Thought-provoking "elephant thinking"

In Thailand's elephant taming field, there is a strange phenomenon:

The elephant weighing thousands of pounds was tied up honestly by a thin iron chain.

Why didn't the elephant break free?

It turns out that when the elephant was young, the elephant tamer began to tie the baby elephant with an iron chain. At that time, the baby elephant struggled desperately and could not break free from the chain.

Over time, the elephant became accustomed to being tied by the chain, and even though its strength had already increased several times as it grew up, it no longer tried to break free, and was willing to be restricted by the chain.

This is the thought-provoking "elephant thinking".

Like elephants, so do people.

Many times, what limits a person is not the environment, not the effort, not the ability, but the fixed mode of thinking.

Only by breaking the fixed thinking and tearing down the wall of thinking can we gain a new life.

A photographer often takes pictures by the sea.

He found that a fisherman caught a net full of fish every day, but he always threw the big fish back into the sea and took away only a few small ones.

When asked why, the fisherman explained that his own pot was too small for the big fish to cook.

The photographer asked: "Why not change to a bigger pot?"

The fisherman said: "The pot and the stove at home are matched. The stove is only so big. If the pot is not suitable, it cannot be used."

The photographer suggested that the fisherman build a new stove, but the fisherman said:

"The stove was left by my grandfather. I don't know how to make a new one after I dismantled it. Even if someone helps me build a new one, I don't know how to use it."

The fisherman's words are stunned. Once a person's thinking is frozen, it can become so ignorant.

Schopenhauer said: "The biggest prison in the world is the human mind."

People are most afraid of framing themselves.

Sticking to the old way of thinking is making your life a prison.

Lao She's novel "Camel Xiangzi" exposed the life of a person with a fixed mindset.

Xiangzi, the protagonist of the novel, was diligent, simple, and kind at first, without the bad habits of other drivers.

It stands to reason that Xiangzi's life should have many possibilities, but he chose to buy a car and pull a car, ignoring the changes in the outside world.

He also ignored the advice of the people around him, narrow-minded and stubborn, blindly pulling a car, saving money, buying a new car, and then continuing to pull the car.

Throughout his life, he lived in the cognition that he had delineated, and he unknowingly encircled himself into a "cage".

After experiencing the blow of his new car being robbed and the passing away of Hu Niu and Xiao Fuzi, he still didn't think about how to change, but gave up on himself, and waited to die.

Emerson said, "Mediocre people are mediocre because they are too stubborn in their thinking."

Indeed, if people always cling to old ideas and traditions, they will inevitably lead to a dead end.

The times are changing, the environment is changing, and the form is also changing. Past experiences, inner concepts, and own habits must be reviewed and updated in time.

Break the mindset, think more, and take one more step to truly find the way to the future.

Some time ago, a friend shared a story that made me very emotional.

A friend said that the village of his hometown is rich in a variety of fruits, vegetables and other agricultural and sideline products.

However, due to inconvenient transportation and poor information, although the agricultural products are of high quality, they will often fall into unsalable sales.

And many agricultural products are seasonal, and once the season passes, it will be more difficult to sell.

Whenever the market is not good, in order to sell their own agricultural products in time, the villagers cut prices one by one.

The middlemen have taken the villagers' minds right, and often forcefully lower prices.

The villagers work hard all year round to make little money, but the middlemen make a lot of money.

This situation continued for several years, until the arrival of a college student village official.

How did the college student do it?

After learning about the situation, he established a professional cooperative of agricultural products, organized villagers to sell them uniformly, and prevented vicious price reduction.

Designed the village logo, registered the village logo as a trademark, unified the packaging design of agricultural products, and made a brand.

With the help of Internet live broadcast and other means to publicize, start the brand. Organize teams to go to big cities to promote, and establish direct supply with major supermarkets.

In this way, the sales volume is guaranteed, the brand value is also increasing day by day, and the income of the villagers relying on agricultural products has increased significantly.

