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Hello readers, Welcome to the space will remind you to strengthen the muscles you have…but these ones are inside your head. As always, the letter gives you a trio of thoughts: Aphorism: In just a few short words we have much to think about. This week’s lesson Critical Thinking Activities for this week
THOUGHT 1: AN APHORISM "The emotional brain responds to an event more quickly than the thinking brain." — Daniel Goleman, Book: Emotional Intelligence"
Goleman idea brings attention to the fact that logical thinking, or slower thinking, requires more time and effort. It means we need to think, whether it is the emotional mind or the logical mind that is needed. The better we get at choosing the right one at the right times, the more we improve our lives. This can be done by smart people. That’s you, you can be smart. THOUGHT 2 CONSTRUCT YOUR LIFE WITH LOGICAL AND EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE I am a social constructivist expert. I look at what elements are socially constructed in an individual’s life that either aid or hinder them. I am also an interdisciplinary practitioner. This means I am trained to look at a person’s life holistically which includes biological, psychological, and social factors. This means recognising what the social constructions are, but also recognising the importance of observing what are not social constructions. This is a fundamental approach to knowledge to best assist people. It is vital that we are accurate in assessing which elements are social and can be changed and attended to, and which elements are personality-based or biologically ingrained and might serve a different purpose and are more difficult to “automatically” change. We all have “automatic” thinking and second-order “thoughtful” thinking. How well we manage these automatic and non-automatic thoughts is how well we will attend to reality. The further we are from reality, the less likely we are to solve the problem. This is why biases are so problematic, because they help us lie to ourselves. Lying means we are not being truthful, and problems require a certain level of truth to be solved. The Elements We Construct in Our Lives There are elements in our lives that we set up and create, or "construct," which shape our social reality. These elements contribute to the choices we make, influenced by a mix of personality, biology, and other factors. Using an interdisciplinary approach, we know that both internal and external influences shape our decisions. Examples: These are all choices we can make to change or keep. Of course, people have various abilities and limitations, and some individuals face barriers that make it harder to make better choices. But overall, we need to use critical thinking to assess what we CAN change. Most people have plenty of opportunities to improve the social arrangements of their lives. Aligning Our External World with Our Psychological
Needs You can socially construct your external world to match your psychological needs. We become more mentally unwell the more misaligned our external world is with our internal world. Social Intelligence Social intelligence can be assessed based on how a person intelligently evaluates what is working, what is not, and how to arrange the social world to their benefit. Let’s take an example of the most unwell people. As a frontline social worker for years, I worked with people facing the most catastrophic cognitive times in their lives. You might think, "Why should I care about the most unwell?" Well, you should. Because it is a trajectory, and we are on it. We need to know what contributes to the worst social and psychological scenarios to be able to be at our best. This is how we use truth to guide us. We become mentally unwell not only because of the things that happen to us but also because of the unresolved issues and negative experiences we accumulate over time. It’s important to notice these things and address them. If you are unwell right now, make sure you work through these with a therapist or someone you trust. The more our unresolved issues accumulate without being dealt with, the more control we lose over our mental state. We can not hold so much without it spilling over, The clearest, healthiest minds are those that attend to issues as they arise, avoiding the buildup. For example, many of the people I worked with were often in organisational chaos. They struggle to organise their worlds, and suddenly everything is out of order, leaving them unsure of where to start. Their external world are often a mess. When things are out of control outwardly, we feel that way mentally. This goes for all of us. Think about it now, when do things spiral out of control for you in your inner world: When I work with people who are facing inner chaos, we do not say, "Use your intuition without restraint”. This is because, at this point, intuition has become skewed. When we are emotionally disoriented, our intuition is disoriented. Our intuition will not guide us the right way. This is where logical thinking and critical thinking matter. Intuition can only be trusted once it is oriented correctly, and you need slower, more thoughtful thinking—what we know as critical thinking—to determine if your intuition is oriented correctly. Balancing Logic and Emotion The critical thinking I teach combines both logical intelligence practice and emotional intelligence practice. I believe overall intelligence is about how well you can live a cognitively and socially successful life. Historically: Intelligence and Cognitive Abilities Historically, intelligence was often tied to cognitive abilities, especially problem-solving skills relevant to specific job functions. This view of intelligence emphasised practical, work-related skills and employability, often in areas like: Technical expertise Analytical thinking Logical problem-solving
A Modern Example: The Engineer Let’s take an example of someone like an engineer with excellent critical thinking skills in their work domain. This person is capable of solving complex problems due to a higher IQ and expertise. Despite these strengths, they may not possess the cognitive health required to navigate and solve problems at home or in life in the same way they can at work. Expanding the View of Intelligence The modern view of intelligence, especially as I teach it, has expanded to include emotional intelligence, adaptability, and the ability to navigate complex social and emotional settings. We all must learn to balance logic and emotion. Logic enhances your ability to think slowly and critically. Emotion strengthens your emotional intelligence, which in turn improves your critical thinking.
