Psychologist Explains How to Improve Your Mind
Summary
TLDRThe script discusses transforming your mindset to change how you perceive and respond to the world. It emphasizes realizing your subjective view of reality is likely inaccurate. Continuously questioning assumptions and outdated perspectives allows psychological flexibility to see opportunities others miss. Intense learning refines mental models, enabling a finely tuned filter to focus only on valuable signals. Avoid distractions by ignoring 80% noise before considering affirmative steps. Loyalty to your future self, not present conditions, determines choices. Clarifying your thesis - the essence of your beliefs, goals and strategy - creates simplicity enabling rapid life transformation.
Takeaways
- ๐ Our perception of reality is inaccurate and subjective.
- ๐ฎ Letting go of limiting old ideas allows for new ideas and opportunities.
- ๐ง Transforming mental models changes how you see the world.
- ๐ Journaling helps examine your life and see patterns.
- ๐ก Question assumptions and strip complexity to clarify focus.
- ๐ Intense learning transforms worldviews and mental filters.
- ๐ค Awareness of biases improves decisions and problem-solving.
- ๐ Connect to your ambitious future self as the filter for decisions.
- โ First focus on avoiding noise before considering opportunities.
- ๐ Clarify a simple, focused thesis of your beliefs, values and strategy.
Q & A
What does the quote 'We don't see the world as it is we see the world as we are' mean?
-It means that we all perceive and interpret the world subjectively, through the lens of our own experiences, assumptions and biases. We don't see reality objectively.
Why is it important to examine your own thinking and assumptions?
-Examining your own thinking and assumptions allows you to identify limiting beliefs or biases that may be distorting your perception of reality. This self-awareness allows you to revise your mental models over time.
What is confirmation bias?
-Confirmation bias is the tendency to interpret new information in a way that confirms your existing beliefs or assumptions. People often avoid or dismiss evidence that contradicts their internal narrative.
How can journaling help transform your mind?
-Journaling allows you to track how your perspectives change over time. Noticing how your views differ from your past self can build self-awareness and psychological flexibility to update your beliefs.
What is a mental model?
-A mental model is an internal explanation or framework you use to interpret information and experiences. Transforming your mental models involves revising your core assumptions and beliefs about how the world works.
What is selective attention?
-Selective attention refers to how we train our minds to focus on certain information while filtering out other data based on our interests and priorities at the time.
How did Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger develop unique perspectives?
-They continuously upgraded their mental models through intense, lifelong study across multiple disciplines. This gave them higher-level views to see opportunities others missed.
What should you focus on first according to Charlie Munger?
-Charlie Munger believed you should first focus on what to avoid, what not to do, before considering affirmative steps. Identify and filter out noise before determining the signal to focus on.
Why transform your mental models?
-Transforming your mental models allows you to shift your perceptions, assumptions and beliefs over time. This leads to clearer thinking, wiser decisions, and seeing possibilities you couldn't see before.
How can loyalty to your future self guide your decisions?
-Letting your vision for your future self guide today's decisions, rather than sticking to old habits or perspectives, empowers you to make short-term sacrifices for long-term rewards.
Outlines
๐ How our subjective perception shapes our reality
Our perception of reality is inaccurate and subjective. We see the world through our own lens, not objectively. Transforming our mindset requires recognizing this and becoming aware of our mental models. Letting go of limiting old ideas is key to adopting better perspectives.
๐ง Constant learning transforms worldviews and mental filters
By constantly learning, we can transform our worldviews, assumptions and mental filters. This allows us to see opportunities others miss. Masters like Charlie Munger study extensively before acting to develop perspective.
๐ Focusing on avoidance and the future self for flexibility
Charlie Munger's exhaustive analysis focuses first on what to avoid. Questioning assumptions and being aware of differences from our past selves builds psychological flexibility. Making choices loyal to our future selves raises our standards.
Mindmap
Keywords
๐กPerception
๐กMetacognition
๐กMental Models
๐กPsychological Flexibility
๐กSelective Attention
๐กConfirmation Bias
๐กWorldview
๐กReframing
๐กContinuous Learning
๐กFuture Self
Highlights
Your view of reality is inaccurate, that is a really healthy place to start
It's not the getting new ideas, it's actually the letting go of the old ones that stops the new ones
Continuously recognize how you see things differently than your former self
Your worldview is a frame, a reference frame, a set of models and ideas you've collected over time
People want their behavior to be consistent with their identity
Transforming your mental models allows you to filter for and find unique opportunities
Upgrade your model to filter out noise and not get caught up in distractions
Let your future self be the filter and frame for the choices you make
Hard decisions, easy life. Easy decisions, hard life.
