Build Mental Models to Enhance Your Focus | Charles Duhigg | Big Think
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- Опубликовано: 14 сен 2016
- Build Mental Models to Enhance Your Focus
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We all get the same amount of hours in a day. Some people definitely seem to have more. Writers like Steven King and James Patterson, performers like Beyoncé, filmmakers who release a new blockbuster or shoe-gazing comedy every year, and world leaders who are across all of humanity’s problems. Even some humble ordinary folks seem to get more done than appears possible, but 24 hours is the contract our planet signed with the sun so there it is, cut and dried.
In these distracted and competitive times, there is an overwhelming thirst for knowledge on productivity and life hacks to beat procrastination. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Charles Duhigg finds it incredibly problematic that even though we have more tools and digital assistance than ever in achieving our goals, that same luxury interrupts us more often and makes it so much harder to focus.
In researching his latest book Smarter Faster Better Duhigg spent an inordinate amount of time (well-structured time, we assume) talking to over 400 people about productivity, collecting several hundred tips and hacks, many of which contradicted one another. So what reliably and consistently sets ultra-productive people and organizations apart?
One of the key commonalities he found was the ability of some people to selectively focus. It turns out the most efficient among us are constantly prioritizing and asking themselves: what are the goals that I should be chasing after right now? According Duhigg, this process starts with mental imagery, what he calls building a ‘mental model’ in your head at the start of each day, something Duhigg now dedicates his morning commute time to. He advises that we spend that time picturing what our day will look like - what do you need to get done? What are the events you can expect? How will you go about doing them? We are surrounded by the needs of others all day long, whether it’s a boss, colleagues, family or friends, email requests or social notifications, and it’s our natural impulse to react immediately when called upon. A notification 'ding!' is tragically pavlovian. Many of us will get a text while we’re busy and send a quick reply that we later regret, or blurt out an unsatisfactory answer to a boss who puts us on the spot. People with a mental model in their minds, on the other hand, already know what to focus on, and have the ability to say or ‘Can we discuss that at a later time?’ or simply leave a text or email to sit for a while. "The more that I have thought through what’s about to occur, the more that I have a strong vision in my mind of what I should expect and anticipate, the more my subconscious is going to be able to decide this is what you should focus on." Instead of reacting immediately, your time is actually much better spent taking a couple of minutes to make a better decision about where your focus should go.
Charles Duhigg's most recent book is Smarter Faster Better: The Secrets of Being Productive in Life and Business.
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CHARLES DUHIGG:
Charles Duhigg is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter for The New York Times and the author of The Power of Habit. He is a winner of the National Academies of Sciences, National Journalism, and George Polk awards. A graduate of Harvard Business School and Yale College, he lives in Brooklyn with his wife and two children.
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TRANSCRIPT:
Charles Duhigg: Nowadays it’s incredibly hard to stay focused. There’s so many distractions around us at any given moment. Your pocket vibrates at any given moment because you’re getting ten new emails and on social media there’s all these new notifications and the phone is ringing and your kids need help and your colleagues are coming up because you are working in an open office plan and they’re asking you to chime in on some memo. Maintaining focus nowadays is harder than ever before. But it’s way more critical too. One of the things that we know about the most productive people and the most productive companies is that they create ways to enhance their focus. They manage their mind in such a way that they’re able to focus on what’s important and ignore distractions much better. And the way that they do this is by what’s known as building mental models.
Essentially telling themselves stories about what they expect to see, engaging in this kind of inner dialogue about what they think should be happening...
Read the full transcript at bigthink.com/videos/charles-d...
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This is very similar to athletes that use mental visualisation before there athletic performance. It queues the brain, prompts it for the expected requirements of the day and directs energy to the focus.
This technique works even better when used the night before as well. Before bed, or in bed, mentally steep through the day you've just experienced. It shouldn't take more than a couple of minutes. Don't get caught up in what you should have done or didn't do, just walk through what happened or what you experienced. Then walk through tomorrow, how you'd like it to look, what you'd like to do, what you'd like to experience, what you'd like to feel. Again, this needs to be constructive, and should take about the same amount of time.
