Interesting the way military people think and talk about common problems: Here at Fort Riley, we continually strive to create a culture of performance excellence and enhanced resilience for all Soldiers, family members and Army civilians. Together we’re focusing on a skill or concept each month that contributes to our resilience. The resilience skill of this month is Avoiding Thinking Traps. We can enhance our resilience by identifying and correcting counterproductive patterns in thinking through the use of mental Cues and Critical Questions. It’s your spouse’s birthday. All they said was they wanted some “quality time” with you. Naturally, you listened, and bought them absolutely nothing. Their birthday arrived, and there was a huge blow up. Your spouse assumed you knew exactly what they really wanted. In the real world, we cannot read each other’s minds, and issues such as these can become larger than life and spiral out of control. Most people commonly run through life with blinders on. The ability to take a second and re-think situations more flexibly, accurately and thoroughly is a major asset of a resilient person. F.A.T. thinkers (flexible, accurate and thorough) avoid thinking traps. This is another Army-approved resilience training skill. Thinking traps are overly rigid patterns of thinking that can cause us to miss critical information about a situation or an individual. This skill allows an individual to gain more information about a person or situation before making judgments. If we have a hunch and look for further evidence to support or deny our initial thoughts, we have not succumbed to a thinking trap. If we search for evidence and refrain from making assumptions, we are exercising more flexible, accurate and thorough thoughts. Taking countermeasures to avoid thinking traps takes time and effort. The following are some common thinking traps: • Jumping to Conclusions • Mind Reading • Me, Me, Me • Them, Them, Them • Always, Always, Always • Everything, Everything, Everything These patterns of thinking traps undermine our resilience in a variety of ways. Have you ever had a moment where you wish you could have done something different after you gained just a little more information? Are there disputes at work or home that might have been handled differently if someone would have asked better questions and not jumped to conclusions with little evidence? If our perceptions are inaccurate, if we missed critical information or if our reactions are ineffective, we can use this skill to gain more information and think more flexibly. Avoiding thinking traps is our chance to take the time necessary to think more flexibly, accurately and thoroughly to respond to events in our lives in a productive manner. Building mental agility is a major asset for a ready and resilient force. If we find ourselves stuck in these thinking patterns, we have to find a way to “break out” of these styles and see the situation more clearly. Today’s Army is all about doing things right the first time, and if we jump to the same conclusions with little or no evidence for our beliefs, we routinely have to go back and cover our tracks. Asking and answering the critical questions of this skill, teaches us to trust our intuition or follow another route to find an optimal solution. For more information about building resilience and open training times, contact the CSF2 Training Center on Custer Hill at 239-8835.
Posted on: Tue, 21 Oct 2014 02:16:34 +0000
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