Consciousness is overrated

You should approach a big decision by gathering plenty of data, perhaps listing the pros and cons of each choice and then sleeping on it. That sleep period, or downtime, is the key, because it gives your unconscious mind a chance to process the data and produce the most rational choice.

Consciousness is overrated – I knew it all along

Mary Winter

We breathe, we blink, we move blood around our bodies without a conscious thought.

We run downstairs, and our feet automatically navigate the steps.

We fall head over heels in love. We feel anger and jealousy and hunger.

We dream. We suddenly remember.

Some believe the engine behind such involuntary actions may be the unconscious mind, a deep, dark vault in the brain (my description) that houses traumas, repressed urges and memories, along with an unimaginably complex control panel that dictates many of your actions.

Now a Dutch social scientist says the same unconscious mind can help us to make the best choices when we’re faced with difficult decisions.

For years, Ap Dijksterhuis, a professor of psychology at the University of Amsterdam, has been studying how people make decisions and who makes the best ones. What he’s concluded is that for simple decisions, it’s best to do a little research beforehand, but for big decisions, it’s actually counterproductive to overanalyze things with your conscious mind.

Here’s the example he gave National Public Radio: “You are more likely to choose the right shampoo if you engage in a little conscious deliberation, pay a little attention to what you’re doing and read a few labels and make a few comparisons. . . . But for complex decisions like cars, houses and computers, it’s exactly the other way around. It’s better to engage in a little unconscious thought.”

Specifically, he says, you should approach a big decision by gathering plenty of data, perhaps listing the pros and cons of each choice and then sleeping on it. That sleep period, or downtime, is the key, Dijksterhuis says, because it gives your unconscious mind a chance to process the data and produce the most rational choice.

“After you have all the data, your unconscious works on all that information and gives you some kind of summary judgment,” he told NPR.

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Full article at Rocky Mountain News