Then when you wake up tomorrow, walk through the coming day again.
To the entire RUclips community,
Regarding getting knowledge:
I learn 30% from the video and I understand 70% from the comment section alone.
I thank each one of the good commentator who explain as simple as they can.
Thanks a lot again.
Cheers!
same, sorry I'm so lazy to comment this whole thing, but thank you all amazing commentators
This is the first step of stoicism. Prethought and mental preparedness.
(\__/)
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(”)_(”) Bunny into your signature to help him gain world domination.
Yep, it was the first thing passed through my mind.
stoisism 👁️
I zoned out and had to rewatch the whole thing. Worth it. Probably.
Just picture yourself rewatching it, in your mind.
Guys, this is immensely valuable if you really think it through. It's a heuristic, not just thinking. But you should also account for what you would do if the perfect scenario isn't happening, ahead of time.
I finally now get what the phrase “mental model” means and how to apply it and why. Keep seeing this phrase but never really got a handle on what it was or how I could apply it. It all seems like psycho babble but now it makes some sense. It’s basically deciding what matters in the moment and what doesn’t so you can treat distractions as such. It’s getting very clear what is important and relevant and what isn’t. Very helpful explanation which will enable me to revisit several books and hopefully extract some value from them.
Begin with the end in mind. So that you'll be able to avoid distractions and focus more on the important things.
The more you try to envision what you should expect the things to be turned out, your subconscious mind will tell you what to focus on and what to ignore.
Mental Model - Imagining the expected end - Result: No distractions and more focus.
Isn’t that called the backwards law. It can work, but is there a final goal or certainty to life. It just keeps on changing, doesn’t it??
Envisioning what should happen and identifying anomalies is good for isolating problems, but it has no bearing on the resulting action. It will not necessarily lead to better outcomes because once the problem has been identified, the mind now has to respond, and the response will be regulated by the emotional system, which may or may not be functioning to one's benefit.
Well, wouldn't you handle emotions in the same way? Build a mental model of how anger looks to you. Then create a mental model of what triggers you. Then from practice, you will eventually realize when your model doesn't add up to the anger that you are feeling, and that should break the cognitive distance.
The mind is very complicated, and each person is different in the way they think.
The primary principal we can deduce from this video is learning the stop, think, then act rule.?
While I agree that effective action requires both the identification of a problem as well as proper execution of a solution, you are basically describing a two step process. Seems to me that doing step one correctly is quite a significant part of getting good outcomes.
I wouldn't say the video is about stopping and thinking, rather it's encouraging us to maintain a constant point of reference so we are immediately aware of anomalies. I imagine this is much harder to apply to our own emotions, since we would be working within the system.
But if your emotions are such that you are unable to take action even after identifying the problem, it would seem that you are either undertrained or unsuitable for the job.
The best way is to just DO IT.
me to i understand what he is saying, but i don't know how i can use this information. he isn't explaining it very well how or when to apply this stuff..
@@tyed94 this sounds similar to a concept in zen buddhism and the practice of mindfulness - when something unexpected pops up, maybe something you didn't plan for, or even a confrontation, instead of being reactionary and trying to immediately respond which can lead to an outcome less than desired, you stop and observe your thoughts and emotions, and instead of being reactionary and just going with whatever you feel at the moment, you can instead step back and choose a different more thought out response to that specific situation.
this is perfect for people like me who otherwise let unpredicted interruptions just RUIN their day. thank you :)
I'm absolutely going to use this for predicting reaction mechanisms in my Organic Chemistry test tomorrow and for the rest of life! ❤️ This is great!
The concept of building a perfect mental model and compare it with the actual reality goes hand in hand with the preoccupation with failure model. Thank you Charles for sharing.
I just wear headphones and it works great.
Love this. Fantastically simple and applicable presentation.
I think we should all try some of his tips in order to improve our productivity. I just listened to an AoC podcast with Charest Duhigg, they discuss the science behind what motivates us and how we can change the patterns that shape our behavior for the better.
