Recently a friend reached out to say that she’d started reading The Extended Mind, and suggested I might enjoy it as well.
I found the audio book through my library – available immediately! – and even though I’m just 40 minutes in, I’m here to suggest the same to… basically everyone!
So much of what Annie Murphy Paul sets up in her introduction to her book already resonates with me. I’m so guilty of digging in when I’m feeling stuck mentally, certain the answer is to just keep sitting and focusing and forcing something that’s not coming. Similarly, I also know unequivocally that I retain information better when I write it down with a pen on paper rather than just with my laptop’s keyboard, and I genuinely understand a process best when I’m able to take the steps, click through, and complete the work myself rather than watching someone else do the same.
Paul also highlights the flaws inherent to the two major metaphors commonly used to explain the brain: brain as a computer, and brain as a muscle.
Regarding the faults with the computer analogy, she explains,
“When fed a chunk of information, a computer processes it in the same way on each occasion, whether it’s been at work for five minutes or five hours, whether it is located in a fluorescent lit office or positioned next to a sunny window, whether it’s near other computers or is the only computer in the room. This is how computers operate.”
“But the same doesn’t hold for human beings. The way we’re able to think about information is dramatically affected by the state we’re in when we encounter it.”
However, she acknowledges that while that may not be how brains work, individuals are now expected to do more and more with less. This is a familiar feeling for us all these days, I know. Paul says,
“… as to that growing need to think outside the brain: as many of us can readily recognize—in the accelerated pace of our days and the escalating complexity of our duties at school and work—the demands on our thinking are ratcheting up. There’s more information we must deal with. The information we have to process is coming at us faster. And the kind of information we must deal with is increasingly specialized and abstract. This difference in kind is especially significant. The knowledge and skills that we are biologically prepared to learn have been outstripped by the need to acquire a set of competencies that come far less naturally and are acquired with far more difficulty.”
With my few personal touchpoints to thinking outside of the brain, and Paul’s compelling introduction, I am so intrigued to learn more about what processing outside my brain might look like in practice, and to develop personal strategies for greater success.
If you’re also curious, the author offers two free chapters to explore. And if you do end up picking up the book and would be interested in joining a conversation about how new ways of thinking can improve our lives, please let me know! I’d be happy to coordinate a virtual book club in early November! I’d also love to know what other books you’ve enjoyed lately. Do you have any recommendations?
You can contact me via email: mylenek@idebamarketing.com, or LinkedIn. Hope to hear from you!
Mylène Kerschner – Senior Research and Consulting Manager
