Hello friends!

I will start today by stating: it is imperative you learn how to become a critical thinker.

Train the brain.

Why?  

Because the smarter you are at organising your thoughts, the better your life will be.

I have witnessed that critical thinkers who have learned to understand the emotional mind, are able to fix relationships by practicing these sophisticated thinking methods.

If you commit to your mind you will become smarter and transform into a better thinker, communicator and person.

That is a fact.

It is clear people are drawn to unpolluted thinkers and move away from polluted thinkers. This happens in homes, workplaces and with friends.

If you are in this community and read my content, you will become a better thinker. This is the commitment I can give to you.

WHAT IS CRITICAL THINKING?

Critical thinking is to think intelligently, that is, thinking creatively and curiously. It is intelligent thinking practices.

You learn to draw on the intellectual part of your brain. That is the logical, rational and reasonable mind and learn to understand and control your emotional mind.

We are in a constant battle with the emotional mind and awareness of this, moves you closer to critical thinking.

The volume of information you are dealing with means you need this skill now more than ever before.

It is a matter of mental survival. It is that serious. Do not let your mind down. Our life is a slow race towards losing cognitive capacity.

Do not let time take your superpower – the ability to think.

Critical thinking is for all people. For people in charge of, families, workplaces, communities and countries. It is for leaders and managers and CEO’s to learn in order to get the most out of workers because your leadership is intelligent and your minds are optimised.

The only thing you lack is that, so far, no one taught you.

PERCEPTION

Focusing on how perception impacts your decisions is central to critical thinking.

Your mind determines how you see the world and controls what you do next.

Of course biology (sex), personality (mind) and social (environment) facts contribute to why your perceptions are the way they are but that is a conversation for another day.

What matters now are the quality of your perceptions. 

Critical thinkers learn how to understand perception and therefore are able to make decisions which benefit themselves and others because they are in tune with how to perceive for benefit.

CRITICAL THINKING AND THE INTELLECTUAL MIND

I am a scientist but first I was taught how to think like a scientist. I have been teaching students how to think like scientists for many years.

And now, I will teach you–it is not that hard.

The best solutions to the world's questions have been provided by the scientific method. All that is the process of rational, logical, and reasonable assessment. When you apply these skills to real-world situations, you are able to work out the most accurate course of action.

HISTORY

Critical thinking has its roots in the science of mind—that is, psychology as well as philosophy, mainly, the philosophical school of Pragmatism.

The mind is constantly battling between the rational (reasoning, order) and the non-rational (emotional, chaos) mind.

Therefore, it's crucial to acquire a set of skills that guides your mind toward the path of rational and logical thinking. This entails not only becoming aware of your emotions but also mastering the ability to control their influence over important judgements.

EMOTIONS

Often, we react to stimuli emotionally, especially where we perceive it as negativity directed towards us. Critical thinking will help analyse phenomena intellectually and reduce emotional reactiveness.

Emotions, while omnipresent in our human experience, do not inherently help optimise the decision-making process or assist in establishing truth. Our emotions, the way they present, and impact us are also dependent on biological, personality and social factors.

The source of our emotions and their impact on our thinking needs to be understood to reduce their impact on our thinking.

This is why it is a useful endeavour to speak honestly and therapeutically about our experiences, upbringing, relationships, personality factors and gender, in order to understand the way we are. This information enables us to understand the lenses which inform our perceptions.

However as we do not use the emotional lens or singular subjective and personal lens to scrutinise scientific findings, it is therefore equally unwise to make decisions on real-life situations through an emotional or subjective lens. But this is what most of us do.

Objective awareness is best.

We look at issues, events and people through our own lenses. That involves all the emotions, biases and judgements we hold as people.

For example, making important decisions or drawing conclusions when we are tired, stressed, worried, annoyed, sad, healing from trauma, is not a good idea. It is the cause of most of our relationship and communication breakdowns.

So,

HOW?

STEP 1. Learn how to test for reasonableness.

STEP 2. Understand the influence of emotion.

STEP 3. Take the most pragmatic course of action.

The essence of being a critical thinker revolves around three key components:

1.    Knowledge:      

Possessing a logical set of facts or reasons

Ensuring validity and soundness of your position or judgments

Using persuasive language and effective communication

Express fair justification

Engaging others in a conversation to unearth accurate or beneficial information 

2.     Skills:

The ability to apply the knowledge of critical thinking to real-world scenarios including conversations or any interaction with others and decision making

Commitment to using critical thinking honestly and ethically

3.     Disposition:

Personal characteristics including open-mindedness, curiosity, empathy, fairness, integrity, and humility

The intellectual and emotional requirements can be cultivated through practice, shaping a disposition that prioritises reasoning over alternative modes of thinking and learning.

REFLECTION AND METACOGNITION

At the heart of critical and intelligent thinking is your ability to be aware and reflect on what is happening in your own head.

You must aim to use self-control not to allow rogue thoughts to cloud judgement. You aim to be able to structure your ideas, thoughts in your mind before you act upon them.

This is called metacognition and it is a skill.

You can achieve all this with practice!

Next week the Sunday Synapse will expand on reflection and metacognition.

Stay tuned for the Sunday Synapse, which will be delivered to your inbox every Sunday! Get ready to take on a new week better than you were last week!

If it does not bring value to you, just hit the unsubscribe button.

Until next Sunday, take care.

Dr. Esha.