Both are interconnected and rely on each other—they cannot exist without the other. Well, they can, but the outcomes reflected in the quality of our lives are often less effective. You may have a natural inclination toward one or the other, but you have the capacity for both. Making the Right Decisions In order to make the right decisions, you need to understand social patterns and rhythms so you can make decisions that are as close to reality as possible. Emotions can distort reality, but logical and emotional intelligence work together to make it clearer. The Mindline We all sit on something called THE MINDLINE. This is the line that represents our psychological, emotional, and mental health. The Mindline is long. Let’s say one end represents serious mental illness, where social life and history have culminated and have just taken their toll, and the other end represents a person who has used the tools to find peak or at least consistent mental health. We move up and down, bouncing around on this line depending on the context, topic, and time. Throughout our days, weeks, months, and years, we’re constantly dancing along this thin line. You can fall off. You can get back on. You can be frozen, you can move forward, and you can go backward. What Contributes to Our Position on the Mindline All the elements in our lives contribute to where we fall on this line and how we navigate it: Our upbringing and environment Our personality traits Biological factors Context Physiological needs, such as hunger, physical health, sleep, and exercise Psychological health, including stress, mood, negative events, trauma, and coping mechanisms Social connections, such as relationships and support systems Cognitive load, including mental fatigue and the capacity to focus Cultural influences and societal norms Our critical thinking and problem-solving ability Our emotional intelligence
Developing Critical Thinking In social scientific training, we learn skills that enhance both our logical intelligence and emotional intelligence: We examine the quantity of things—such as how many people are saying the same thing, which authors are repeating certain ideas, whether there are too few authors, too many, and in which contexts, times, places these patterns emerge. Lesson for real life: What patterns are present in my life regarding recurring issues? What are the common threads that keep coming up, and how can I recognise them? We reflect on our own emotions and upbringing to ensure they are aiding our assessments rather than causing conflicts with our understanding. Lesson: To increase emotional intelligence, we must confront our thought processes—where we’ve been, how our past has shaped our current thinking. This self-awareness extends to understanding others' thinking as well, helping us build intellectual empathy and overall emotional intelligence. We analyse incompatibilities—identifying what doesn’t make sense and what conflicts arise. Lesson: We can apply this skill in real life by recognising when a pattern occurs in one group but diverges in another context. By critically analysing these breaks in patterns, we can draw conclusions and understand where logical inconsistencies exist
THOUGHT 3: ACTIVITY Learn about Swiss psychiatrist Luc Ciompi who studied the relationship between logic and emotion. He introduced the concept of affect-logics, which suggests that emotions and reasoning are not separate but interact continuously, influencing each other in shaping our thoughts and actions.
Ciompi’s work stated that emotional and cognitive processes are intertwined and that understanding one requires an understanding of the other. His research provides knowledge for us to think about how both emotion and logic play crucial roles in decision-making, mental health, and human behaviour. For practitioners and educators, have your students learn more about him and think critically about the pros and cons of his “affect-logics” in relation to context and time.
2. Under the heading ‘developing critical thinking’ above, you have been given some scientific practices that help increase logical and emotional intelligence. Choose a social issue that lots of people are concerned about and work through those three steps. Watch your biases. Reflect!
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