Speaker 1: Hi, everyone, it's Eric from the One You Feed With
Speaker 1: this week's mini episode. I want to start this week's
Speaker 1: mini episode off with a quote in all affairs, it's
Speaker 1: a healthy thing now, and then to hang a question
Speaker 1: mark on the things you have long taken for granted
Speaker 1: Bertrand Russell. I've been thinking recently about our tendency to
Speaker 1: think we know the answers to things. There's a couple
Speaker 1: different Um We've talked about cognitive biases before. One of them,
Speaker 1: the confirmation bias, is the tendency to search for, an
Speaker 1: interpret or recall information in a way that confirms our
Speaker 1: belief or hypothesis. So basically, we notice what confirms what
Speaker 1: we think and we ignore what goes against it. It's
Speaker 1: a fairly natural bias and a lot of people, and
Speaker 1: like a lot of cognitive biases, it gets worse the
Speaker 1: more stressed we are, the more in a hurry we are. Um.
Speaker 1: I came across um something this week that I'm certain
Speaker 1: I'll pronounce wrong, but I think it's the Unstallung effect,
Speaker 1: which is the tendency of people to keep trying to
Speaker 1: solve problems the same way, even if they're better solutions.
Speaker 1: So they've done a bunch of experiments with chess players
Speaker 1: and normal people where they teach them to solve something
Speaker 1: a certain way. Then they change the problem, but they'll
Speaker 1: still try and solve the solution in the same way,
Speaker 1: even if there's an easier one available. This sort of
Speaker 1: sounds a little bit like if all you've got is
Speaker 1: a hammer, right, everything looks like a nail. But I
Speaker 1: think in general, both these things point to this idea
Speaker 1: that we don't change our minds a lot. In our
Speaker 1: interview with Maria Popova, she talked about the uncomfortable luxury
Speaker 1: of changing our minds, and this is one that I'm
Speaker 1: guilty of. I have a I have a relatively strong worldview.
Speaker 1: I suppose that I see things through and things that
Speaker 1: adhere to that makes sense, and things that don't I
Speaker 1: tend to ignore. And I've been working lately on being
Speaker 1: more open to things that I don't understand, or at
Speaker 1: least just being open in general to say, well, maybe
Speaker 1: that could be the case, or you know what, I
Speaker 1: just won't close the door on that completely. I'll leave
Speaker 1: some room for that to be possible. And I think
Speaker 1: that's really important in living a good life and in
Speaker 1: feeding our good wolf is two is to be open
Speaker 1: to new information. A story that I think illustrates this
Speaker 1: is a story from the Zen tradition. There is a
Speaker 1: scholar who comes to visit his zen master and says
Speaker 1: he wants to be taught by the zen master. But
Speaker 1: the scholar has learned all the sutras. He um has
Speaker 1: studied extensively, and so he asked the master to help
Speaker 1: him learn, and then he immediately starts talking about all
Speaker 1: of the things that he already knows. I've studied this,
Speaker 1: and I've studied that. The master listens patiently and then
Speaker 1: begins to make tea, and so when it's ready, he
Speaker 1: comes over the scholar and he starts to pour the
Speaker 1: tea into the scholar's cup until it begins to fill.
Speaker 1: It's mostly full. Now it's overflowing and all over the floor.
Speaker 1: The scholar sees what's happening and shout, stop, stop. The
Speaker 1: cup is full. You can't get any more in. The
Speaker 1: master stop pouring and said, you're like this cup. You
Speaker 1: are full of ideas about Buddha's way. You come and
Speaker 1: ask for teaching, but your cup is full. I can't
Speaker 1: put anything in Before I can teach you. You'll have
Speaker 1: to empty your cup. And I think a lot of
Speaker 1: us are like this. We don't want to be wrong,
Speaker 1: we don't want to not know. Not knowing is uncomfortable
Speaker 1: when we're talking to people, particularly people who might have
Speaker 1: a lot to teach us. There's a natural tendency to
Speaker 1: and I do this all the time to be like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I know, yeah, I know, um, because I want I
Speaker 1: don't want to look like I don't know. But that
Speaker 1: not knowing, that being open um. In the Zen tradition,
Speaker 1: it's called beginner's mind, just to be open to the
Speaker 1: idea that we don't know everything, we can learn more,
Speaker 1: and that things we may already believe we can change
Speaker 1: our mind about. Just having that openness as we go
Speaker 1: through the world and hear different things can be a
Speaker 1: real benefit. So that is what has been on my
Speaker 1: mind this week. I hope you have a great week.
Speaker 1: Another interview out on Tuesday. As always, Thanks for listening
Speaker 1: and we'll talk again soon. Bye.