You can't focus deeply if you're all over the place with your attention
Intensely learning raises your standards filter to stop letting old trash in
Clarify your vision and strategy on a single page
Simplify complex systems by stripping away the non-essential 80%
Put your focus on the single bottleneck that matters most
If you can clarify your focus, it's incredible how quickly you can transform
Transcripts
in this video I'm going to share with
you a few big ideas about how to
transform your mind and by transforming
your mind you can change how you see
things what you say yes to what you say
no to and ultimately you can focus on
better and better things my name is Dr
Benjamin Hardy I'm an organizational
psychologist let me start with a first
quote from Dr Steven rvy cvy said we
don't see the world as it is we see the
world as we are so we see the world
through a subjective lens we don't see
the world accurately none of us see the
same thing the same way we all see it
through our perception and as Charles
Munger said I'm going to share with you
a really crazy cool idea from Charles
merer I've learned so much from Charles
Munger he was the partner of Warren
Buffett but Charles Monger said that our
cognition cognition being our thinking
comes from our perception perception is
the more meta the more macro uh even
there's a concept called metacognition
which is thinking about your thinking
and that's a really big idea by the way
even Socrates said the unexamined life
is not worth living the first really
important thing here is to realize that
your view of reality is inaccurate that
is a really healthy place to start most
most people they never actually get
there they think that their view is
objective they think that what they they
think that their view is right and i'
I've dealt with so many people like this
where they just won't change their mind
even with better perspectives better
evidence they just won't change their
mind and it's really hard to deal with
people like that really big beautiful
idea that's related to this and in a way
that's helpful and and some of what I'm
going to teach you in this video it's
going to be a very brief simple video is
how to start to become Mindful and aware
of your own mental models of your own
ideas and ultimately how to start
letting go of the ideas that are holding
you back uh I love the quote from John
mayard Kan he's a really famous
economist but he basically said it's not
the getting new ideas it's hard it's
actually the letting go of the old ones
that stops the new ones if you're trying
to learn new ideas but they're
inconsistent with your more meta more
macro level models and views of the
world those ideas are just going to go
in one ear and out the other so one
really helpful idea is obviously just
the recogn that you're not your past
self and I think that it's very powerful
to journal this comes with the whole
idea of the unexamined life is not worth
living very powerful to continuously
recognize how you see things differently
than your former self how you would do
things differently than your former self
not just 5 years ago even five weeks ago
or five days ago that's part of framing
Framing and reframing and actually
shaping your view of of the world your
worldview by the way is a frame it's a
reference frame it's a worldview it's a
set of models and ideas that you've
collected over time and learned and
really attached to one really important
Point here is that you're not your pelf
and that you see things differently than
your pelf and actually that's one way of
creating what's called psychological
flexibility is just continuously
referencing and recognizing how you're
seeing things differently than your past
self so I'm going to go ahead and read a
short quote from Charles monger and then
ultimately I'm going to give you a big
idea something that ultimately Charles
Munger Warren Buffett used to have such
a unique view of the world which
ultimately allowed them to filter for
and find really unique opportunities
that most people didn't see there's a
concept two really related Concepts in
Psychology one is called selective
attention selective attention means that
our attention is trained we train our
attention to look for something very
specific the connected idea to that is
what's called inattentional blindness
William James the father of American
psychology he was a Harvard psychologist
he said that there's millions of things
going on outside which I don't even
notice why because they have no interest
my experience is what basically is
relevant to me so that's the whole idea
of fine-tuning your filter but you can't
fine-tune your filter until you go
Upstream a little bit and that's
transform your o overarching models or
your frame of reality your frame which
is your core assumptions your views your
your knowledge your beliefs those things
shape your mental filters and once you
get really good at shaping your filters
then you can actually find and focus on
really really powerful things so I'm
going to share with you three big ideas
from Charles Monger in his book poor
Charlie's Almanac the first one is what
he calls inconsistency avoidance
tendency basically this is the same
thing as confirmation bias but it's the
idea that we do not want want to be
inconsistent and there's a lot of
research on this by Dr Robert chalini
he's very famous in his research on the
fact that people want their behavior to
be consistent with their identity and
and so people ultimately try to avoid
inconsistencies at all cost it's very
rare for people to deal with Paradox
actually in Psychology they call that
dialectical Truth where you can actually
agree that two things conflicting can
also be true or right most people they
can't handle that most people they will
do anything and everything they can to
avoid inconsistencies so if any
if they learn anything or if they're
dealing with anything that conflicts
with their current model their view of
reality they'll immediately just dismiss
