Understanding Critical Thinking

 

“ The essence of independent mind lies not in what it thinks but how it thinks “- Christopher Hitches
Critical thinking is an ally to each one of us in our everyday life. It helps us in every situation, be it a mathematical problem or real-life scenarios. We take divergent paths, unsure of the route to follow. Why are we lacking focus?

 

Where are our minds?

In this very competitive and challenging world, we are programmed to win. We all aspire to be champions and the best at what we do. The mind is capable of thinking forward and backward in time. Most of the thinking is not potential intellectual thinking. They are primarily ‘What if ?’ questions, which implies our minds are mostly full of doubts and apprehensions, as to why things might not work out the way we want them to.

Our minds are always playing all sorts of tricks and games, too hard to figure out. What if I am not good enough? Instead of focusing on the things we already know we ponder upon the obscure future. We are demoralised for not having enough time.

 

Understanding the workings of our mind

The reason behind our excuses lies within ourselves. Instead of focusing on that one thing we are good at, we try to expand horizontally. “I already know 3 languages, why not a fourth!? As citizens of a judgemental and performance-based world, we love the idea of multitasking. We never stop at one task at a time. In the course of doing what we desire, we lose time and forget our individual potentials. So rather than focus on new things, we should rather keep functioning just the way we are with an eye towards improvement. This ability to focus brings out the best in us, contributing immensely to our present life.

We live our lives with a short-term focus. We are losing the ability to build our self-esteem without getting feedback from others. There are so many things in the way which refrain us from performing our best.

Why are we lacking focus? Well, it is not always necessary that things will work out the way we plan it. So let us learn to embrace randomness. One does not fall from grace if he makes a mistake. Rather, he loses out on the joy of participating if he is afraid to fail. Let us simply give our best efforts mindfully and wait to see things fall into place

 

Handling distractions

There is a way in which we can free ourselves of all disturbing thoughts. How do we do this?
Once we recognize our thoughts, let us segregate them based on whether they are disturbing or not. Once done, we concentrate only on the non disturbing thoughts. Once the mind is thus free of distractions, it becomes empowered to focus better.

This was a short term focus. What do we do in the long run? We direct our attention towards our soul – our inner core. We focus on our inner voice and follow it for it will always direct us on the right path.

So let us destroy our nervousness by channelising our attention into neutral objects by withdrawing attention from negative things as it will make our restless mind turn calm and composed, thereby helping us concentrate better. .

 

About the authors

The article has been contributed by the following students from St Joseph’s High School Matigara: Agnimitra Biswas, Meghna Biswas, Ashwika Agarwal and Sreeparna Dutta Choudhury.