external world to enhance our thinking. (View Highlight)
Paul asserts that by engaging in bodily motions while learning abstract concepts, you can recall those concepts more easily later, especially if you’re able to repeat the same learned movements (View Highlight)
learning through movement has been shown to improve comprehension and memory for all students—we’re all kinesthetic learners (View Highlight)
Linguists believe that communication through physical gestures developed before verbal language—consequently, the gestures we make are often just as information-rich as the words we say. By gesturing more in our conversations with others, we vastly increase the chance that they’ll understand what we’re saying (View Highlight)
If you’re trying to learn something, solve a problem, or generate new insights, Paul recommends giving your thoughts physical form—whether by writing them down, representing them in images, or modeling them in some other tactile way. Moving your thoughts from your head into the physical world means that you don’t have to actively remember as much, giving you more mental capacity to think effectively (View Highlight)
If you can give your thoughts a physical form that you’re able to physically manipulate, that’s even better, according to Paul. Biologically speaking, the brain is much better at making sense of physical objects than abstract ideas, so you’ll get better results working through your thoughts with your hands than in your mind. For example, if you’re trying to determine a seating arrangement for your wedding reception, you could write your guests’ names on slips of paper and physically move them around until you’ve found the ideal configuration (View Highlight)
externalizing your thoughts creates distance from them, allowing you to judge them more clearly and objectively (View Highlight)
multitasking in this way makes each task take 50% more time than if it was our sole focus (View Highlight)
In Hyperfocus, Chris Bailey claims that our hunter-gatherer neurobiology not only explains why we’re so easily distracted in the wrong workspace but also why we’re so drawn to multitasking. Constantly noticing new stimuli in our environments helped keep our ancestors alive, so the brain rewards us with dopamine every time we start a new task. Thus, many of us like to constantly switch between multiple tasks while working. However, multitasking in this way makes each task take 50% more time than if it was our sole focus (View Highlight)