I find that when I don't pander to the thoughts in my head and 'stop thinking'. I am more alert, sensitive, aware, patient. Apposed to a train of thoughts that can distract, annoy, and direct me in a type of routine.
Im not sure how this works for people with anxiety, ya know.
Viewing all of the possible bad things that could occur can actually be freezing
I thought about this too. I think we just need to try and discipline ourselves into appreciating the low probability of those thing happening. Then, as this guy said, we get a genuinely reasonable prediction of the day, and feel better about facing the day. (Idk though. D:)
Phil Stubbs sounds ideal! baby steps are needed tho, if i step right into it, ill probably will be stuck in catastrophic thinking for a long time xd
ill make it a goal then, to one day be away from anxiety in such measure that this kind of thought does not distress me :)
What worked for me was actually realizing that EVERYTHING has an element of risk and that probabilities are shit, I could be the 1/10000000000 to die of a spontaneous aneurysm what can I do about it ?. The only risks I need to take aciton to are ones that are actually there infront of me, other than that everything else is equal. I started imagining positive scenarios as well, if I'd think of some impossible fear (ex. falling off bridge a safe bridge) I'd imagine the opposite, that I can fly off and be safe. it's illogical but so are the fears
Keep tough amig@s
Ali Zawahry i am going to save your reply so i can remind myself of it everyday. as someone suffering from depression and anxiety, the ideas in this video are sort of impossible to try. as someone commented, i would scare myself to death in the 'envisioning' process! so your idea feels a lot more practical for someone in my condition. thanks.
There is a wonderful book The Art of Empathy: Life's Most Essential Skill and there is a section on Anxiety...and when people who experience intense anxiety asking the question What REALLY needs to happen? It can soften the focus and lead us in the right direction one small step at a time. Quite brilliant. Hyperarousal is tough. Sometimes keeping your eyes open and feeling your breath in your rib cage can help in critical moments.
Keep on keeping on man....I needed that
Oh my goodness I love Big Think. So helpful!
Wow! Your words are simply brilliant. So knowledgeable. Thank you!
couldnt see the video without distraction was busy reading the comments
could've just showed a clip from a sherlock holmes fight scene
Ch33no exactly what I thought
With RDJ’s narration... feels good
lmaoo
Wow this is great advice ... last few days I started guessing what is going on in his mind or predicting what would be his behavior after looking at his body language and mainly facial expression and then compare it with reality. Now I also try to use that trick, what that nurse Darlene used in hospital, in various situations.
Eh, I dunno'. I buy the nurse studies he mentions but this doesn't seem like it is a complete picture, that it takes into account all of the ramifications of using "mental models" this way. It seems like _exactly_ the type of mindset that causes group think, ideological stubbornness, people who seem to have *blinders* on, business types that only care about making more money than the other guy and have apparently zero regard for whatever problems they create, etc. It almost makes the pitch that closed-mindedness is a good thing. Yeah sure, you will be more efficient at your predetermined task if you close yourself off to anything and everything that is not part of said predetermined plan, but *you are closing yourself off to anything and everything that is not part of said plan*!
Also, I became better at focusing as my life experience accumulated. The more big ups and downs I experienced the more perspective I gained. That perspective neutered the worry I used to feel about certain things because I had been through those things already and they didn't ruin my life. As they say: "Don't sweat the small stuff." and "This too shall pass." It's how I define _poise_, and it didn't come from proactively making mental models. It just came from getting knocked, dusting myself off, and getting back in the saddle again.
On the contrary I would say, that it primes you for anything and everything that is not part of said plan.
You will go through your day and be prepared for whatever you expected - so that might be more or less robotic really - but when you suddenly stumble on to something that surprises you, you wake up and are determined to figure out why. At least that's how I understood his story with the nurse.
I have not tried his advice out yet, but could be fun I guess.
