Expand Your Mind with These 12 Habits

Intelligence can be continuously improved. Everything a smart person knows, they learned from somewhere at one point or another.

Getting smarter doesn’t necessarily mean a huge commitment of time and energy every day. 

If you can consistently train your brain to adapt to new situations and information — you will get smarter with time.

The good news is, you don’t have to spend a lot of time every day to become wiser, intelligent or smarter than you were yesterday. You can invest just 5 or 10 minutes every day to do more of what helps you upgrade your mind, cognition, and knowledge model. 

1. Focus on Your Personal Priorities

In 10 minutes, you could decide what to do next week. You can also track what have you learnt so far to avoid getting complacent and help learn new things.

A good plan will make you look forward to it. Make a list and write down what you want to learn in the next few days.

Don’t over-plan, this may cause you to underact. A decision alone changes nothing. Action is the greatest gift that only you can give to yourself, so get started.

2. Read to Put Your Brain to Work

What is the best book to promote the brain? People have different opinions on this issue. Some people think that it is enough to develop a daily reading habit, but others think that one should choose from a variety of novels and non-fiction works.

Charlie Munger once said, “I constantly see people rise in life who are not the smartest, sometimes not even the most diligent, but they are learning machines. They go to bed every night a little wiser than they were when they got up. Books can really help a lot, particularly when you have a long way to go.”

3. Embrace Lifelong Learning

Smart people are passionate about new knowledge, and they never stop learning.

The learning effect is best when you connect it to things that you’ve already learned. The more you know the more you can connect.

Use the Feynman Technique to make sure you understand things better. This is perhaps the single most effective studying tool that you can use to focus.

Don’t stop looking for answers. If you still can’t understand something, find ways to expand your knowledge so that you can truly understand it.