it so the next big idea from Charlie and
ultimately as well from Warren Buffett
is just the constant transforming of
their their worldview their mental
models and they do this honestly through
intense study so let me go ahead and
just share two quotes because the
intense study and constant learning is
how you ultimately transform your models
you you actually develop very high level
views of the world and that allows you
to see things differently think about it
very few people are just learning
machines where they're constantly
learning where I can powerfully say I'm
not the same person I was a week ago
because I know so many things my P off
didn't know so if you are constantly
learning and if you're intensifying your
learning that's how you're going to
change your frame and your model and
ultimately you're going to develop very
highlevel perspectives that allow you
then to see things that other people
can't see to analyze situations other
people can't analyze so ultimately what
you want to do is you want to
continuously transform your core model
or your core mental models but your core
frame your core perspective and that
then allows you to have a much finer
green filter or selective attention you
can then see things that other people
can't see and that's ultimately what
allowed Charles monger and Warren
Buffett to make very few big bets they
were able to see things that most people
couldn't see and they were able to
detect signal where most people saw
noise and they were also able to avoid
most of the noise and that's part of
having a very finely tuned filter is is
that your your mental filter is mostly
about what you don't see that's the key
and that's actually crucial to what
monger and really high level thinkers do
even if you study for example Nim TB
with antifragile most things are fragile
most things are noise and so you want to
continuously learn develop really epic
powerful models of the world very
powerful perception very high level
learning and that then allows you to see
that most things the juice is not worth
the squeeze most things are are to
filtered out most things are irrelevant
most things are a distraction
fundamentally and so the purpose of a
filter is that you stop seeing and stop
noticing most of the things that are
ultimately distracting you think about
it if you do not have a a quality filter
what that means is that you're letting a
lot of stuff into your life that you
don't ultimately want you're letting a
lot of trash in a low-grade filter lets
a lot of trash in so the purpose of the
filter is to block out and stop most of
the stuff from coming in only the signal
comes in and the way you fine grain your
mental filter your selective attention
is by continuously transforming your
model and by upgrading your model you
will filter out most of the noise and
not need to get caught up in all the
distractions think about it we live in a
distraction world most people they are
lost on the internet and their filter is
so bad that they let in so much nonsense
and by letting in all that nonsense I I
love the quote your input shapes your
outlook and so they're letting in just
trash their filter is not refined it's
not cleaned and their worldview is is
not welldeveloped it's like eating a
candy diet you can't have a powerful
filter without continuously improving
your overarching Freeman models so
here's the quote and the big idea
Charlie's exhaustive screening process
requires considerable self-discipline
and results in long periods of apparent
inactivity this habit of committing far
more time to learning and thinking than
to doing is no accident it is a blend of
discipline and patience PA exhibited by
true masters of a craft often as is the
case Charlie generally focuses first on
what to avoid that is on what not to do
before he considers the affirmative
steps he will take in a given situation
so the main point here is that Charlie
has an exhaustive screening process he's
not just being quick and lazy and sloppy
with his decisions if he's going to do
something and by the way you studi them
they did not make small bets they
studied studied studied and this is by
the way very counterintuitive because a
lot of people they say you should throw
a thousand spaghetti against the wall
That's not how they do things they say
if you're overly diversifying it means
that you don't know what you're doing if
you're unclear in your decision it means
you didn't study well enough the habit
of spending way more time thinking
analyzing than doing is no accident
that's the key to Mastery is
transforming the model and also becoming
aware becoming aware of your own biases
becoming aware and you do that a lot of
times Honestly by journaling but also to
the idea of Socrates the unexamined life
is not worth living being aware of when
you did things that you could have done
them better even just thinking about
today not to necessarily beat yourself
up but just thinking about how could I
have done that differently that then
allows you to kind of see the patterns
in your life the second part though and
this goes from frame to filter is is
that as you become a lot more exhaustive
and thorough and studying and really
beginning to develop a very powerful
profound view of reality and of the
world you then start to have a Lot F
finer grained filters and as Charlie
said he first focused is on what to
avoid that's also really crucial and
this fits by the way with Elon musk's
thinking Elon Musk talks a lot about how
a lot of Engineers and things like that
they just do what they're told rather
than question assumptions that's
actually one of the keys to continuously
reframing is questioning your
assumptions and you can even do that by
the way for reframing a trauma you can
question your assumption about the event
The Experience about the other person
about their motives but questioning your
assumptions questioning your view is a
really powerful thing and then what Elon
Musk says is before he adds anything new
he strips things out he strips away the
