Namaste, Welcome to SAM-VAD (Together In Conversation). Last week, I shared an excerpt titled – ‘Focus on the useful, the true and Connections’ from the book titled ‘Fluke’ – Chance, Chaos and Why Everything We Do Matters by Brian Klaas. In this episode we drew the attention to the fact that as modern humans though we have mastered a tiny slice of the world but by coordinating our efforts and putting those slices together, we’ve unlocked potential that was previously unimaginable. It has helped us forge breathtaking scientific progress. But we’ve focused so much on what is useful that we’ve forgotten what is true. Connections matter as much as, if not more than, components. The more modern science puts individualism under the microscope, the less it stands up to scrutiny.  Now, SAM-VAD (Together In Conversation) to the ones paying heed, is where we try to draw your attention to things that matter and the importance of your attention, because, ‘Our life’s experience would ultimately amount to whatever we had paid attention to’.

Attention: is as fundamental as food; and we go blundering about, seeking ways to assuage the craving, instead of learning how to provide ourselves with what we need, sensibly and calmly. Once our attention is drawn to the mechanism of why and what we give attention to, it is as if a veil has been stripped off and we become freer in our action and choices. And that is our endavour.

This week I bring to your attention an excerpt titled – ‘Creatures of Habit Resistant to Change’ from a book titled ‘Think Again – The Power of Knowing What you don’t know’ by Adam Grant, author and professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

This book looks at the areas in our lives where we routinely fail to reassess in light of changing conditions and feedback: from our beliefs, to our undertakings and pursuits, to our standard operating procedures, interpersonal relationships, and to the counsel we receive.

Creatures of Habit Resistant to Change

In this book the author reveals the many ways in which we all buck the necessity of changing our minds or otherwise unlearning what is no longer helpful.

He points out that we are afflicted with cognitive laziness, preferring the ease of hanging on to old views over the difficulty of grappling with new ones. Doubting ourselves can have the effect of making the world feel less predictable, thus undermining the brain’s schema of personal stability in which commitment and consistency of thought are cornerstone strategies.

All of us at one time or another have suffered from a cognitive bias (known as the so-called Dunning-Kruger Effect) in which some knowledge and experience in a specific area causes one to overestimate their competence in that area. In the age of social media, it’s what fuels so much contention and discord between people: because we all read about world events and take in certain points of view on our feeds, we become so certain in our knowledge that we stubbornly champion them, free of any doubt.

Excerpt from ‘Think Again – The Power of Knowing What you don’t know’ by Adam Grant.

I am sure that you will enjoy reading this book, to read book report you can click on the following link and subsequently buy your copy too:

https://humanjourney.us/mind/think-again-adam-grant-review

Enjoy reading it with your family, friends and near and dear one’s.

Namaste!