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How To Train Your Brain To See What Others Don't--byCarolyn Gregoire, syndicated fromhuffingtonpost.com,Sep 08, 2013

The mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be kindled. --lutar!h

Charles Darwin had one of the greatest "aha!" moments in all of history when writing his magnum

opus n !he rigin of Species. After reading a book written 40 years earlier on population growth and

resource competition, Darwin immediately saw the connection to the ariation among species that he hadobsered in the alapagos and "oila, the theory of natural selection was born.

"Darwin reads this book and says, #$ow, that#s it!# %hat e&emplifies the #aha!# of getting the newpiece of information, and seeing the implication and seeing how it fits," cognitie psychologist ary 'lein,

author ofSeeing #hat thers $on%t& !he 'emar(able #ays #e Gain )nsights , tells %he (uffington )ost."%hat was an une&pected shift in his understanding."

%hese epiphanies and flashes of sudden clarity tend to come at the most une&pected moments. *o dowe hae any control oer these insights, and is there a way to train the brain to become more attuned to

them+ nsights may be une&pected, but we can actually teach ourseles to see connections that others mayneer notice.

"An insight is an une&pected shift in the way we understand things," says 'lein. "t comes withoutwarning. t#s not something that we think is going to happen and that#s why it#s une&pected. t feels like a gift

and in fact it is."

Here are five thin"s #ou should know about insi"ht -- and wa#s to brin" more $aha%$ moments into

#our life.

Be !urious.

-eing curious is the best way to become more insightful, says 'lein, and a lack of insight oftencomes from being in a passie and disinterested state of mind.

"Curiosity is another engine of insight," says 'lein. ")eople who get insights see something that#s alittle bit off, and instead of ignoring it, they#re curious about it. Curiosity keeps our mind engaged to work

out the implications."

http://www.dailygood.org/search.php?op=auth&name=Carolyn%20Gregoirehttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/25/insights-brain_n_3795229.html?ref=topbarhttp://www.amazon.com/Seeing-What-Others-Dont-Remarkable/dp/1610392515/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374435450&sr=1-1&keywords=seeing+what+others+donthttp://www.amazon.com/Seeing-What-Others-Dont-Remarkable/dp/1610392515/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374435450&sr=1-1&keywords=seeing+what+others+donthttp://www.dailygood.org/search.php?op=auth&name=Carolyn%20Gregoirehttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/25/insights-brain_n_3795229.html?ref=topbarhttp://www.amazon.com/Seeing-What-Others-Dont-Remarkable/dp/1610392515/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374435450&sr=1-1&keywords=seeing+what+others+dont

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&et #our mind wander.

A 0/ psychological studyfound that daydreaming passie though it may seem actually

inoles a ery actie brain state, which is why the wandering mind can sometimes stumble upon brilliantinsights and sudden connections. %he researchers credit this phenomenon to the fact that daydreaming

correlates with our ability to recall information in the face of distractions. ecent neuroscience researchhasalso found that daydreaming inoles the same brain processes inoled in imagination and creatiity.

" worry about people who spend all their empty time when they#re not in conersations listening to

music or podcasts or things like that, and not leaing any space to 1ust daydream," says 'lein.

a# attention to !oin!iden!es.

"-e more alert to anomalies," 'lein says, "rather than 2uickly e&plaining them away and staying in your

comfort 3one."

$e tend to ignore coincidences or not think much of them, because they#re often meaningless, says 'lein.

-ut looking for coincidences is a powerful way to make surprising connections.

"%here#s a belief that correlation doesn#t imply causality, which is true. )eople see all sorts of correlations in

coincides that turn out to be spurious, so they get a bad reputation," 'lein says. "-ut in my work find that alot of insights are fed by people spotting coincidences and making assumptions, and instead of 1ust saying #t

must be true,# doing to followup work to find out if it#s true."

&ook !losel# at !ontradi!tions.

nsights can occur when we encounter ideas that don#t make sense to us.

uestioning contradictions is another path to epiphanies. $hereas curiosity makes us wonder,

contradiction causes us to doubt and it can be another powerful way to gain insights.

"5ur tendency when we hit a contradiction that inoles things we beliee we understand well is to

say, #$ell, that must an anomaly.# $e hae a marelous set of techni2ues for e&plaining away inconenientfacts," says 'lein. "%he contradiction only leads to an insight when people take it seriously enough to

e&plore it a bit."

!t on #our insi"hts.

Daydreaming isn6t the only state of mind that can lead to insights.

"#e found a number of e&amples where people were under tremendous pressure and came up withmarelous insights," says 'lein. "$e should embrace urgency."

%his urgency forces people to look at things they#d otherwise ignore 7what 'lein refers to as "creatie

desperation"8, and when they gain an insight, encourages them to act on it right away. %his is fre2uently how

chess grand masters try an unusual moe that ends up being successful and winning the game for them.

"%he problem with too many organi3ations is that they don#t feel any pressure to act on the insights

they#e had," says 'lein. "%hey act like they hae all the time in the world and then they end up going out of

business."

http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/science/2012/04/the-benefits-of-daydreaming/http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/science/2012/04/the-benefits-of-daydreaming/http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/beautiful-minds/201102/why-daydreamers-are-more-creativehttp://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/science/2012/04/the-benefits-of-daydreaming/http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/beautiful-minds/201102/why-daydreamers-are-more-creative