Agreed, looking for what's not there, comparing to mental models, thinking ahead, all good, FOR HIM OR THEM. Not necessarily for us. There's more than 2 or 3 ways to be better, or be excellent at what WE do. He could have come up with other ways to be better for those of us with less patience, poorer observational skills, fewer mental models. He's shooting at the target with arrows, say, but what about those of us more suited to walking up to the target, to get it within arms reach, before acting?
That's focus, m'right? You ignore anything else.
This happens when you mistake the map for the territory. When you take the model too seriously.
Well, psychopaths are known for their focus, and that makes them pretty much succesful sooo...
What works for me is being present with the moment and what i am feeling and then making a decision based on my priorities and consequences of the actions..the phone goes off and i sense the desire to pick it up and im mindful of that desire but i then focus on the task at hand bc its a greater priority and consequence of picking up the phone would be time spent not doing what I know what Id rather do...different strokes for different folks
Do it for focusake
Jack1138 lmao
lol
This is interesting. Thank you for sharing
Spend time thinking about how I'm gonna react to situations is a great way to build models. Initially, there might be more unexpected stuff, as we note them down and have an action plan we can handle things better
Nice. He's referencing premedidatio malorum (negative visualization). it's an ancient practice by the stoics. Basically you need to visualize all possible outcomes - sometimes including even your own death - so as to react well when they come calling. Good insight Mr. Duhigg
Envision the Upcoming Day ... helps keep Focus on What You've Decided Ahead of Time is Important -- so that you can Ignore Distractions ! Awesome, thanks Charles!
My own analogy would be like Choosing Ahead of Time to Eat Healthy -- find a place for lunch .... and when walking there make it much more easier to ignore the less-healthy places which you encounter first ... ensuring higher chance of eating healthy
Envisioning Ahead of Time ! .... What is Important !
Great. Absolutely great insight.
They are just mindful, they reflect on what's going on around and inside their head, and by that achieve a clear picture of reality. (Which helps you not only to focus, but to be, and become, the best version of yourself)
This technique is at least 2,000 yards alone. The very first page of ‘meditations’ by Marcus Aurelius summarizes this video perfectly.
Couldn't make half way through video before I got distracted by other videos.
I had to play it at 2x speed. It helps to full screen it.
Barnard Rabenold how can we play at 2* speed
Sai Krishna go to the settings (*) change from normal to 2X
@@Barnardrab Wonderful idea. Totally missed it. Guess he wasn't talking fast enough into the point.
I guess I'm inclined more to visual videos to keep my attention. lol.
Thanks.
Amazing insights!
My most significant takeaway is that I must build a mental model which is informed by the latest knowledge to spot inconsistencies and interpret them.
And, training the brain to envision an ideal day and working in the direction to maintain focus
this is big thinking, literally.
I heard my type of discussion to focus.This is really awesome technique
This is awesome. i have been working on the mental model for my perfect woman for ages, keeps me focused.
Hello , How is it going ? I am picturing it as well and it changes everyday 😅
I tried this method but simulating the outcome and receiving unexpected question/ problems not only make me more focus but also increase in anxiety.
This is nice thank you! The famous photographer Ansell Adams was known for ; Step #1 pre-visualization.
Life is Full of Uncertainty and uncountable scenarios (I believe most of the time), so i don't think you can expect every time but yes you can mentally prepare urself for upcoming similar situations, this will subdue the fear of Uncertainty and you will handle the current situations.
Like thinking about what your opponent is going to do and come up with counter measures
I needed to hear this
I struggle with attention and this is really helpful
Watching this instead of studying for a test.
I don't think it's working.
So the plan is to think ahead and investigate anything that doesn't meet your predictions.
Brilliant!!!!
Same idea is explained by one of the best mathematicians of our generation, named Terrance Tao. He explains the idea in terms of intuition rather than pictures. I think with learning and understanding anything, human brains are not able to remember every single detail. Hence, the information must be abstracted and a way to do that is build intuition models.
Thanks Charles
Well this was very interesting to me, I guess that (some) other people dont think ahead and plan in thier mind, dont create models, run through conversations that may happen etc.
