Listening Well

Unconscious bias influences our ability to hear others, their ideas and learn new concepts. We operate under these beliefs without being aware of them.

But being open to new ideas is a skill rather than a character trait, which is good news because this is a skill that we can develop.

Here’s a little tip on how to develop an open, youthful, learning mind.

An internal model of the world

Our brains create an internal model of the world. It uses that model to try and predict what's going to happen next.

The better you can predict what will happen, the higher your chances are of surviving.

For our caveman ancestors, an accurate prediction?could mean the difference between life and death.

Your internal model of the world has been created from everything you've learned from your own experience and been taught by people around you.

It is made up of conclusions you’ve made about how the world works. Some conclusions are conscious, and some are made unconsciously by your brain when it responds to stressful situations.

These conclusions are your beliefs, and they guide your every decision.

An efficient brain

Active thinking consumes a huge 20% of your calorie intake. It was an expensive evolutionary move in our ancient ancestors, which has luckily paid off. As we’re all here today.

In order to save energy, your brain attempts to reduce the need to think about everyday, repetitive and insignificant?things and keep that precious thinking energy for anything really important.

It is fundamental efficiency all focused on your survival.

To achieve this calorific efficiency, the brain automatically creates and then uses unconscious beliefs as much as possible.

Innate resistance to change

This means that your brain will tend to hold on to an existing internal model of the world - existing beliefs - rather than spend valuable calories in re-evaluating and updating them.

In practical terms, your brain will look for confirmation of an existing belief by default.

Which means that we have a natural tendency to look for what we agree with.

An in-built resistance to change our model of the world.

And the more confirmation a particular belief gets over time, the more fixed it becomes in our minds.

It explains why people get ‘set in their ways’ as they get older. Our brains do that by default, all from a drive to be more efficient.

Unfortunately, that?doesn’t leave much space for learning and growing, which is highly desirable especially in our rapidly changing society these days.

We need all the mental flexibility we can get!

Choosing a learning mind

Fortunately, we're not doomed to living with old and outdated internal worldviews.

Just becoming aware of how the brain acts by default can help in learning situations.

Knowing that your brain will automatically look for what matches and agrees with your internal model means that you can do something about it.

Even though looking for confirmation of existing beliefs is an unconscious tendency, you can still act in a different way if you choose to do so.

This is why having an open mind is a skill.

Here’s one way to develop that skill.

First, you decide that you’re going to be open to learning.

Now this is going to take a little extra brainpower, so you need to be willing to expend that effort and energy.

When listening to new ideas, don’t listen for whether you agree or disagree. That’s the default pattern of seeking confirmation for what you already believe.

Instead, listen out for new insights.

By paying attention to these insights and actively thinking about them, your brain becomes receptive to new information that may (or may not, as you choose) update its model of the world.

When you listen for insight instead of agreement, it will sometimes feel like hard work. Because it is, you’re actively spending precious brain energy.

This is the price you pay for a ‘beginner’s mind’.

However, with practice, you can develop the skill of listening for insight and make it a habit any time you want to learn, discuss or debate something.

This skill will allow you to continue to learn and update your worldview?even into very old age.

It is the key to a youthful mind.

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