With Strategy In Mind: Part IV

Of enormous significance is the fact that people can actually learn to increase the level of activity in the optimistic part of the brain through training and focus. It is one thing to have scientific evidence to verify how our brains actually work. It is another altogether to observe it directly from the inside and find a way to use that knowledge to our benefit.

It might come as a surprise to learn that scientists of a very different sort observed the very same workings of attachment and aversion in the mind well over two centuries ago, long before cognitive psychology and scientific technologies like MRI. (In fact, they observed a third element as well, one they documented as a lack of feeling, a dullness, a perceptual “blind spot” if you will -- the delusion of not being aware of actual sensation (data) that was in fact present.) These three factors were observed to be core human “biases” rooted in the nature of the mind that interfered with our direct observation of the senses, fundamentally distorting our ability to process reality.

How did they discover this? Loosely speaking, we could say they developed the capacity to objectively use certain neurological functions of the brain to observe other functions and parts of the brain. The ancient path of Raja Yoga in Hinduism was designed for empirical, scientific discovery of the mind. It required that individuals set upon a course of psychological experiments that developed powers of concentration, the ability to quiet physical and mental distractions, and the ability to consciously focus attention or use different kinds of attention in the mind for long periods of time. Simply put, they used the tools they had: they used the mind to study the mind, from the inside out.

You may wonder what on earth could bring these seemingly separate if not opposing domains together. The answer, in part: the Dalai Lama. The Buddha himself practiced this inner scientific discipline for many years. The direct observation of the mental forces of Aversion, Attachment and Delusion are core to the practice of Buddhist meditation. The pursuit of spiritual enlightenment seems worlds apart from war and business strategy, but the underlying mental disciplines and capacities are not. Today, eagerly supported by the Dalai Lama, the efficacy of ancient methods that “use the mind to observe the mind” are being verified in laboratories of neuroscience. Unlike ordinary test subjects, MRIs show that Buddhist monks are able to move their attention to specific mental activities upon request and then hold focus there for extending periods of time. They also produce levels of brain waves rarely observed in other humans.

Some of these remarkable monks are nothing less than Olympic-caliber athletes of the mind. But like Olympians, they have simply focused on certain human competencies with an elevated commitment and discipline. If Buddhist monks can learn to observe and separate mental activity from the roots of human bias, so too can others. We have many business leaders who are trained athletes -- if some spent as many hours in mental awareness training as many did in athletic training, who knows what might be possible. It’s merely a matter of turning the focus to a different field of achievement. A good leadership strategy, we suggest, would be to look inside.