My mind has always worked this way, I ususaly have dificulty getting to sleep because im planning ahead for the next day, I never realised that other people dont do this. What a fascinating look into other peoples minds.
I have to say though - im not particularly 'productive', atleast compared to my peers - but im comparing my self to other coders, and creating mental models is essential to coding.
This was hard to digest. Interesting, but feels incomplete. In a way it’s a recommendation to think to the future vs focus on the present. Be mindful. I think all of these mental mechanisms can work in tandem if people are aware of all. I think it’s not as simple as planning your day. Setting expectations. This is a deeper topic. If expectations don’t pan out and people don’t have the coping to recover, then it’s an issue. Having too many expectations on how things should go is setting up a frustrating life. I hope there’s a part 2 that expands on this!
Great 👌🏻
Useful video
I don't think it is such a well rounded approach to take for your main mode of being, but it's definitely a good mental tool to have in your kit
True, you may increasingly lose your spontaneity if using this tool too often.
Thank you sir. You just gave me a life hack. :)
Thank you
I think to focus we should exercise regularly and be in the moment by grounding our energy
It's perfect to use this to get ahead on the commute to work. Too bad it's not socially acceptable to earn credit time for it!
It sounds like Charles Duhigg has basically described a QA or 'reality' check in progress. What's really important to it's success is knowing what 'perfection' (or at least a high quality result) should include. If you don't know what a perfect scenario looks like, how can you recognize when the scenario, product, process, etc. has drifted from it?
Thus, the nurse who did best sounds like she had more experience in diagnosis, or at least the right framework to make her decisions from.
what a new way to build focus. It surely has a correlation with expectancy. That expectancy is the thing that made our focus build up even more. For me personally, if I expect something to happen, I would make an artificial analysis that includes the cooperation between my expectation with the reality. I would then evaluate my mistakes and build up an even greater framework on building an expectation. Because, in my opinion, a great prediction is based on many considerations. Thanks for making this video. I'm adding this one up to my mental model and hopefully I could implement it in my day-to-day life, especially my class!
Questions arise, how far could we implement this mental model? Could we implement it on things that we don't really know anything about?
For example, when you're learning physics and you don't even know what the current material are talking about. Is it better to create a technical mental model in your head (read : my teacher will explain complicated context and formula ; my teacher is going to use X) or to create a technical mental model (read: Force is equal to X, therefore it is used in Y). What's the best method to be used? Or is it best to use both model at the same time to produce greater outcome as you speak like a generalist?
Another Q's, how much could we implement this model? Because, I come to think of the energy that we need to spend in order to using this model an optimal sideview. If you don't even have the energy to pay attention to something because you're using the model for too long and too broad kind of things, what's the value of this model? That's actually a basic Qs that, "We" is the better approach to talking rather than "I". Also, could we implement this mental model for researching purpose? could we analyse a website using a mental model? I'm super interested in one since I'm demanding a research skills right now
Another one, could we avoid sleepiness with this kind of mental model? When I'm in a class, I don't really pay attention to the teacher. Instead, I opened multiple tabs in mine. I want to delete them, one by one, scanning for the one that actually has the worth-it trade-off right now. However, this mental model surely made me sleepy. I should develop another mental model to produce energy :)
HAHA I'm watching this whilst distracted from my job
Finally, an accurate title on a bigthink video.
Please do a video about dyslexic brains
sometimes (planning, considering) helps sometimes creates anxiety for me. When I feel healthy it all occurs automatically.
I don't build mental models and my focus is fairly well developed. I simply ignore things that are unrelated to those things I've prioritized. That's all one needs to do. Ignore both external things and internal things - even emotions. Focus is a simple behavior. Very simple. Focus is the absence of distraction, therefore ignore.
listened to the nurse story twice to fully comprehend concept
Good point. Probably should have said it in half of the time though.
They all have mental models, his argument that other nurses do not cross reference their mental models with current child behavior is unlikely. The difference is the accuracy of the models not the presence or not of models in the nurses brains.
Javier Wagner What research do you base you opinion on? Seems likely that he had studied the topic more than you.
