Book 256 - A Year of Magical Learning

Reflection Title: Tell a Better Story!

Book – Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman (Part 5 of 5)

Book Description:

In his mega bestseller, Thinking, Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman, world-famous psychologist and winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, takes us on a groundbreaking tour of the mind and explains the two systems that drive the way we think.

System 1 is fast, intuitive, and emotional; System 2 is slower, more deliberative, and more logical. The impact of overconfidence on corporate strategies, the difficulties of predicting what will make us happy in the future, the profound effect of cognitive biases on everything from playing the stock market to planning our next vacation―each of these can be understood only by knowing how the two systems shape our judgments and decisions.

Engaging the reader in a lively conversation about how we think, Kahneman reveals where we can and cannot trust our intuitions and how we can tap into the benefits of slow thinking. He offers practical and enlightening insights into how choices are made in both our business and our personal lives―and how we can use different techniques to guard against the mental glitches that often get us into trouble.

Reflection:

There is truly nothing better than a good story.

Humans LOVE stories! Stories are how we think, and stories are how we remember. As we learned in Moonwalking with Einstein, the world’s best memory athletes don’t think in words, numbers, or rote memorization; they think in vivid, creative, and imaginative visuals to help them craft a narrative to help them remember. Why, because stories are what stick.

Daniel Kahneman talks about our 2 selves of how we view the world in Thinking, Fast and slow. Those 2 selves are our experiencing self and our remembering self. The experiencing self does all the living by going through a succession of moments while the remembering self is the one that gets to keep the memories. When people make decisions, the remembering self is in control, Kahneman explained.

I like to think of this concept as, the experiencing self is what is going on right in front of your eyes in this exact moment, the remembering self is the story we tell ourselves based on the totality of those experienced moments.

Here is an example from my life.

What my family experienced with my daughter on a day-by-day basis was brutal. We sat alone in a room in a hospital, isolated from the world due to COVID, and watched on the sidelines as our daughter endured tremendous difficulties for a chance at life in this world. We watched her struggle, fight, and ultimately endure excruciating pain and suffering during her short 39 days here in this world. Each day, each hour, each moment in the NICU with her were filled with thoughts of panic, bings and bongs from machines, fear, worrying, being bored, being terrified, filling time with reading, writing, or working, and asking a lot of questions to ourselves and the doctors/nurses. Occasionally each day we would make some special memories with Emilia by reading her some stories, holding her hand, kangarooing with her, talking to her, etc. Sadly, those moments were few and far between in comparison to everything else that was going on.

And then, she passed away.

This was the reality of what we experienced with our daughter in her short life with us.

That is not what I remember at all!

What I remember is the most precious being I’ve ever been around in my life. What I remember is watching someone with incredible strength and courage endure suffering that she didn’t ask for but embraced head on. What I remember was calm, safety, and comfort on the chair next to her isolate. What I remember is hearing her machines helping her breath. What I remember is unconditional love between a child and her parents. What I remember feeling surrounded by community with our doctors, nurses, and family / friends tuning in on the NICview camera to watch Emilia’s every move. What I remember was an incredible journey filled with highs and lows. What I remember was learning so many new things each day through the books I read next to her and the questions we asked of her doctors and nurses about what they were doing and what Emilia was experiencing. What I remember is seeing values and purpose in action right in front of my eyes.

Finally, what I remember is the most epic final 7 hours of Emilia’s life after we extubated her and she fought until her last breath comforted in her mother’s arms into the early hours of her last day on this Earth.

That story I told myself could have been something totally different. That story could have been filled with pain, sorrow, depression, anger, blame, etc. For some reason, that isn’t what my mind allowed me to remember and I’m so grateful. That bad story would have only taken me further away from Emilia, and I couldn’t let that happen. I made the decision to tell myself the positive story about Emilia’s life and journey and that is what I wrote and captured in my first book, I Can’t Imagine. Sharing the positive story and writing about it every day was how I was able to reunite with my daughter, to find purpose in this world, and imagine a new way in which we could still be together forever in all that we do even if we aren’t able to physically be together in this world.

Emilia and I decided that is going to be our shared story and we’ve never looked back. Living for 2 and imagining a life with my daughter next to me is my reality and a story I’m happy to tell myself and share with the world.

Question: What story are you telling yourself?

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Links:

What is The Year of Magical Learning? An Introduction

YOML Podcast Discussion - Coming Soon

YOML Bookstore - Thinking, Fast and Slow