Mindfulness (A Merloyd Lawrence Book)

Mindfulness by Ellen Langer illustrates how we often mindlessly go about our lives. Ellen Langer presents her case by using the research that has been done in psychology (many of which were partly conducted by her). There are many insights I could list, but here are a three of my favorite ones

We tend to categorize things. Ellen Langer proposes a situation in which somebody asks you for a three by seven feet piece of wood in exchange for a significant sum of money. You look around your house and find nothing resembling the specific item. Only later do you notice that your own door is about a three by seven feet piece of wood. Why didn’t you think of this? According to Langer, this is because we create categories to understand the world. For you, the door has been categorized as only a door, and not a piece of wood. Thus, we should be mindful in creating categories.

Premature Cognitive Commitments. Imagine spitting a little bit of your saliva into a clean cup. Now drink it. Your mind will probably tell you that drinking saliva is disgusting. But think again: wasn’t that saliva already in your mouth? Our reaction is due to something called the premature cognitive commitment. This is basically when we take a fact for granted without thinking carefully about it. It’s probably something we were told when we were younger and have never closely thought about.

Creativity and Mindfulness. Often, we are told that some things are just true. Period. Langer argues that this can actually hinder our creativity. According to experiments, when a subject is told that something could be something (this might be a book) opposed to being introduced to an object with certainty (this is a book), they could think of more creative ways to use that specific object.

Conclusion. Overall, this was a very short yet eye-opening read. To think that much of our days are gone about on “autopilot” is certainly intriguing. As a side note, the way Ellen Langer demostrated a few psychology tricks by sneaking them upon you in the book made it that much more delightful.