We all use models, some fail to update their models with new information.
**** Great!! , Awesome ; Thanks!! ( and Thanks to for subtitles spanish !! ) -
“when you know who and what you are, you’ll know who you’re not” -Aziza al’Zaire
Discover this on Christmas 2022
So...what are the actionable steps?
The best way to focus is ignore every fucking one.
.
The best way to read a book in a day is to go somewhere - anywhere but where you usually stay. That's why people are able to read on holidays because there are no distractions and you are able to focus.
.
Best work in my life was done when I tuned out the extraneous world.
.
This makes an even stronger argument for meditation
This works so well since reality is so chaotic your ecpectations will ever miss the mark.
"... should actually b'go." Ha my brain says b'go too ! 😝
I wanna try out an OBE. :(
It's cool to see your face after listening to the audiobook "The Power of Habit" which I recommend.
What a clear-spoken person. I read his book "The Power of Habit" and some of its important points are still in my head. I read Napoleon Hill's The Law of Success and I still couldn't comprehend his idea of subconscious mind and imagining my "successful" image. Maybe this video is the key to it. I'll try it tomorrow the first time I open my eyes.
Was just gonna say "Hey, they mention that exact story in this book called "Smarter faster better"". Realized the author is the guy in the video :)
This was good.
This makes sense.
so i watched the video, like once and yanked out main points within the concepts Charles was explaining and created a conclusion with my own words.
Essentially
take your time, make every second count and envision a standard or a model till both the model and standard become an instinct of our nature.
this is just an interpretation after all and is probably far from right.
So basically… line your expectations up with reality. Thanks for the advice
Nice.
I am alil annoyed at this... I thought this was what daydreaming was and I struggled for years to regulate it... To the point it made me depressed! Now I'm a poorly socialised hippy that can't hold down a job😅
Really good to know this! Validating af!
Creating strong intentions when the day begins and then by ingoring the things that come up in your way unexpectedly, you try to maintain the course of the day you have envisioned in the morning. Sounds easy but it needs practice because unexpected causes may occur from the expectations everyone has from you. Also you you must be emotional disciplined ...
On a personal level this is an effective, easy to adopt technique. But broader society? Try imagining what a better world looks like and don’t become depressed!
Cal Newport is on this as well.
That's... wow
I'll do it rn
Meditate with storytelling!
This is something I can do.
Yap…I can’t focus on one thing even when I play video game…
Only in a movie theater I will focus on the movie if I don’t fall asleep.
if anyone out there cares for some fruit...the fruit we harvest from the tree of knowledge is only valuable if we practice and live it. We create how we perceive this reality. good, bad, freaking out or chill. The only way to quiet the mind is to sit with it. be the observer. follow the all mighty breath...and don't run when shit starts floating to the surface. be with it! season yourself in all of it with compassion and love for yourself. Be the timeless LOVING souls that we are. We all find ourselves in this wild ride, let's celebrate it! ))☆(( ))♡((
Anybody else notice the caption at 6:33 being the complete opposite of what he said?
Speaker: "...what you can safely ignore."
Caption: "...what you can safely dwell on."
Right on! The nurse example here is very useful, comes to show the importance of idealization and acting upon that model in order to improve things, which unfortunately most people usually don't care about or intentionally prefer to ignore.
Expectation breed unhappiness when you don’t get what you expect.
Round a round man, keep spittin'. Check out Monster Florence. Would love to hear a collab
What to do when I am asked by superior for something urgent? I can't put it off for 30 min....
Start early in your life and in your day to alter your distractive life altering patterns. Society can have you paying attention to useless things, such as, "do people like me" or "will I be successful" or "do I look good today." Live life, enjoy each new experience and don't do things you think you're supposed to do but instead, move into each new experience without expectations.
"Building a mental model" might be how the people describe how they stay focused, but the important action they are taking is really "Living in it" - they are focused on being in that state or in "the now". I prefer thinking about it as "living in the now" as has been widely popularized by a few different authors. The mental model side of things is a natural part of how we think.
visualize what you want to achieve or happen