When I was studying for my undergraduate minor in psychology, I learned about cognitive biases. For those who are not familiar, humans are prone to a lot of specific biases that distort our perceptions and impact our judgment.
Just a few examples of these biases are as follows:
The Confirmation Bias causes us to focus on, and look for, evidence to confirm our pre-existing beliefs. Meanwhile, we pay very little attention, and give very little credence, to information that contradicts these pre-existing beliefs.
The Fundamental Attribution Error describes our tendency to see someone else’s behavior, or situation in life, as arising from their personal shortcomings, rather than from circumstances in their environment. When analyzing our own behavior however, the opposite is true. We are quick to see unfortunate circumstances as being the cause of our hardship, or our less-than-desirable behavior.
Perhaps you have heard of the Band-Wagon Effect, which persuades us to do something because everyone else is doing it.
And then there is the Halo Effect, whereby someone’s positive attribute makes us assume they have even more positive attributes than they perhaps do.
Unfortunately, from what I have read, these biases are not particularly fixable. But I find hope, and challenge, in the way Buddhist practitioners aim to approach any given situation using what they refer to as beginner’s mind.
Using a beginner’s mind, in the Buddhist wisdom tradition, refers to being mindful and present with our experience as it unfolds in our environment and interactions, and not becoming attached to any subjective notion that may arise and skew our judgement. When we look through the non-judgmental eyes of a beginner, there is more opportunity to learn and grow, and less likelihood of doing real harm. Using this framework, we can build our reality with more love and less risk.
Perhaps most importantly – practicing with a beginner’s mind can become the default mode when coupled with the non-judgmental awareness of mindfulness-meditation. I will leave you with this quote:
“For things to reveal themselves to us, we need to be ready to abandon our views about them.”
-Thich Nhat Hanh
