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If You Can Handle this One Uncomfortable Thing, Your Intelligence Will Skyrocket.
It goes against human nature, but if you can master it, it’s totally worth it.
Do you ever just get really, really annoyed with your monkey brain?
I know I do. It happens every time I’m stressed and I overeat, or when I’m in a anxiety-inducing situation (I’m late and I can’t find my PHONE!) and I have to actively work to tamp down my fight or flight reflex and tell that little under-evolved amygdala to just calm the heck down.
Thank goodness for that prefrontal cortex, amiright?
Well, unfortunately, I recently discovered that it’s time to add yet another task to the long list of things my amygdala-babysitting prefrontal cortex has to manage: getting comfortable with paradoxes.
If you’ve ever seen the movie “The Mitchells vs. the Machines,” you’ll know what I mean. (By the way, if you haven’t seen “The Mitchells vs. the Machines,” put it on your list. It’s a gem.)
In the movie, the Mitchells own a truly hideous dog, and it turns out to be one of their greatest weapons against the machines that are trying to take over the world, because the dog doesn’t fit the machines’ robotic programmed parameters. The machines scan the dog and say,
