心灵驿站 | 如何打破思维定势？

when you want to enhance your final paper or class presentation, the only scheme that pops into your mind is the first draft; 

or when you try to plan a distinctive event for the upcoming festival, all you can come up with is exactly the same plan as last year...

This situation, where we can only think of one way to solve a problem and can't come up with other methods, prevents us from solving problems efficiently and innovatively, leading to deep contemplation, anxiety, and increased stress.

Don't worry, you've just encountered a phenomenon that most people will face: mental set.

Mental set refers to the tendency to be restricted by previously formed thinking patterns when solving problems, making it difficult to discover other solutions or generate creative ideas.

The results showed that the vast majority of participants adopted these two methods: either pinning the candle to the wall with thumbtacks or melting one side of the candle by lighting it and sticking it to the wall.

However, both approaches took a long time. The correct method was to use the thumbtack box as a candle holder by nailing it to the wall and then placing the candle on top of the thumbtack box.

This is mental set, also known as "inertia thinking" or "habitual thinking." This negative thinking pattern limits the novelty and efficiency of problem-solving. Due to previous experience or habits, we can only see one solution when facing a problem, making it difficult to step out of the traditional framework to find new methods or generate creative ideas. Meanwhile, when we fall into mental set, we may miss more effective problem-solving approaches, leading to reduced problem-solving efficiency.

如何打破思维定势？

How to think out of the box?

There are various ways to break free from mental set. Here are four methods to broaden your thinking and aid in problem-solving that you may find helpful.

We can set a clear issue or theme, and then randomly solicit opinions from those around, regardless of how untraditional or seemingly impractical these opinions may be. Alternatively, we can propose a specific solution as a starting point and invite those around to further enrich and refine their thoughts based on it.

You can try to think about the problem from someone else's perspective, such as your competitor, customer, expert, teacher, friend, or classmate. Imagine if they were to encounter this problem, how would they approach it?

Psychologist Silvia's experiments have shown that when solving a problem, if one temporarily sets the problem aside and does something else, such as reading a book, going shopping, or resting, after a period of time, one may suddenly have an inspiration or insight for solving the problem. This is because during the incubation stage, the brain engages in subconscious reasoning. And when sleeping, the brain reactivates and diffuses related memories, forms distant connections, and alters the representation of the problem.

So, the next time you're struggling to find a solution and can't think of anything, why not take a nap first!

This method starts from the result of the problem and works backwards step by step until the initial conditions or causes of the problem are found. First, clarify your goal, which is the final state, and then reverse-engineer the previous states until you reach the current state, which is the initial state.