things that don't matter from the 8020
perspective strips away the 80% that's
exactly what Munger does as well he
first focuses on what to avoid on what
to ignore I've heard it said that most
people spend 80% of their free time
entertaining themselves and maybe 20%
educating themselves if you flipped that
if you spent 80% of your time educating
yourself and 20% of your time
entertaining entertainment is important
taking breaks but if you're spending 80%
of your time learning and reframing your
view and and developing new and Powerful
models of the world those models allow
you to see what other people don't see
intense learning allows you to see the
opportunities and to see the pathways to
incredible things that other people
wouldn't see you could also just also
just learn how to deal with people how
to find Opportunities how to make money
whatever it is massive learning massive
models but also becoming aware of your
limiting assumptions becoming aware of
the things that are ultimately stopping
you your perception is stopping you it's
it's slowing you down that is crucial
and then ultimately raise in your floor
as a person which your floor is
ultimately your standard and filtering
everything else out beginning to say no
to things that your past self said yes
to even your past self a week ago this
is so powerful and you can make this a
continuous part of your process you can
develop incredible psychological
flexibility it does take humility
there's a lot to be said that most
people will not change unless one of two
things happen either a trauma like an
extreme event usually they say it's only
an extreme event that will finally force
people to change I think that that
should not be the case um certainly uh
extreme trauma or what some people would
say is Extreme grief yes those things
certainly can lead to finally letting go
of bad ideas or old ideas Etc and
finally making new changes but you can
have instead kind of what Socrates would
say the continuous process of analyzing
your life of observing your life of
observing and framing how you're
different from your past self I love the
whole idea that it's not the past that
determines the present mentally it's
always the present that shapes the
meaning of the past another obviously
powerful frame is getting connected to
the frame of your future self and
letting your future self uh and scaling
that up massively letting your future
self be the filter and the frame for the
choices you make in the present being
your identity in the present you go from
being to doing to having and just doing
what your future self would do but you
really can develop a lot of flexibility
where you're no longer worried about
being inconsistent with your past self
far more powerful to be consistent with
your future self to be loyal and
Allegiant to your future self rather
than to your present conditions to your
present situation if you let the future
be what is the filter for what you do in
the present if you let the future be
what you are loyal to yes in the short
run you're going to have to make some
hard decisions but there's that great
quote you know hard decisions easy life
easy decisions hard life if you're
operating from your future self from
that frame and you're continuously
observing and journaling and thinking
about how you're different from your
past self also if you're just doing
intense learning and raising that filter
you can really know you've raised your
filter when you stop letting in the same
old trash when you stop letting things
in your filter became more intense and
it doesn't let that stuff through that's
when you can really start to deeply
Focus I love the book cal newport's book
uh deep work related book of his so good
they can't ignore you you can't become
so good they can't ignore you if you are
all over the place with your attention
if you if you're if you're not focused
but the point is is that the quality and
the depth of your focus comes from your
view of what is valuable and if you
aren't intensely learning then you're
going to be focused on stuff that
ultimately probably isn't that valuable
obviously we all have our own subjective
views but as you learn more as you gain
more perspective as you gain more wisdom
you'll then filter out more of the
things that are non-essential and you
will then focus on higher and more
powerful and more meaningful and more
useful things and the deeper you focus
the more and the faster you will
transform we all have a thesis uh a
thesis is a business term it's also an
academic term but we all have a thesis
and that thesis is essentially your
model it's your view of reality it's
your why you're what and your how it's
your goal your it's it's your it's
essentially your beliefs your values
your goals and your strategy and so we
all have a thesis I actually think it's
really powerful to clarify your thesis
on a single page I sometimes ask leaders
for example share with me your vision
and if they have like a five seven page
Vision that means that they're not clear
as Steve Jobs would say it takes a lot
of work to strip away the complexity and
make things simple and if something is
not a simple model then you can't
transform it um you always want to take
a a complex system and you want to
simplify it and you simplify it and the
only way to simplify it is to strip away
the to strip away the stuff that doesn't
matter strip away that 80% and
ultimately frame things down so that you
can clarify the single bottleneck of
focus that's the core thing you want to
put your attention on your focus on and
boom if you can do that it's incredible
how much you can transform your life and
how quickly you can transform your life
go to future self.com if you want a free
Kindle version of my book future self be
your future self now also if you go to
future.com sl10 xfree uh links down
below you can download the free kle
version of 10x is easier than 2x the
third book in my Trilogy with Dan
Sullivan have an amazing day
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