Blog on mind and brain research and advice

The Scientific Power of Thought

May 10, 2014 by Joycelyn Campbell 2 Comments

I can attest to the power of mental training on increasing physical strength. At the end of January, my personal trainer at the gym suggested I start doing a new exercise. When I went over to the equipment to give it a shot, I struggled to do ONE rep. So I decided to try mental training in addition to the physical training.

Every other day, I sat down in my office chair, closed my eyes, and imagined myself going to the gym and using the equipment. I mentally did three sets of 15 reps for each mental training session. The first time I tried this exercise again at the gym after beginning mental training, I was able to do three sets of five reps. By the fifth session after beginning mental training, I was able to do a full three sets of 15 reps.

The trick to the visualization part of this is that you can’t imagine watching yourself, as if you were looking into a mirror. You have to imagine yourself using the equipment and contracting your muscles just as you would if you were actually doing it.

The next time I start a new exercise, I’ll definitely augment the physical training with mental training.

Inside Week 1 of What Do You Want?

May 8, 2014 by Joycelyn Campbell 1 Comment

This is a guest post by Jean S., who is sharing her experience of participating the 6-week What Do You Want? course. More posts by Jean will follow, on consecutive Thursdays, as she gives us her perspective on the rest of the sessions.

Nila's Mama (Left) Preforms with a Barbershop ... — Barbershop Quartet (Photo credit: Lea LSF)

I used to think there was something wrong with me because there are things I really, truly want and need to do before I die, and yet I haven’t gone after them, or even half-satisfied the need. In the first meeting of the What Do You Want? course, I learned that it isn’t a flaw in me. It’s System 1, the unconscious, doing its job, what it knows how to do, which is maintaining the status quo. That’s a biggie. As Joycelyn said, “The unconscious keeps you alive, but isn’t interested in enlivening you.”

There are always worksheets which we complete in class, and if not done in class would be harder to do on my own at home. We learn and expand our own thinking as we take turns sharing our thoughts and writing, which we could not do at home, alone. By writing in class, we are sure to get it done, or at least get the process started.

We are never asked to share things that we are not ready to, although sort of by the nature of this work, we end up sharing a lot and finding we have a strong, mutually supportive group.

The main assignment for this week was to fill out one 5″ x 8″ card per day, dedicated to completing the sentence that starts: “What I really want is…” I have gotten past criticizing my every entry. I hear when it starts to sound like a “what I don’t want is…” list. My entries can range from little things that have been bugging me in my environment, such as “What I really want is a new, hand-held shower head,” to somewhat more elusive goals such as “to be clear as much as possible about how to behave so as to be my best self.”

I don’t pay attention to whether it makes sense to put something on this list. I just keep writing. Day after day, many of the same things come up and this tells me they must really be important enough to me to do something about.

Then there are little surprises, like “What I really want is to sing in a Barbershop Quartet.”

The class is provocative, as Joycelyn has many ways to shift our thinking and our understanding about the way we work. This is a great investigation, and I see how exposing it all to light will help us make a difference in our “status quo,” even if we sometimes drag our feet in the process.

Focus: Keep Your Eyes on the Prize

May 5, 2014 by Joycelyn Campbell Leave a Comment

A distraction is something that keeps us from giving 100% of our attention to what we’re doing or attempting to do right now. By diverting our attention, it dims our focus. Being distracted isn’t the same as choosing to take a break. Allowing ourselves to be distracted is rarely a conscious choice.

The path to anywhere is booby-trapped with an unrelenting blitzkrieg of tempting distractions so magnificent and horrible—and insistent—they may even invade our dreams.

These distractions tempt us because they include:

things we’re naturally interested in
things we’re convinced we need to know (every single thing there is to know) about
things we have to be on top of or take care of
things we suddenly remember we forgot to do
things that are simply so compelling we can’t not be distracted by them
things that take our minds off whatever we’re doing that we don’t want to be doing
things that seem better (more interesting, easier, or maybe just newer) than whatever we’re doing now

The internet is a major—and obvious—source of distraction, but it’s a piker compared to the source of distraction inside our own heads.

Attention is notoriously difficult to keep focused. One reason is that conscious attention requires, well, consciousness, and conscious (System 2) attention is a limited resource that can’t be easily or quickly renewed. It definitely can’t be renewed on command. If we squander it early in the day, we may not have enough left for another task that requires it later on. And squander it we do, on all kinds of things that are not worth actually thinking about.

When it comes to maintaining focus on a long-term goal—keeping our eyes on a distant prize—we often trip ourselves up at the outset by not accounting for the inevitable flagging of conscious attention. All evidence to the contrary, we’re convinced we will maintain the same level of enthusiasm and focus through the entire extent of a project that we had at the beginning of it. We count on our interest and enthusiasm to carry us through. It can’t and it won’t.

The sane thing to do, then, would be to assume that our interest, enthusiasm, and attention are going to flag and to create a plan that doesn’t rely solely on will power, self-discipline, enthusiasm, interest, or anything else that comes and goes.

