. If you like to read to pass the time, pick up a non-fiction title. Many of them are more entertaining than you may expect.
Always be ready to question your own beliefs
Something unfortunate happens to us with each year we spend on this planet. We gradually become convinced of the correctness of our ideas. We become arrogant in other words. Make peace with the certain fact that there are a great number of things that you are wrong about. Rather than twisting the evidence to fit your theory - twist your theory to fit the evidence.
This habit can be one of the most difficult of all to develop, but it is also one of the most important.
 | How to work out if you're better off renting or buying a place to live | | It's a decision we all face sooner or later: Should I rent or buy? We all need a roof over our heads - somewhere to have some privacy and bring up a family. |  | How to hook up with members of the opposite sex | | A man and a woman meet each other at a singles bar. He bowls her over with his conversation, she dazzles him with her beauty. Within moments, they fall in love. Three months later they're married. |  | You have to run pretty fast in this life even just to stay still | | The Red Queen is a character in the Lewis Caroll fantasy story "Through the Looking Glass". The main character in the story, Alice, comes across the Red Queen and finds her always running in the same spot. |  | Keep your ears and eyes open, and your mouth shut | | Who wins in life? Often it's the lucky, but just as often it's the best informed. The quality of our decisions is directly related to the quality of our information. Therefore, it's important to make sure your information is top-notch - this isn't as easy as many people think. |  | Most of the big advances are made simply by trying stuff out | | Most of the people you meet day-to-day think they have a pretty good idea about how it all works. Or at least, how all the bits they care about work. They've made up their mind long ago about things, and regard anyone who's willing to think otherwise as a dangerous idiot. | | The eleven biggest mistakes single men make with women | | I have spent time around a lot of women, had a few girlfriends and am now married, so I've learned a few things along the way. From my own experiences and what I've observed from those around me, here are the eleven biggest mistakes men make when dealing with women. |  | Find the right balance between improving your situation and enjoying it | | There's a funny scene in the film "Thank you for smoking" where the main character, a public relations shill for the cigarette industry, is asked how he can do such an unethical job. "Everyone's got to pay the mortgage", he replies. | | Improvement usually requires suffering | | We all want to be better people. We want to be smarter, wiser, stronger and more beautiful. Look at any magazine rack in any supermarket, and you'll see that self-improvement is on a lot of people's minds. | | Be generous to the future | | The future is like a giant spiritual bank account. You can invest in it, or withdraw from it any time you like. How you treat this bank account plays a big part in deciding how successful you are. |  | Don't let others manipulate you by making you feel uncomfortable | | We all want others to do things our way. If we can persuade those around us to somehow bend to our will, we feel that life's riches will be provided as a reward. So people can become very sneaky when it comes to trying to manipulate others. One of their most cunning tricks is to create uncomfortable situations that they hope you will be desperate to get out of. |
New articles are being added all the time, so make sure you bookmark Paul's Tips and come back.
|
|