Mental Models: Change Your Mind Improving Decision Making Skills and Critical Thinking, Solve Problems Faster and Control Your Life with Powerful Strategies, Strategic Tools and Great Mental Models by Adam Feel

Author:Adam Feel [Feel, Adam]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Published: 2019-08-30T00:00:00+00:00

Applying Mental Models in Critical Thinking

After looking at a few mental models that you can use to improve your critical thinking skills, let’s consider how you can apply some of the mental models that had been previously discussed.

The Pareto Principle and Critical Thinking

Critical thinking can indeed change your life since you will be making systematic decisions more often. Of course, we can't deny the fact that our decisions affect our lives. When we make the right decisions, it influences the events that happen to us. For instance, deciding whether to marry can transform your life. Similarly, making the right move to start a business can also change your life completely.

Remarkably, our lives are defined by the activities that we engage in every day. If you choose to sleep every day instead of working, you can be sure that there are no goals that you will be expecting to accomplish. Nevertheless, working more hours in a day also doesn’t guarantee that you will be productive. Vilfredo Pareto in his Pareto Principle argued that you can do more with less.

So, how should you use this mental model to think critically about your daily activities? People are often faced with the challenge of shopping for only the things that they need. Have you ever been a victim of impulse buying? Well, we all have. You’re walking down the street, you notice something that captures your attention and you buy it without thinking twice. After a day or two, you realize that what you bought is not as important, so you ditch it.

Your wardrobe is true evidence that you have engaged in shopping habits that only take away space from you. According to the Pareto Principle, 20% of your wardrobe account for 80% of what you frequently wear. This means that most of the things that you have are there to occupy space.

The same principle can be applied to your relationships. Sometimes you will want to believe that you have many friends. However, the truth is that you only interact with a few of them. Your call log on your smartphone can show this. There are some people you rarely communicate with and yet you call them friends.

The notion behind the Pareto Principle is that it helps you to understand that you have limited resources to utilize. Therefore, you should learn to prioritize what is important. When thinking about doing certain activities, you should take a step back to consider whether they are important to you. You should dedicate more time to higher priority tasks. Adopting the 80/20 mindset will help you value your time and focus on the most important things first. Ultimately, you will waste little time chasing the wind.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and Critical Thinking

Your critical thinking skills can also be improved by using Maslow's hierarchy of needs. With the help of this model, you will understand how people are motivated with the needs that they ought to accomplish. People will always be driven to achieve their basic needs before anything else.

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