I’m betting that pretty much everyone, including those of us who are growing older, may have some anxiety about our cognitive function.
The good news is that there are simple things you can do in our everyday life to improve the way your brain works—which means that you can become more productive and more visionary. “Surprisingly Simple Ways You Can Trick Your Brain Into Focusing,” a recent Fast Company article by Gwen Moran, presents a nice overview of the work done by Sandra Bond Chapman and her team at the Center for Brain Health at the University of Texas.
Ms. Chapman and her colleagues have developed a program called Strategic Memory Advanced Reasoning Training (SMART), which has been shown to improve focus, memory, and cognitive function in as few as nine hours. Research indicates that the training enhances the communication of information across the brain and increases blood flow. The good news for those over age 50 is that the work program participants do expands connections between key brain regions and that can lead to new learning.
The Basic Tenets
Essentially, SMART homes in on top-down processing, which makes it possible to quickly grasp main themes and the bottom line. This is the kind of thinking that creates vision, and that’s essential for effective leadership. Bottom-up process, on the other hand, allows you to glom onto details. While understanding the facts is important, visionaries typically don’t get stuck in the weeds.
I’ll leave you to check out the article—a fast five-minute read—for an explanation of the program’s three areas of focus: strategic attention, integration, and mental flexibility. Here, I take note of things we all need to do:
- Stop Multitasking. How often have we all heard this? And why? “When we’re constantly shifting our attention from one thing to another, we inhibit our ability to learn and get things done.” (Couldn’t have said this better myself.)
- Distill and summarize. Just as reporters do, look for the key theme and the overall storyline, then focus down. Ms. Chapman notes that shifting back and forth between the big picture and the nitty-gritty can help us learn faster and gain greater insights.
- Take Brain Breaks. A few five-minute breaks away from technology—and that includes your mobile phone—and work can give your brain a much-needed rest. Ms. Chapman notes that bathroom breaks can lead to breakthrough ideas. (I myself wash a few dishes in the sink or water and deadhead my geraniums.)
- Read Less. Go Deeper. The smartest leaders know that they can’t know everything about everything. So they focus. They’re selective about what they take in. Because no one can know it all. Interesting, eh? (This fact certainly speaks for building a team to which you can delegate comfortably.)
I loved this article. As a content creator who has trained herself to sit still for large chunks of time, I appreciate its emphasis on focus and selectivity. Each of us is surrounded by people who seem to multitask easily, and I’ve talked to colleagues who have expressed some anxiety about not being able to do several things simultaneously and do them well. The next time you’re on the road and the phone rings, you may want to ask yourself: “Can’t this wait? Will the world come to an end if I don’t get to this for 30 minutes? Maybe my caller will have figured out an answer. Or maybe I’ll be able to offer the benefit of better thinking if I’m not trying to watch out for the crazy guy in the blue Subaru.”
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