If you want to use your brain to help maintain your focus, one thing you can do is set up checkpoints along the path to monitor your progress and to reward yourself for your achievements. The hits of dopamine your brain releases when you reward yourself will not only make you feel good, they will also activate emotional and learning circuits to increase the likelihood you will remember what you did and will want to do it again. As you get closer to reaching your goal, your brain will actually increase the amount of dopamine it releases each time you pass another checkpoint.

Achieving a distant goal—which could mean two months, two years, or two decades from now—requires detailed planning in order to get your brain to get with the program. Imagining the outcome—so you know what you’re aiming for—is important. But if you don’t identify all the steps it will take to get to the finish line and claim the prize, your brain will not be on board. Your brain, in fact, will be looking to board any passing train it catches sight of, and it will be taking you right along with it.

[NOTE: This post is the third in a series. See also When the Going Gets Grueling and Fortitude: Don’t Leave Home Without It.]

That’s What I Did: The “Done” List

May 1, 2014 by Joycelyn Campbell 2 Comments

When I came across an article by Janet Choi on the 99U website titled, “The Art of the Done List: Harnessing the Power of Progress,” I was intrigued enough to read the entire piece. And then I was intrigued enough to try it.

The Done List is a proactive response to the relentless, slave-driver aspect of the To Do List. You know how you rarely finish all the items on your To Do List? The same is true for the rest of us. Then at the end of the day we’re disappointed in how little we accomplished. That’s because we measure our accomplishments by how many things we crossed off the To Do List, not by how many things we actually got done.

The idea is extremely simple. Based on The Busy Person’s Guide to the Done List:

When you do anything you consider useful, however small a win it may be, write it down on your done list. (Or wait until the end of the day to write down your list.)
At the end of the day, look at your list. Reflect on and celebrate all the things you got done!
Review regularly—in the mornings to kickstart your day, every week, month, or year, or simply whenever you’d like a little boost or look back.

What worked for me was to write things down shortly after I finished them and to exclude—for the most part, anyway—non work-related items. After just a few days, I noticed two things. First, I was actually somewhat more motivated to get the minor and annoying things on my To Do List done and crossed off. I’m not sure why. Maybe it was just an effect of paying attention in a different way. Second, I was surprised at how many things—large, small, and in-between—I do each day that aren’t on my To Do List but that contribute to my goals.

The biggest surprise from this experiment was this: the written evidence suggests I don’t waste as much time as I thought I did. The Done List has already given me a clearer picture not only of what I do all day but of the kinds of things that need to be done. If I don’t take into consideration some of the necessary tasks or activities I have to complete or involve myself in, I won’t schedule time for them. Which I wasn’t.

You can find a download link to The Busy Person’s Guide to the Done List at the bottom of the 99U article. It’s very thorough at 40 pages long and the authors of the book cite a number of sources to back up their assertions, including research by Dan Ariely, Antonio Damasio, and Ray Baumeister.

But all you really need are the three steps listed above. If you decide to try this, I’d like to know how it works for you.

Fortitude: Don’t Leave Home Without It

April 28, 2014 by Joycelyn Campbell 4 Comments

Fortitude is the mental toughness that keeps you going when the going gets tough. Fortitude helps you deal with adversity, overcome obstacles, and keep on keeping on instead of giving up. If you’re going to take on any kind of a challenge, you’ll need a heavy dose of fortitude.

Fortitude is kind of an old-fashioned concept and isn’t too popular in a lot of circles. Acknowledging the need for it implies that you’re likely to face difficulties, that things won’t always—or ever—go smoothly or quickly or the way you want them to. Further, it implies there’s value in being able to overcome and learn from the problems that beset you rather than, say, caving in, blaming others (or bad luck), or throwing a temper tantrum.

There’s an interesting correlation between fortitude, expectations, and success. The people who have succeeded in accomplishing what they set out to do generally expected to succeed. But they also expected it wouldn’t be easy. People who expect success to come easily aren’t prepared for the difficulties and even setbacks they encounter. They tend to quit and to blame the circumstances instead of recognizing their own lack of fortitude. It just wasn’t in the cards.

Unpacking this single word exposes all kinds of great qualities, including:

Strength
Courage
Endurance
Determination
Resilience
Perseverance

Fortitude isn’t showy. It’s an inner strength that rests on a belief in yourself and in what you’re doing. It doesn’t mean you don’t have doubts; it just means you don’t give in to them. It doesn’t mean you don’t get tired or temporarily discouraged; it just means you take a break and then get back to work. It doesn’t mean you don’t feel like quitting; it just means you stay the course instead.

Whether or not System 1 (your unconscious) will help you or hinder you in situations requiring fortitude depends on whether it sees what you’re doing as a mater of survival or as a threat to your survival. But System 1 isn’t really the place to look for mental strength or toughness. You have to use System 2 (the conscious part of your brain) to override fatigue, fear, uncertainty, temporary defeat, setbacks, and obstacles. If you’re clear about what you want–and why you want it–you can use your brain to keep you on the path to achieving it.

I put fortitude at the top of my list because without it, you’re hamstrung before you even begin.

When you do anything you consider useful, however small a win it may be, write it down on your done list. (Or wait until the end of the day to write down your list.)

At the end of the day, look at your list. Reflect on and celebrate all the things you got done!

Review regularly—in the mornings to kickstart your day, every week, month, or year, or simply whenever you’d like a little boost or look back.

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