This is the difference in thinking.

The villagers have a single mindset, thinking that if agricultural products cannot be sold, they can only sell them at low prices.

However, college students stood on a higher perspective, changed their thinking, and came up with a better solution to solve the problem that has plagued the villagers for many years.

Writer Liu Run said: "Mediocre people change the outcome, excellent people change the cause, and top-notch people change their thinking."

Thinking and cognition often determine what kind of life a person can live and what kind of life height they can achieve.

When doing things, if you always think with a fixed mindset, you will rest on your laurels, and you will be unable to move forward.

On the contrary, jumping out of the inertia of thinking and learning to think about problems from a different angle will usher in a new world.

Just like cutting carambola, cut it vertically, but cut it horizontally to get a five-pointed star.

Therefore, don't live your life with an unchangeable mindset, thinking what others have never thought, so that you can do what others can't do.

How far a person can go and how high he can climb depends on whether he can break the high wall of thinking.

There is a saying in "Black Swan": "The only one standing in front of you is yourself."

Life can be unstoppable only if there are no high walls in the heart.

The following 4 dimensions will help you break the fixed thinking and gain a new self.

1. Destroy Empiricism

"The Spring and Autumn Annals of the Lu Family" recorded a story.

The State of Chu wanted to attack the State of Song by surprise, and sent someone to measure the depth of the Mi River and make a mark for crossing the river. However, it rained heavily and the river swelled a lot, but the people of Chu still crossed the river according to the pre-set markers. As a result, more than 1,000 soldiers were drowned and the crossing failed.

Everything in the world is changing all the time, if we blindly stick to the barriers of empiricism, we will often get into trouble.

The famous "turkey law" says that our brains become dependent on past experience, and over time, they will form fixed thinking.

Only by breaking the empiricism can we break the shackles of thinking and jump out of the rut of intuition and experience.

2. Read more, think more

Lin Yutang said: "A person who has not developed the habit of reading is bound by the world in front of him in terms of time and space."

Reading is a key to understanding the vast world and opening the door to cognition.

Every book is a set of "modes of thinking".

The more you read, the more different modes of thinking you will see, which will help open up your thinking paths.

Accumulation can lead to thin hair. People must keep reading and thinking, and constantly absorb new knowledge, in order to prevent the solidification of thinking and constantly enrich themselves.

3. Communicate with people with high cognitive level

Business philosopher Jimmy Rohn said, "You are the average of the 5 people you interact with the most. Whoever you hang out with is who you become."

The higher the cognitive level of the people you come into contact with, the faster your thinking and cognitive abilities will improve.

The reason why many people grow rapidly is largely due to the high people they make friends with.

Therefore, if you communicate with experts more often, you will be immersed in your ears and eyes, and your thinking will be improved unconsciously.

Walking with excellent people is a magic weapon to break the fixed thinking, open up the pattern of vision, and avoid detours.

Ji Xianlin once said: "As people grow older, they are most afraid of rigid thinking."

People with rigid thinking are reluctant to accept new things, live in their own unchanging life, and eventually lose touch with the times.

Sometimes, because of our too regular life, after facing the same thing many times, it is inevitable to form thinking inertia.

It's like a person with a hammer in his hand, who sees everything as a nail.

Therefore, try to change and exercise your thinking in some small things on weekdays.

For example, go home in a different way, shop in a different way, look up information in a different way, change in a different way of dressing, and so on. These small changes can train the brain to jump out of the inherent framework, learn to solve the unforeseen, and keep the mind active.

There is a saying: "Education is bronze, ability is silver, connections are gold, and thinking is ace."

What kind of thinking a person has, what kind of life they have.

There is a dialogue in "Genius on the left, lunatic on the right":

"How big is the world?"

"If thinking is a wall, the world is on the other side of the wall."

For the rest of our lives, may we all continue to push the wall of thinking and make the road of life wider and wider.