How does our inner critic affect perception?

How does our inner critic affect perception? I love this TED talk by Amisha Jha, where she discusses the problem of information overload. Our brains have evolved to solve this problem using an attention system, which allows us to direct resources where they are needed.

Amisha is a neuroscientist who studies the human brain’s attention system. She wanted to know how attention controls perception, why it can leave us distracted, and whether we can train our brain to pay better attention.

She has shown that attention changes our perception, but if we are in a stressful situation this effect is diminished. In a similar way, our own mind wandering can also diminish attention’s power, and therefore our perception. Our minds wander up to 50% of the time, and it causes us to make errors.

Amisha offers mindfulness training to active duty military personnel, to try to protect against lapses of attention that may occur in stressful conditions. What she found was that the more that people practice mindfulness, the more they can improve their attention under stress. She believes it can help protect against post-traumatic stress disorder.

I firmly believe that mindfulness is helping me to gain control of my life, allowing me to make better decisions and to enjoy life more. Practicing mindfulness regularly has made me more aware of my inner critic, which means it has less power to affect my perception!

Project 365

I set up this website after deciding that I want to build a more creative life for myself, so I can give up my job and be in control of my own destiny.

I have set myself a goal of publishing an article on my website every day this year, to document my journey from employment to self-employment.

The name I chose was Project 365 because I see this as a year that I have dedicated to learning and self-development, as I countdown to freedom. It started on 1st January 2021, so I have 277 days to go!